Looking back on Myst (article)

[VVK]

Hello, all.

So, I haven't been contributing on these forums much, but I've read some really interesting discussions here occasionally, and some people here seem to really know about adventure games, which is, of course, unsurprising. Well, I read this and was intrigued, even though I never played Myst myself (maybe I should now) and wondered if it could spark some discussion here. Any thoughts on this? Are games like this coming back, or could they? How about among adventure games specifically? Have any of you done it in your games?

http://www.grantland.com/story/_/id/9713372/looking-back-game-myst-20th-anniversary

[maximusfink]

They did make 5 myst games. There were a few others that came out that were myst-likes, maybe anna or kairo would be recent ones though i never played them. These 1st person adventure games aren't that popular I guess. I loved myst when I was a youngster but I always found the puzzles to get in the way of exploring the world which was much more interesting to me. I personally got fed up a few times and just used a walkthrough.

[Stupot]

Myst was always one of those games I kept meaning to play and knew it would be up my street, but didn't actually get around to it until very recently (about 6 months ago).  I love it.  I love puzzles.  Mysts story is nice, but not really important. The puzzles relate to the story only very tenuously, but they are good puzzler's puzzles and I love them.

I own Riven, but still haven't got around to playing that (maybe in another 20 years).

I always found the puzzles to get in the way of exploring the world which was much more interesting to me.

To me, the world is the puzzles.  Without the puzzles you have nothing to explore but some random islands and book pages.

Jonathan Blow's The Witness reminds me a lot of Myst.  I don't know if Blow would like it to be labelled a 'Myst clone', but it certainly seems to be like a more up-to-date take on the format. I will certainly be interested to see how that game is received.

[VVK]

I always found the puzzles to get in the way of exploring the world which was much more interesting to me.

I got the impression it was about exploring. It's highlighted in this article, too. That's the side I was wondering whether it would come back about. The article compares it to the Internet, which was an interesting take.

[dactylopus]

Good article.  I find this quote interesting:

"It was kind of weird: We got accolades for increasing the exposure of what was called the 'adventure game,' and then we got blamed on the other hand for the death of the adventure game, because it was too big and too hard to top it." -- Rand Miller

It's true, the game did expand the possibilities for adventure games, but it also served to kill traditional adventures.  3d was becoming more popular, for one, and many of the leading adventure game studios were laying off their art teams in favor of 3d artists.  But Myst generally had a different perspective on adventure gaming.  There were no characters, there was no inventory.  The whole game was about interacting with the environment and exploring it.  As they put it, they were more akin to world-builders than storytellers or game makers.  Myst was so popular that many studios wanted to emulate it without any idea of how to go about doing so.

These Myst games, while being more built on the world than the narrative, are mostly puzzles.  The worlds are fantastic, but removing the puzzles would remove much of the mystery and intrigue from the games.  At times, the puzzles were frustrating (I got stuck on the final puzzle in Riven, and gave up on it for years until I was able to find the answer on the internet), but they were in depth and interesting.  I kind of miss the days of games like these that required pages of hand written notes and diagrams in order to solve everything.

I think the game's legacy is just coming into view now.  There are games like Dear Esther (that many will say aren't really games) that tap into the same ideas of world-building and exploration, while expanding on the narrative and storytelling elements.  There are also a lot of open-world, sandbox games that owe a lot to these games, even if the gameplay is largely achievement-based, or more closely compared to action-adventure games or shooters.  Myst was definitely far ahead of its time, and I think we'll be seeing more of these types of games in the coming years.

Stupot+, I'd give Riven a go.  I loved that game.  The world is so much bigger and more immersive than that of Myst.  I highly recommend it.