Believe it or not, I never played MYST, one of the most
popular graphical adventure games of all time, when it was released
back in the mid-nineties. At the time, I was a diehard Amiga fan who
didn't want to make the transition into Windows. Looking back, I regret
not doing so. Undoubtedly many of the qualities that would have made
MYST so noteworthy in 1994 seem rather tame now (the graphics are
impressive, but the video segments seem a bit dated). Likewise, I've
been playing so many games that owe a great deal of their heritage to
this predecessor, and I'm not entirely clear on Cyan's specific
innovations. I'm doing my best.
I bought MYST as part of a package called the "10th Anniversary DVD
Edition" released by Ubisoft. The package includes Myst "Masterpiece
Edition," Riven, and a third-party game in the series called Exile. I
intend to play them all, though I've only managed to complete the first
one at this point. One really nice feature of this set is two
interviews with Rand Miller. The interviews shed a little light on the
creation of the series and the developers' goals and ideas about game
marketing. MYST did partially crash on me at least three times during
gameplay; by this I mean that I was dumped to my desktop, but managed
to click back and re-enter the game without data loss. Otherwise, the
game worked fine.
Apparently, MYST was designed to be a game for adults who weren't
already into games. It was an effort to create a more universally
accessible game with a much wider audience and very broad appeal. To
that end, the interface has been reduced to the bare essentials. At
times this can be annoying. I would have appreciated an inventory or at
least the ability to carry two pages at the same time. The player moves
around by simply clicking on a spot on the screen; the perspectives are
all pre-generated. This becomes a severe problem on at least one of the
worlds, where knowing which direction you are facing becomes critical.
Clicking where you want to go doesn't necessarily mean you will be
facing the direction you thought you would when you get there. Indeed,
I became so frustrated by this flaw that I almost resorted to cheating
to get past a level involving pipes and flow controls. A small compass
in the corner of the screen (or the like) would have helped immensely.
* spoilers ahead *
The strengths of MYST are its story and intriguing characters. It's
clear why so many new media scholars like Bolter have seized upon this
work and discussed it at length. The developers are having some fun
with writing, books, and story-telling. Ironies abound. The books you
find in MYST are portals into other worlds, and their "pages" amount to
short videos that provide a sort of fly-through of the destination
world. The creator of the these worlds, Atreus, seems to have the power
to alter them by either writing or visiting them directly. Meanwhile,
his sons have been overcome by greed and have begun destroying these
worlds and killing their inhabitants. Atreus reacts by imprisoning them
both in books, but they have managed to secret away a page from another
book and thus have trapped Atreus in yet another world. During the
game, the player finds pages of the brothers' books and has the option
of inserting them. With each page, the brothers' videos get a little
sharper and clearer. Both of them accuse the other of destroying the
worlds and warn the player not to release the villain. Of course, at
the end we discover both of them are corrupt (which is also obvious
when one explores the world), and it's Atreus who must be freed.
The player also discovers many books and papers on the journey.
While most of the books have been burnt beyond repair, others provide
tantalizing clues and stories that flesh out the game's rich story
arcs. The game sets up nicely for its sequel, Riven, though the ending
of MYST is quite anticlimactic.
* end spoilers *
Compared to earlier graphical adventure games like those of Sierra
On-Line or Lucas Arts, Cyan's MYST is a sharp departure. Gone is the
humor and "cartoon" quality so central to these other titles. MYST's
photorealistic graphics and ascetic feel lend themselves to a new type
of adventure gaming experience. It's more meditative; there is
something of a Zen-like quality to it all, really. The ambient sound
and music definitely add to this atmosphere.
MYST turned out to be a great deal shorter than I first imagined.
None of the puzzles I found were especially difficult and most were
quite intuitive. A few gave me trouble, but the Masterpiece edition has
an on-board hint system to provide just that little hint you need to
move forward without removing the challenge.
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