2885_Cheerio’s First Report_Version 2.0
**Posted by Anonymous at 9:39 PM
Myst—first 3D game in my life, original released in US on September 24th, 1993. It is an adventure puzzle game, which is released on a CD format. (http://www.giantbomb.com/myst/61-3970/). What’s more…? Myst is a “point- and click” game created by brothers Rand and Robyn Miller, it was developed by their company, Cyan (now Cyan World), and was originally published by Broderbund. (http://www.giantbomb.com/myst/61-3970/). “point and click”, which for my experience on playing this game, it means that you click on the image and it leads you to a new image, or for some part in the Myst, when you click on the book, you will be able to open the book and discover something in the book. Unlike some other games during that time period when people need to type in certain action to ask the computer to do it. Myst is first-person game, there’s no character for the player, when you go into the island, what’s shown on the screen is what you see through your eyes as a stranger in that island. The only way you interact with the world is by clicking on the objects.
The name “Myst” came from the book “Mysterious Island ” that Robyn had been reading at that time, which is written by Jules Verne. (Article: The Ages Of Myst--Love it or hate it, you cannot deny Myst’s place in gaming history http://play.tm/article/460/the-ages-of-myst/) I think that’s why when translated to Chinese, the name Myst becomes “Mysterious Island
So what makes Myst a good game? I think graphic plays a very important role here. The graphic has created a realistic and detailed world for the players to “get lost” in the island.
When I first open the “book”, my first impression was coming into one word—“wow”, can’t believe that’s the game back from 1993, I feel like wandering around the island, and looking around at the beautiful scenery, even non of the puzzle has been solved I feel like enjoy myself in that world. You will never know the glamour of the game if you don’t open the book, however, even if you open up the guide for the game you might not be able to solve the puzzle. Like what it said on the Mystjourney.com, “Few are chosen. Fewer succeed. Journey now to an island world surrealistically tinged with mystery where every vibrant rock, scrap of paper, and sound may hold vital clues to your unraveling a chilling tale of intrigue and injustice that defies all boundaries of time and space. ” (http://www.mystjourney.com/myst/)
Robyn Miller said “when we did Myst we wanted it to be a very rich environment and a very detailed environment.” They did it, and did it very successful! (Miller, Rand and Robyn; Cyan. (1993) The Making of Myst.) When I show the game to my friends, 90% of them when I asked how is the graphic, they said, not bad, yet when I tell them the game was from 1993, they all shocked, that must be a big project at that time as it is still hard nowadays to get that kind of graphic. The image has been compressed into a smaller size to make the game play smoother because of the limited RAM for computer at the time, but still it is great quality of images.
The sound also contributed a big part on the succeed of the game, the sound technician Chris Brandkamp said in The Making of Myst that he have to wait till they finished the concept and most of the thing then he can start to work on the sound, because the scene and the sound should match each other. And the funny part is, he said the biggest pain for him during the making of the sound is the sound of bubbles, because that’s the sound from the toilet. Personally I love the music in Myst, it’s not that fast speed but not slow, gives people relax mood while playing the game, there’s no combat part in the game, there’s no way to die in the game, so player don’t need to rush at any point of the game, it’s able to be saved and open it next time to continue to explore. However, the sound of Myst is sometimes scary when you find yourself in the unknown island by yourself, everything around you is strange to you, and you need to get clues to solve the puzzle by yourself.
Testing was also important which lead to a great outcome as it mentioned in The Making of Myst. It is said that the testing is an incredible good way to get some ideas because they want to make the game not too hard for people, but at the same time challenge people. With testing among some people will see how the game is like for different people.
The name “MYST” is definitely got the qualification to be put under list of canon game.
Firstly, it is the first game which has its own sound design, as the old games just imported some music or sound effect into the game, instead of design the sound originally by themselves. (Myles, AIT, oral description.).
“Playing all those arcade games, I never even paid attention to the music,” Wall tells host Andrea Seabrook. People don’t realize that the sound is actually affecting how they play the game at the beginning. It was 1993’s Myst that made Wall realize the power of music in a game. (http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=89565567, visited on 2010/9/16.)
The idea of making a game with its own sound design, which hugely influence the games nowadays, designers of game consider the music is one of the most important component for the game, indeed, dynamic sound effect is one of the most important aspect for the game design. People realized that the game will be more interesting with its own music which has its own style. – This is what we learn from MYST most importantly.
I haven’t solve any puzzle out in the game I guess….apart from putting two pages respectively into two books and seen one strange guy talking in the book, guess there’s far more to go, but I enjoyed wandering around in the island. And there’s no storyline about the game, which makes the game so different from other games at the time, also it will confuse so many people when they first play the game. All the clues you need to find by yourself, you are the only one who can help yourself.
All the images from game play screenshot and the video—THE MAKING OF MYST.
I fixed the part with orange color text~