Myst: Interactive Fiction Edition

Dryness

Sun, 11 Apr 2010 14:34:00 -0500

> south

As you approach the metal door, it slides open, revealing the dock where you began.

MYST: The Dock (west)

> south

There’s no sense in getting wet.

> east

MYST: The Dock (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.

Meandering

Wed, 17 Mar 2010 23:34:37 -0500

> 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

MYST: Subterranean Hallway

Repetition

Thu, 04 Mar 2010 19:34:00 -0600

> 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.

Delay

Sat, 27 Feb 2010 15:51:00 -0600

> 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.

Implication

Sat, 20 Feb 2010 16:35:00 -0600

> 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.

List

Tue, 16 Feb 2010 16:55:25 -0600

> 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.

Imagery

Mon, 15 Feb 2010 21:21:20 -0600

> head north

MYST: Subterranean Chamber

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?

Claustrophobia

Sat, 13 Feb 2010 15:18:00 -0600

> Bound down the corridor

MYST: Subterranean Hallway

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.

Oh hi.

Sat, 13 Feb 2010 10:14:43 -0600

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!

> Restore

Fri, 12 Feb 2010 20:29:00 -0600

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.

Myst: Interactive Fiction Edition
All things Myst and D’ni Copyright ©1993–2009 Cyan Worlds, Inc.

RESTART, RESTORE or QUIT?

> restart

You have just stumbled upon a very thick, very out-of-place book. The beige cover — was it once green? — is heavily cracked and faded with age and wear. Barely legible among the crackled patches of color is the word “MYST” in black serif type.

> take book

You slowly take the book in your hands. It is quite heavy. A thick layer of dust and dirt envelops it.

> shake book

A cloud of dust is created and stirred around you and the book.

> Open Book

As you turn the first page, your curiosity turns to shock; where there should be writing, there is a jagged-edged, rectangular picture — a moving picture — covering half the page.

The image depicts a very curious place, perhaps an island or a peninsula. The viewpoint revolves constantly, again and again, around the end of a wooden dock. In the water beside the dock are the masts of a sunken ship; past the far end of the dock is a huge gear protruding from a tall platform; the long side of the dock abuts a shallow wall with a portcullis; and next to the end of the dock at the center of your revolving view is a small wood.

You stare transfixed at this repeating motion for a few seconds, hoping that it will hypnotize you before you have to face the discovery you’ve just made. Swallowing hard as you realize it won’t, you start gathering yourself to determine your next move.

> look at other side of page

Careful not to touch the image — you’re not quite sure why — you turn the page. The new lefthand page is blank, giving no hint of the magic taking place on its opposite side; the righthand page bears writing in a strange, flowing script. It’s vaguely reminiscent of some eastern languages you’re familiar with, but both your fuzzy memory and the current bizarre situation tell you that it’s not a language you’ve ever seen before. It’s no use to try to decipher it; you turn back to the moving picture, eager to continue in your bewilderment.

> Flip through book

The rest of the pages all bear the same strange script; you impatiently turn back to the first page.

> talk to someone

There is no one to talk to. Or there might as well not be — right now, the book dominates the entirety of your attention.

> remove panel

As the page with the image is ripped from the book’s spine, the image fills with noise and becomes more discolored and distorted until, when the page is fully detached, it fades into a pitch black rectangle.

> put page back in book

The edge of the page seems magnetically attracted to the book’s gutter, and with no effort at all the image comes back to life, though it’s still noisy and discolored. As you press your finger down the crease, a trail of light follows your finger, a dull roar sounds, and the image is restored to full clarity.

> tap panel

You tentatively reach out to touch the image. The moment your fingers brush against it, your hand tingles slightly, as though a faint electrical current were passing through it. Like a magnet, the full of your palm is drawn to the image, flattening against the page. The tingling intensifies, traveling up your arm and spreading through the rest of your body. For the briefest of moments you observe yourself in trepidation, followed by awed horror as you glimpse your right hand emitting shimmering, golden light that follows the tingling up your arm.

As this happens, the world changes. You feel the book rushing toward you, growing, enveloping you, all while seeing the strange island revolve around you. A deep, nasal sort of roar crescendos in your ears. Your vision blurs, and for a few sickening seconds, you feel your body painlessly dissolving. The roar grows in pitch and intensity, the shimmering light entirely confiscates your sense of vision, your panic turns hopelessly into resignation — and then it all stops. The tingling is sucked out of your body via the fingertips, your vision clears, the roar becomes a distant echo, a cool salty breeze licks your face, and you find yourself on

MYST: The Dock (west)

Your senses have returned so abruptly as to disarm themselves; head throbbing, you lurch forward, unsure whether this display is truly involuntary. In any case, your body is now quite sure that it stands on terra firma, and you straighten.

You stand on a wooden dock, about fifteen yards long. The dock runs east toward the tall ledge with the gear — you can now see a second gear there lying on its side. To the west is the small pine wood. To the north, at eye level, is solid ground; the earth here acts as a shallow north wall to the dock, and into this wall is set a solid iron ~~portcullis~~ door with no visible handle. Immediately south, the masts and crow’s nest of a sunken wood ship protrude from the water, a vast ocean extending to the horizon.

> peer through ~~portcullis~~ door

The solid rusted iron door is closed. (Yeah.)

> pry open door

Just before your fingers touch the door, it slides into the wall with a startling whoosh, revealing a long, dark corridor beyond.

> bound down the corridor until you hit something

> Restart

Fri, 12 Feb 2010 20:13:24 -0600

Let’s try this again, shall we? This time we’re hosted by a third party, so random technical glitches as we experienced before won’t fall prey to my attention deficit and cause me to abandon the blog in shame.