All Ages - General Overview and Places Where I'm Stuck Now

[pastle]

Finally got my hands on this game this week... couldn't get it while at college. Anyway, it generally seems like a pretty solid game, although it's missing alot of the little touches that gave previous games depth. Like the little trinkets on people's desks and stuff that did nothing but were fun to play with. Here we just get what appears to be a pair of dirty underwear on four identical rooms in four identical beds in D'ni (I'm assuming the place with the shaft is D'ni... if it's not then whatever). Reminds me alot of uru, and that's not necessarily a good thing.

Anyway, the ages, and my progess.

Taghira - This age was impossible to me at first because I had no clue how to use the slates. Once I got that straightened out this was a breeze... and a little short. It felt like a really small age and beating it wasn't that satisfactory. Gone are the myst III days when you got a cool ride after beating an age. (I still say amateria was the most rewarding age I've ever beaten). Anyway again I'm getting a strong uru vibe from this age, and not a myst vibe. Too much hopping from place to place, but whatever. It wasn't all that bad. Probably meant as a beginner age (since it's the first one you come to and all).

Todelmer - No clue what to do in this one. Well, there are clues I guess but I don't feel like trial and error-ing to figure out how to put them together. Plus the red telescope room (first puzzle) lags me out alot... too many polygons I guess. Anyway, I've turned on the power (which I'm not sure how I managed to do... I was just playing with the levers on that thing in the back). And I've seen the thing way up on the wall outside that says for the one with the fourth quadrant displayed to put it at six and one. And I've figured out that the little knobs are for magnification. And that the numbers in the big slate that the arrow moves up and down (a clock?) go from 0 to 15 and always add up to 15 in the pairs. What I don't get is why the pair that has the oval in it changes... or what to do with the four telescopes. Am I supposed to get them all to look at the same thing? Anyway, looking outside, I'm thinking (hoping) this one has some cable car rides. Also perhaps a sweet slate command that gets the bahro to clean up some roots.

Noloben- Fun age, I guess. I'm stuck near the end, I imagine, or maybe a puzzle or two shy of the end. I've gotten to the top of the lab and stood on the thing and gotten it to open the door and whatnot... clearly the puzzle is how to get something to stand on that thing and be able to walk through the door at the same time. I'm thinking that a bahro creature should do the trick, but my first attempts at this failed: I dropped my slate on the symbol (with a nonexistant scratch drawn on it so that it would get two lookings at before it got returned), ran to the pedestal, linked to the home bubble, and sprinted towards the island. I didn't make it in time, and I'm thinking perhaps it might be impossible to make it in time, and that there's some other solution.

I've also tested the game out on a few points here and this age is kind of buggy. Like if you drop your slate with the command to deliver the slate to a certain pedestal and then link yourself to that pedestal before the bahro gets there, you never see the bahro when you emerge from the linking, and half the time the slate isn't there, waiting for you. When it is, it's invisible.

Also, I tried turning the underground locks so that it would be impossible to go through them one way (from the shore) but possible to do the other way (from the lab). What happened the first time I did this (and I only did it once) was that there wasn't a passage on the other side of the lock, nor a wall, just black nothingness. I stepped into it and fell through the map. Fortunately the game had some sort of built in mechanism that returned me to my last linking point after not too long.

Also I'm not sure if there was supposed to be an intelligent way to unravel the underground maze... I just used trial and error. At first I was trying to line up the symbols with the corresponding window hole symbols or something, but that didn't do anything. I noticed the numbering on the windows, and I suppose that might be important somehow, but I'm not sure. And I don't know what the rain command is for... in Laki'Ahn and Taghira the weather commands were important but I haven't figured out what to do with the rain command yet. I wonder if it would make it rain in the tunnels since the lighting comes from those holes in the roof... hmm.

Laki'Ahn - I love the look of this age... unfortunately I have to spend most of my time looking at the ground because if too many polygons get in the picture I lag like crazy. (this is a RAM issue, I think.... I've only got like 512. My video card is fine). Here I'm stuck trying to get up that floor plate thing where standing on the plate makes it rise but stepping off it makes it stop. I've already figured out that that the bahro will exert the same amount of force as I will, but I can't get them to stay on there long enough. Drawing a meaningless symbol gets me REALLY close to the top (it's the longest animation I've found so far) but not quite there. Also I accidentally commanded wind while inside that tunnel and it made everything brown, which was odd, since there was no way sand was going to get in there.

