Thread 11980621

>Myst, Riven, Myst 3: Exile, Uru, Myst 4: Revelation, Myst 5: End of Ages
>Shivers, Shivers 2
>Drowned God
>Lighthouse: The Dark Being
>Rama
>Obsidian
>Celtica
>Reah
>Chemicus, Bioscopia, Mathica
>Schizm: Mysterious Journey
>Rhem, Rhem 2: The Cave
Whatever happened to games like these? What killed off mystlikes?

Dunno, but Riven is probably in my top 10 favorite gaming experiences of all time. Shame the followups weren't quite so good.

>>11980621 (OP)
They were eaten the tidal wave of Hidden Object games that started coming out in the mid-to-late 2000s. Similar to how the RTS genre was subsumed by ASSFAGGOTS.

My favorite Myst ripoffs were the Dark Fall trilogy.
Special mentions also going to Barrow Hill 1 and 2.

>>11980621 (OP)
They were boring powerpoint presentation games. Glad they died.

I'm on the other end, I'm kind of amazed there were so many of these at a point. A couple mystlikes is understandable, but I don't know what made all these devs in the 90s think the key to a good video game is copying the barren uneventful environments Myst had. Does any of them even come close to Riven?

>>11980621 (OP)
Stopped making money. Myst was a big money maker, it was the cutting-edge tech demo of its time, that's why it got so many rip-offs. Most rip-offs just copied the trippy aesthetics while offering weaker puzzles and worse atmosphere, so the genre became associated with boring slideshow shovelware. The jump to 3D only made them more awkward. Once the novelty wore off, many players found it dull, got stuck on opaque puzzles, or tired of pushing random levers. When immersive 3D worlds with combat, platforming, and variety became the norm, Myst-likes games lost their broad appeal and survived mainly among hardcore puzzle fans. Or had to adopt different theming, like horror or detective games.

Point-and-clicks, puzzle adventures, and escape-room-style games still exist, especially on Steam and mobile (stuff like The Room), and all of them owe a big debt to Myst. Flash era was another turning point because of the low barrier to entry and free accessibility, it really popularized escape-rooms but made it a cheap genre.

Cyan is still around: they recently put out the Riven remake and added a new island to their Myst remake, though they are struggling financially and lost their spark a long time ago. Amerzone also just got a remake.

There are plenty of indies carrying the torch. Some are more direct Myst homages, like Quern or Neyyah. Or reinterpret the formula in more original ways: Outer Wilds, The Witness, Blue Prince, Platonic, La-Mulana. All of them excellent Riven spiritual successors.

Coming out in a few days https://store.steampowered.com/app/1289720/Neyyah/

>>11981327
I mean Myst sold like crazy, being the most bought PC game for few years. Honestly I still don't understand it. Even if screenshots looks impressive for the time, I just not see the appeal for an average person, not puzzle lover.

>>11983031
It dripped with atmosphere, and the story was compelling, if short and straightforward, and the world was fascinating and made people want to know more. What's hard to understand?

definitive version of myst? I tried the original but it felt like I was playing a budget visual novel with the daz3d tier still frame renders

>>11983041
Just play all the versions
Myst, RealMyst, Myst Masterpiece, RealMyst Masterpiece, Myst 2021 remake

>>11983063
Don't forget about Pyst!

>>11983041
>definitive version of myst?
Hard to say. here's a quick rundown.
>Mac original
The original version of the game. visuals are very compressed but the game is less buggy than the much more famous windows port
>Windows original
Missing a lot of subtle visual and audio effects of the original mac version. All OSTs cut in half to save space, the colour palette is ever so slightly brighter, moving forward is instant now as opposed to the originals slight fade transition, turning while standing in place is instant and no longer features a wipe-transition (I found that this makes navigating the Channelwood age a bit harder). Doors also open instantly instead of fading between states.
>Masterpiece Edition
Based on the windows original. visuals are less compressed and way less bugs. Visual and audio downgrades from the transition to windows are still present, this time on Mac too.
>RealMyst
My favourite.
A full real-time 3d remake with free movement. Some models are *slightly* lower-poly when compared to the originals prerendered models. A whole new age to explore in the postgame that ties it in better with the sequel.
Full music tracks are back for the first time since the Mac version. doesn't like modern windows but there are patches that will get it to cooperate.
>RealMyst: Masterpiece edition
An ugly unity engine port of RM. Still sold while the original RM is unlisted everywhere. unity-engine grass everywhere that clashes with the artstyle.
>Myst VR
The latest. Another full remake not based on any previous version. changes quite a few things visually but looks miles better than RM:ME. Can be played without a VR headset. My only real complaint is that a lot of puzzles were modified to accommodate standing due to VR. puzzles where the player had to sit in a chair now feature standing setups and puzzles where the player had to get down close to the ground have been raised up in various ways. features the bonus age from RealMyst. Probably the best looking version

