Myst

[silverflagon]

Has anyone here besides myself played the Myst, Riven and Uru games, or similar? I am feeling a bit left out with all this talk of Diablo etc..
Aquaria is the first fight game that I have ever been able to play because of it's beautiful controls, but I still love love those old puzzle games and it would be nice to hear of more such games and other members who play them.

[Alec]

I loved Myst back in the day.

I also bought Riven when it came out, and I really loved the atmosphere. I found that one to be way too hard for me, though. (had to use walkthroughs a lot)

After that I kind of stopped following the series, until Uru. But Uru seemed like a very strange idea, and I had trouble getting into it.

I also read the Myst books. (I think there were 3?) They are actually really, really good.

[Danger Mouse]

I actually liked Myst 1 a lot. It had it's own slow kick back pace and interesting story development. But for some reason or another I couldn't get myself to play 2 or 3. I later on played a Myst game that was fully 3D not just pictures and you could move around in the environment and it was quite stunning. The fact that the game play remained the same and yet the graphics were so amazingly good. Another bonus was that it was free. I wish I could find a link for it again as it would definitely be something that I would love to keep in my library of games. The unfortunate thing of hardware dying caused me to lose this game a ways back. Definitely was quite bummed at not being able to find a lot of the things to replace my losses. At least I got my Urquan Masters back. Man I love Star Control 2. I had never even known about the first one, but wasn't impressed when I did try it after playing 2, and was anticipating the release of #3 for a long time, and was severely let down when it had taken a new direction that just didn't make it the same style. They went from a massively interesting story with many witty elements and colorful vibrant colors, and easy controls and went with something with less plot driven, less witty humour and drab grey-out colors. Definitely lost my interest. But the coolest thing is that Star Control 2 has now been open source for a long time and there have been a lot of modding communities bringing back the game with some amazing new music, and some nice upgraded features. It even has some amazingly fun multiplayer stuff going on for it.

[silverflagon]

I must also admit to using a walkthrough at times Alex but only when I got severely stuck, was it Myst or Riven that used a music puzzle?, I really needed the walkthrough for that has I find it very hard to recall a series of notes, one reason why I am not very good with the Simon says boss

The version of Myst that I have is 3D but not as good as 3D gotten now, I love the little toys that you could interact with that were not a true part of the puzzle, that is one way Uru fails for me even though the graphics are stunning and stomach churning at times

DM I still have all the games on cd and dvd, and the expansion pack, the Path of the Shell, the later being really tough to solve with loads of jumping back and forth from the Cathedral and Realto  You guessed it, the walkthrough appears again because the jumps need to be done in a certain order and I always get caught out if I try to do them without it lol
Is Urquan Masters a similar type of game then, and what's it about DM?

[Danger Mouse]

Silverflagon:
     Star Control II is a game that I wouldn't want to give injustice by trying to describe. There's just so much talent put into it. As far as information on what type of game it is, I would say exploration, and action [even though with the new bot system you don't have to be good at the action, you can let the AI do it for you; even though I would prefer to do the fighting stuff on my own.]. But ultimately it comes down to a story of good versus evil, but it incorporates many other aspects including a love story. I would just point you to THIS WEBSITE so that you can get your own impression of it. There is a screenshot section if you want to get a view at what the game looks like. It can be downloaded there for free as well, under the downloads section. I would and have HIGHLY recommend the game to anyone, and those that have tried it love it.

[Quemaqua]

Myst was... revolutionary for the time, in certain ways, and pretty riveting, but the general way the games worked I find fairly unappealing now.  I could never go back and play one at this point, I don't think.  And I didn't play anything after the first game, though I believe my wife played through the second.

Also, Star Control II is one of the greatest games ever made.  To this day it has lost absolutely nothing in gameplay or general appeal.  I love that game so hard.

[inkblob]

I really enjoyed Myst, tried Riven but didn't get through the first couple of puzzles, it was soooo much walking around to get things lined up and felt myself getting dumber instead of smarter. I have it still and inherited a walkthrough book, so maybe one day will get to it. Return to Zork is very similar to the original Myst, and I havn't played any of the other graphical Zorks that came after that. Neverhood is right up the same tree as those games except all klay and beyond excellent.  I'm a stalwart advocate of Infocom text adventures and still play them to this day.

