myst – Seg On Media

Myst is Now On the iPhone

Myst is now released by Cyan Worlds on the Apple iTunes App Store.

Official Website @ Cyan Worlds | This link opens iTunes right to the application.

Myst is one of the trifecta of games that got me into this art form of interactive storytelling. It’s a body of work that helped shape me as an artist in new media and made me what I am today. Which is why I’m buying the crap out of this title. I have the Myst board game for goodness sake!

I hope that Cyan Worlds does a postmortem on bringing the game to the iPhone. A few immediate questions I have are what kinds of decisions were made to update the port. Was there a point where they pulled punches to make the game have the spirit of the 1993 release? I also want to know what they did with the LAV scenes. Can’t wait to play to look how they turned out on the iPhone.

On a forward-thinking note, I hope this will help Cyan Worlds fund a new project from their studio. Honestly, I hope it’s something not Myst related. Heresy, I know. I love the Myst franchise. I love the work Cyan Worlds has done. But I think it’s time to move away from the past and start with something new.

Note: I did copy the above image from the Boing Boing Gadgets article. I can also screencap it myself, but I’m lazy.

Happy 15th Birthday, Myst!

Fifteen years ago today, Myst was released. It’s been a wild ride since!

While there are a small assortment of titles I can point to, the largest influence in my career as a game developer and artist is Myst. Now that I am employed as a developer at Telltale Games, I wish Cyan Worlds a happy 15th anniversary of their landmark title. Thank you for all of your quality work through the years and inspiring me as an artist.

Mini History Lesson

While 7th Guest was released prior to Myst, 7th Guest was highly restricted due to adult content. I remember purchasing a Packard Bell which included 7th Guest, but wrapped in paper marked “ADULTS ONLY” before revealing what was inside. Myst on the other hand was all ages in the sense that any age can enjoy the title, not dumbed down for children nor exclusive to adults.

Myst really was the killer app for optical disks for data. While there were certainly CD-ROMs prior, they were mostly storing large amounts of data and the occasional postage stamp of video and audio.¹ Or (as the case of 7th Guest) restrictive in target audience. Myst was the first widely distributed entertainment product that fully utilized the space to make an enriched experience not emulated on other media.

RIP: Uru: Myst Online

An end of an era:

Myst Online: Uru Live Season 2 Status
Hi Everybody,
I have some news that some of you have probably not been looking forward to. GameTap has decided to discontinue the operation of Myst Online: Uru Live.
< SNIP >
Ricardo Sanchez
VP of Content and Creative Director for GameTap

I’m upset that the eight year journey has come to a close, but I also think that it’s time for the experiment to come to a rest. Uru was a needed and welcomed experiment in a MMO based narrative, not on combat. The goal was not to level up or defeat the baddie with spells and swords, but to progress and the story line. From this, a very strong and tight-nit group believed intensely in the project and the community they built.