>>11983031
Loads of people played this who otherwise had no interest in games. It is immersive and mysterious, and still quite compelling, it sucks you in slowly as you explore and have no clue what's going on. Dead-simple mechanics so there's no barrier for people in terms of reaction or coordination. You don't have to be a gaymer to enjoy this. World building is done great and reveals itself as you progress, you don't just get tons of lore dumped on you before you even do anything (lots of games made that mistake). Also, no crude or graphic violence, no sensory overload, so it was mature in the proper sense. So your answers are: Accessibility, intrigue, atmosphere, well-guided sense of progress.

>>11983143
What about the PS1 version

>>11983031
It's not like 100 million people bought it.
Once you spent some $3000-4000 on a multimedia PC with all the cool stuff like a CD-ROM, a new sound card and a 15-inch SVGA CRT, wasting another $70 on a game that promised you a peek through into virtual reality isn't much.
I really doubt that more than 20% of those who bought the game ever finished it.

>>11983162
>20%
anon, I would be absolutely flabbergasted if the number even reached 2%

>>11983159
No idea about any of the console versions, but they're probably based on the original windows port.

>>11983162
>It's not like 100 million people bought it.
Weird way to measure things, like the market wasn't smaller then.
It was the apparently the best seller for all computer platforms for 52 months straight, and was the best selling PC game of all time until The Sims finally surpassed it in 2002

Also, Myst is neither very difficult nor very long, if you bought it, you could beat it inside of a week even with a regular job and stuff. Most people I talked to beat it.

>>11983159
https://youtu.be/wm9mUxxy_Go
>15 second load times from disc every time you transition a frame

I don't understand why this game was so popular. The gameplay looks outright primitive by 1993 standards. The SNES was released in 1990 for Christ's sake. Is it just because boomers could play it on their work computers when their bosses weren't looking?

>>11983235
>console peasant doesn't understand the appeal of adventure games
Shocking

>>11983270
I grew up on the C64 and DOS.

>>11983372
Okay, then I'm confused, you were there, yet you don't see the appeal of a game that rewrote the rules for graphical adventure games?

>>11983427
I never played it in era. Maybe I would've been impressed by the prerendered backgrounds. Probably not. I was never impressed by any prerendered games. But looking at it now the gameplay was way worse than other games I was playing around that time and even way earlier. Even for graphical adventure games, the King's Quest stuff was way more interesting.

>>11981537
>Coming out in a few days https://store.steampowered.com/app/1289720/Neyyah/
kek the most shameless riven ripoff i've seen

>>11983235
>Is it just because boomers could play it on their work computers when their bosses weren't looking?
Unironicaly a big part of it's success was older people playing it because it looked more adult than the rest of videogames

>>11983216
My point about numbers is I bet most of those who bought Myst weren't into games. Thus those 2-3 million aren't really much, in my opinion.

>>11983159
I've been playing it, and it's frustratingly slow even on an emulator.

>>11980621 (OP)
After the 'Adventure Games are Dead' period between about 1999-2010, they were replaced by walking simulators, but most of those aren't retro.

I would also say Myst sold massive amounts for what was generally a PC/Mac game, Myst-likes not so much; Sierra and Lucasarts adventure games did better than Myst-likes, so companies pivoted to copying that style instead.

>>11983235
>I don't understand why this game was so popular.
questions like this are so baffling to me. Its like you and I are completely different species. Human children normally start learning empathy when theyre like 5 years old, probably younger.

>I dont understand why billy is so mad I punched him in the face, I had a lot of fun doing it?

>>11983121
>The Best Selliong CD-ROM Game of All Time...
>... is not in this box.

kek

>>11983538
An even weirder post. Like you think "people who aren't into games" are some weird little Amish minority hiding out somewhere who don't count, instead of "most of people on the planet."

Face it, the game had massive appeal and was loved, and still is; it just doesn't appeal to you specifically.

>>11983270
>powerpoint game
>adventure
Nice bait.

>>11983121
>Not the real game!
>It's a parody!
>Not the real publisher!

>>11983143
>>RealMyst
>My favourite.
100% agree on this one. The original RealMyst to me looked the closest to the original's graphics but in 3D. The other RealMyst remakes change way too much. And I really fucking love the way the linking book room in Stoneship looks in RealMyst. The other remakes fog or distort the windows so you can't watch the fish as well.

>>11983143
>>11984298
you arent meant to walk around freely in the world. The game is deliberately designed to show you what you should see and because of this every screen is a work of art. I can think of 20+ frames off the top of my head that could hang in a surrealist museum. Playing some 3d remake deprives you of the experience.