> south
As you approach the metal door, it slides open, revealing the dock where you began.
> south
There’s no sense in getting wet.
> east
You stand on the east end of the dock, which extends west. To the north is a small stone staircase leading to ground above the shallow wall. To the south is a chest-high podium, atop which is a switch.
>
> look around
You stand at the south side of the hexagonal chamber. To the south a staircase ascends. On the south wall, a control panel is beeping.
In the center of the room lies a circular basin. The basin appears empty except for a strange latticework at its bottom.
The repeating chirps stop and a high, long beep sounds; after a moment, the panel slides quickly up of its own accord, and all is silent.
> south
>
> open panel
Grabbing its handle, you slide the panel down into the wall.
> enter 75
You spin the the counter discs until they read “75”.
> press bronze button
A repeating high-pitched chirp, sounding about once per second, emanates from the control panel.
>
> press bronze button
As soon as you press the button, a repeating high-pitched chirp, sounding about once per second, emanates from the control panel.
> examine wires
Several wires protrude from each of the control panel’s four sides. Each wire is of a different color, the meaning of which colors is impossible to guess. The wires exit the panel from all along its sides, but each side’s wires are bunched together as they enter small holes in the stone.
The repeating chirps stop and a high, long beep sounds; after a moment, the panel slides quickly up of its own accord, and all is silent.
>
> examine panel
The square plywood panel is set a finger’s breadth into the stone wall. It is illuminated by blue lights shining through slots cut into each of the inset’s four sides. A small brass handle is attached to the upper side of the panel.
> open panel
Gripping the handle, you slide the panel down into the wall.
Revealed underneath is a dingy metal box. Several wires of various colors exit the sides of the box and disappear into the stone wall. The side of the box facing you bears a rectangular opening and a square bronze button. Two greenish-gray discs visible through the box’s opening read “00”.
> enter 43 into panel
Spinning the two discs, you set the first digit to 4 and the second to 3.
>
> touch water
Your fingers pass right through the water’s surface. You feel nothing, and the water’s apparent flow is not disturbed, but the whole surface of the water distorts and flickers, allowing the briefest glimpse of machinery at the basin’s bottom.
> remove paper
Taken.
> read paper
Set beneath a heading that reads “Imager Settings” are three columns of lines, numbered from 00 to 99. Most lines are blank, but several have short notes; you can read some of the notes, while a few are in the strange script you saw in the Myst book.
Amongst the notes you can read are “Pool” on line 00; “Extrusion Test” on line 40; “Natives” on line 43; and “Marker Switch” on line 47.
Foreign notes are on lines 05, 18, 25, 75, and 76.
>
> head north
You stand at the south side of a dim hexagonal chamber. Behind you, its south side opens up onto an ascending staircase; shallow semicircular alcoves are cut into the other five sides.
In the center of the room lies a circular basin. You can see water in the basin, silently flowing to the basin’s edge from an unseen source at its center. An illuminated yellow button is set into a circular brass fixture on the front of the basin.
Near you, a piece of paper is attached to a panel in the south wall.
> hit something
What do you want to hit?
>
> Bound down the corridor
After ducking through the cramped doorway and climbing down a small ladder, the sliding door closes with a ffffoomp behind you.
You stand in a dark, underground, descending stone hallway running south-to-north. A dim deep-blue light emanates from the downstairs room to the north, barely illuminating the corridor.
>
Wow, this showed up on Myst Blogs sooner than I expected (Thanks, Denis!).
For those of you just joining us, this is a live attempt to turn Myst into a piece of interactive fiction — that is, a text adventure. You type commands, I type responses. The goal is to someday turn all our results into an actual downloadable, playable text adventure.
I’ll be following the real game closely most of the time, but I have some planned diversions and retcons in the works.
I started this a few months ago, but I quickly shamefully abandoned it after some hard-to-diagnose technical problems. This time we’re on Tumblr so I can focus on the writing, not administrivia.
I’ll post the results of the previous command some time later today; from there, it’s all yours!
After the break is our progress in the game so far.
Let me take this opportunity to note that I haven’t planned out every single node of the game, so there may be times (one example of which is the “portcullis” situation below) where I go back and change things. We’re building this together, so deal.