----

The puzzles so far are very reminiscent of uru... and I don't know. I don't like that kind very much. It's like "ok, now see what happens if you start the floor moving and walk off of it before it goes up. Oh look, you discovered another identical room with a linking book in it!" I'm a bigger fan of the tinkering with levers and knobs and whatnot. Interestingly enough the age that has that (Todelmer) is the one I've made no progress on...

If you give any small hints, I'd love it. But please make them small, and emphasis on the small. I just wanted to get my thoughts out there on the game, and since this has spoilers in it and whatnot I have to post it in here.

[pastle]

Finally got my hands on this game this week... couldn't get it while at college. Anyway, it generally seems like a pretty solid game, although it's missing alot of the little touches that gave previous games depth. Like the little trinkets on people's desks and stuff that did nothing but were fun to play with. Here we just get what appears to be a pair of dirty underwear on four identical rooms in four identical beds in D'ni (I'm assuming the place with the shaft is D'ni... if it's not then whatever). Reminds me alot of uru, and that's not necessarily a good thing.

Anyway, the ages, and my progess.

Taghira - This age was impossible to me at first because I had no clue how to use the slates. Once I got that straightened out this was a breeze... and a little short. It felt like a really small age and beating it wasn't that satisfactory. Gone are the myst III days when you got a cool ride after beating an age. (I still say amateria was the most rewarding age I've ever beaten). Anyway again I'm getting a strong uru vibe from this age, and not a myst vibe. Too much hopping from place to place, but whatever. It wasn't all that bad. Probably meant as a beginner age (since it's the first one you come to and all).

Todelmer - No clue what to do in this one. Well, there are clues I guess but I don't feel like trial and error-ing to figure out how to put them together. Plus the red telescope room (first puzzle) lags me out alot... too many polygons I guess. Anyway, I've turned on the power (which I'm not sure how I managed to do... I was just playing with the levers on that thing in the back). And I've seen the thing way up on the wall outside that says for the one with the fourth quadrant displayed to put it at six and one. And I've figured out that the little knobs are for magnification. And that the numbers in the big slate that the arrow moves up and down (a clock?) go from 0 to 15 and always add up to 15 in the pairs. What I don't get is why the pair that has the oval in it changes... or what to do with the four telescopes. Am I supposed to get them all to look at the same thing? Anyway, looking outside, I'm thinking (hoping) this one has some cable car rides. Also perhaps a sweet slate command that gets the bahro to clean up some roots.

Noloben- Fun age, I guess. I'm stuck near the end, I imagine, or maybe a puzzle or two shy of the end. I've gotten to the top of the lab and stood on the thing and gotten it to open the door and whatnot... clearly the puzzle is how to get something to stand on that thing and be able to walk through the door at the same time. I'm thinking that a bahro creature should do the trick, but my first attempts at this failed: I dropped my slate on the symbol (with a nonexistant scratch drawn on it so that it would get two lookings at before it got returned), ran to the pedestal, linked to the home bubble, and sprinted towards the island. I didn't make it in time, and I'm thinking perhaps it might be impossible to make it in time, and that there's some other solution.

I've also tested the game out on a few points here and this age is kind of buggy. Like if you drop your slate with the command to deliver the slate to a certain pedestal and then link yourself to that pedestal before the bahro gets there, you never see the bahro when you emerge from the linking, and half the time the slate isn't there, waiting for you. When it is, it's invisible.

Also, I tried turning the underground locks so that it would be impossible to go through them one way (from the shore) but possible to do the other way (from the lab). What happened the first time I did this (and I only did it once) was that there wasn't a passage on the other side of the lock, nor a wall, just black nothingness. I stepped into it and fell through the map. Fortunately the game had some sort of built in mechanism that returned me to my last linking point after not too long.

Also I'm not sure if there was supposed to be an intelligent way to unravel the underground maze... I just used trial and error. At first I was trying to line up the symbols with the corresponding window hole symbols or something, but that didn't do anything. I noticed the numbering on the windows, and I suppose that might be important somehow, but I'm not sure. And I don't know what the rain command is for... in Laki'Ahn and Taghira the weather commands were important but I haven't figured out what to do with the rain command yet. I wonder if it would make it rain in the tunnels since the lighting comes from those holes in the roof... hmm.

