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Myst Creator Closes Doors
ComputerSherpa writes "Cyan Worlds closed its doors today. Cyan was the creator of Myst, the game that was partially responsible for popularizing the CD-ROM format. Until it was recently overtaken by The Sims, the Myst series was the most popular computer game series of all time. The last game in the Myst series, End of Ages, is scheduled to be released September 20th by UbiSoft."
It was the game that mostly women played and got addicted to, before it was replaced by the other most popular game ever made that mostly women play and get addicted to (The Sims).
I sure wish the game industry would stop being so sexist and start focusing on games that women would enjoy.
It's sad to see them shut doors, but... if their purpose was to tell the story of Myst, and End of Ages is the last chapter of the saga, they have accomplished their mission. Acta est fabula, plaudite!
Circumcision is child abuse.
It was popular because it was cerebral.
A refreshing change from the usual hack and slash, reflexes had nothing to do with it.
> Until it was recently overtaken by The Sims, the Myst series was the
> most popular computer game series of all time.
I'm really struggling with this one, in terms of definitions. I'm not sure exactly how the word "popular", for instance, could be defined to make this true. Popular in terms of how many people have played it? No, that would be Solitaire/Freecell, hands down. Popular in terms of how many hours people have wasted on it? The Mario series probably has that sewn up, if you count it as a "computer" game; if you restrict it to just the PC platform, then we're probably back at Solitaire/Freecell again, but Myst would be _way_ down the list, far below Doom. Popular in terms of what percentage of the people who played it rave about how great it was? I'm not sure what gets that honor, but I'm fairly certain Myst isn't it. The Enchanter series maybe. Popular in terms of money spent on it? That's gotta be one of those MMORPGs you pay a monthly subscription fee for, probably. I can't think of any way to measure popularity that could put Myst on top.
Cut that out, or I will ship you to Norilsk in a box.
But I have to say that I'm glad.
They pretty much killed the adventure game genre. Before Myst, we had great adventure games from Sierra, LucasArts and a few other companies. Granted, they escaped the notice of the general population, but when Myst came along and became super popular, it became fixed in the minds of the populace as the definition of what an adventure game is supposed to be, and REAL adventure games were automatically regarded as 'too complex', and now it is nearly impossible to get them published (Sam & Max 2 and Full Throttle 2, anyone?)
Technoli
Why is it that the sudden closing of one of gaming's most important, influential, and long-running game developers just before the release of the end of their long running saga not worthy for the front page?
ADVENTURERS! - ANTIHERO FOR HIRE - CARDMASTER CONFLICT
so sad to see them go. Played the games, enjoyed the book, became part of the community. It gave me a world to escape to.. They were really creating worlds. It's ashame that after the first it didn't really catch on as much anymore...
There exists some positive integer N that you are the Nth person to read this signature.
I am going to be honest -- and, not to be a troll -- but I never could figure out the excitement engendered by the Myst games. They seemed like a slide-show with puzzles, to me, and I hold them partly responsible for the deterioration of the genre.
I started out playing the Zork games, and later Dungeon Master (MUCH better than Eye of the Beholder), and finally Monkey Island and all of its successors/spin-offs. Myst, IMHO, didn't compare with the least of the games I've just mentioned. It was even sub-par when compared to the Sierra games, which we really adventure games for people who didn't like adventure games.
Once again, why the excitement?
Neopets - the best free game on the Int
Myst was bought by non-gamers, which is precisely why it was so popular.
> Every gamer and 5% of the rest of the PC-owning world has a copy of at least one of the Doom games.
Oh ? Really ? I have a copy of myst, (and riven), but no Doom. Q3A, yes, but no doom. I know other people that have Myst. You only know hard-core games. Myst was one of the very very few games (like the Sims) that were playable by non-hard core gamers. Unlike mario.
The myst demographic was older than the doom demographic, and mostly included non-gamers. I suspect that you are younger than I am (I am near 40), hence, the people you knew at that time were both young and gamers, and not interested in myst.
But, in late 90's, it was the highest selling game of all time. In number of units, beleive it or not.
The reason the Myst series (Riven in particular) are so incredible is that they aren't games. They're complete worlds ready for exploration and discovery, with a HUGE backstory and gigantic mental scope (much of this didn't arrive until after Myst, but the original game is still a classic). They're the kind of adventures where you can literally just stay in an area for 10 minutes "breathing in" the atmosphere. There are places I've visited in various Cyan-made worlds that feel more real to me than many real-life places.
The puzzles and "gameplay" are not the main emphasis -- they're simply a means to an end: story, environment, discovery, adventure. The sound and the music play as big a role as the graphics. There are sounds and musical motives in the Myst "games" that are now encoded in my DNA. I will never, ever, forget my experiences playing Myst, Riven, Uru, Myst IV, etc. They were events in my life not to be duplicated, even though I've played all the games dozens of times over. I've also read all of the Myst books and look forward to the Book of Marrim when it comes out. These books helped reinforce the history of the Myst and D'ni saga and give an added dimension to the worlds in the games.
The loss of Cyan to the game/computer industry is overwhelming. This art form, this incredible technological creative genre -- virtual worlds with beauty and mystery waiting to be explored -- was established by Cyan in a way no, I mean NO, other company has ever done. The future of the game industry is bleak indeed when a group of artists this influential are left begging for crumbs. For someone who has talked so much in this post, I am speechless.
Jared