[silverflagon]

I must admit that there is a lot of walking around but I have always enjoyed the expoling part of these games and that is why I like Aquaria so much, and also the puzzles are way easier to solve lol
But if you like awesome scenery, exploring, scary jumps as well as solving tough puzzles then Uru is good but a walkthrough for the more average person like myself is a must 

This is my Avater waiting for the walkway to the revolving tower to come around, it doesn't stop so you have to time your jump to the second or you get transported back to your Realto  It looks a lot scarier when your playing it


I'll have a look for those other two games as this type of game is in very short suply now worse luck

[Danger Mouse]

That's URU? Looks cool. I've never played it, or even heard of it.

Exploration games with puzzled have always been a favorite, especially when action is also involved.
This is probably why I loved the Sierra Games, Kings Quest, Space Quest,Heroes Quest, and Police Quest series. Among others I enjoyed like Grim Fandango, and some other like Lucas Arts games. I actually stumbled across a Heroes Quest II remake that was actually a remake from scratch, not just a re-drawing over old pixel art to form vga backgrounds. This one looks beautiful. The artwork is so well planned together and looks like it really came together. I can't wait to test it out. It's available for free over at: http://www.agdinteractive.com/

Did you ever get a chance at looking at Star Control II SilverFlagon?

[silverflagon]

I looked at the link you gave me DM, and I have bookmarked this one also, but I daren't have any more games on my computer at present, the amount of stuff that I already have on it is getting scary I really must burn all my photos and other images onto a cd when I get the time, and fortunately it looks like I will just be waiting around on Friday.

Yes that is one part of URU, I finished that age and now I am redoing The Shell Path which is the follow on from this one, and then you can just take your time wandering around looking for secrets that you might of missed the first time around

http://uru.us.ubi.com/ http://uk.pc.ign.com/articles/490/490114p1.html

[RobertWalker]

I got Uru as part of the bundle with my graphics card. It was pretty enjoyable, but I did end up resorting to a walkthrough a couple of times. The most annoying part was being transported back to you Realto every time you missed a jump. Some of the jumps are tough, and it can sometimes take over a minute to get back to the point that you can try again. Long load times were also kind of a bummer. I liked how Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time seemed to be pretty smart about loading; on my machine, I never faced a loading screen for more than a couple of seconds. I imagine it did some preloading/postloading to make that wait as short as possible.

[silverflagon]

I got Uru as part of the bundle with my graphics card. It was pretty enjoyable, but I did end up resorting to a walkthrough a couple of times. The most annoying part was being transported back to you Realto every time you missed a jump. Some of the jumps are tough, and it can sometimes take over a minute to get back to the point that you can try again. Long load times were also kind of a bummer. I liked how Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time seemed to be pretty smart about loading; on my machine, I never faced a loading screen for more than a couple of seconds. I imagine it did some preloading/postloading to make that wait as short as possible.

It does take a while to reload but I have never timed it and I usually find something else to do while it reloads so it's just never bothered me. And yes I have also resorted to walkthroughs at times but never slavishly! I am using it at times now especially with the first part of The Path Of The Shell, that is almost mind numbingly complex with lots of jumping back and forth from Realto to different ages as a part of the puzzle.
I do have a pretty fast computer though since my recent update, the same update that lost me all my saves for Uru

[Danger Mouse]

Ouch, bummer. Losing save games is a real drag, but losing a whole hard drive is so much worse. I can't say how many times I've had a hard drive crash and had to replace it and try to find everything that I had previously lost.

What is the version of myst called that is TRUE REALTIME 3D and is a remake of the first game? I've been looking all over the place to be able to find it again. I thought it was awesome to be able to play the original in 3D when it actually looks the same and yet is real 3D. I know it was available for free download at the time that I had found it years back. Can't seem to find it anywhere for  the life of me. Remembering the name sure would help narrow down searches.

[Alec]

Its called "realMyst" I believe!

[Danger Mouse]

Alec, you rock! Thanks! Doing the google search now. If only you were as fast at responding to my modding section threads. :/ lol
ANYWAYS! THANX!