Laki'Ahn - I love the look of this age... unfortunately I have to spend most of my time looking at the ground because if too many polygons get in the picture I lag like crazy. (this is a RAM issue, I think.... I've only got like 512. My video card is fine). Here I'm stuck trying to get up that floor plate thing where standing on the plate makes it rise but stepping off it makes it stop. I've already figured out that that the bahro will exert the same amount of force as I will, but I can't get them to stay on there long enough. Drawing a meaningless symbol gets me REALLY close to the top (it's the longest animation I've found so far) but not quite there. Also I accidentally commanded wind while inside that tunnel and it made everything brown, which was odd, since there was no way sand was going to get in there.

----

The puzzles so far are very reminiscent of uru... and I don't know. I don't like that kind very much. It's like "ok, now see what happens if you start the floor moving and walk off of it before it goes up. Oh look, you discovered another identical room with a linking book in it!" I'm a bigger fan of the tinkering with levers and knobs and whatnot. Interestingly enough the age that has that (Todelmer) is the one I've made no progress on...

If you give any small hints, I'd love it. But please make them small, and emphasis on the small. I just wanted to get my thoughts out there on the game, and since this has spoilers in it and whatnot I have to post it in here.

[Dave_McB]

As you requested, here are a few hints;

Todelmer: Take a closer look at those "roots". What are they connected to?

Noloben: You're on the right track with getting that door open. Think about delaying the arrival of the second Bahro. (Maybe something Escher said?)

Laki'ahn: Again, you're on the right track. What could keep the Bahro in place long enough? (Some reading might help here.)

You also posted that you had problems if you linked to a pedistal before the Bahro was to take the slate there. I can't understand why you did this since having the Bahro take the slate to a pedistal is usually done when you can't get to that pedistal. By sending the Bahro with the slate, the symbol for that pedistal will appear on the home pedistal (the one in the bubble) which allows you to link to that inaccessable pedistal. (There are a couple of times that you need to do this not because the pedistal is inaccessable but, because you can't take the slate there.) It seems to me that the developers also didn't think that players would do this so they didn't allow for it.
FYI, getting the pedistal symbol to appear on the home pedistal is a by-product of the placing of the slate on the pedistal by anyone, even you.

When you fell into a black hole when going through the under-ground passage from the lab in Noloben is, I think, annother instance of the developers not considering that the player would try this. If you try different turnings of the doors while coming from the beach, you will find alternate passageways that dead-end.

Finally, yes, there is a logical way to solve the under-ground passageways. First; take careful note of the out-line around the symbol. Second; notice what is near where you found the rain symbol. Third; can you make a connection between the marks on the windows of the lab and on the inside wall of the lab? Finally; can you make a connection between what you have seen on the plateau and something that you've seen on the beach?

Hope this helps. Dave

[pastle]

Thanks, Dave, although I actually just beat both Noloben (shortly after writing this) and Laki'Ahn (this morning) haha. I can see that last little puzzle in Laki'Ahn infuriating some players... I have no idea why I thought to try what I did.

Anyway, about the developers not thinking of things... well, they should have. I know about the dead ends, I found a number of them while trial and erroring.... my thought was (at one point, while on the last puzzle) that perhaps there was a shortcut through the tunnel system to the second beach across from the island, so I was checking out alternate routes from the lab. It would have been really easy for developers just to add a flat wall there or a small dead-end tunnel... holes in a map are fairly unacceptable in a release product, in my opinion.

One final note about noloben... what is the logic behind the ladder dropping only when the lab is sealed? That makes no sense to me... It's like "oh, the place is sealed, now the ladder can be deployed. Even though there's no detection system in place to know that the place is sealed and Escher himself said that the creatures are afraid of it and don't come in." It seemed like a cheap trick to make sure you paid attention to what he was saying (and to that one picture on his little posterboard).

Oh and the connection between the symbols on the inside and the symbols on the outside... well I figured out that the symbols on the inside are numbers... but that's as far as I got. I didn't bother trying to match the numbers up with the symbols.

EDIT:

Todelmer is annoying... I see now that the "roots" are cables and control these four telescopes... (there goes hope for a cable car ride) What I don't get is what to do with them, why the oval keeps moving, why it tells me to look at six/one for that one telescope, and why, when playing with the adjustments, I've BSOD'd twice.

I was playing on the hunch that maybe I'm supposed to look at something and I'll see a pedestal symbol somewhere but the places it looks like I might be able to get to off in the distance I can't really point any of the telescopes at.

EDIT 2: HAHAHAHA

I was fooling around trying to guess the symbols or something and I literally drew a circle with a vertical line through it, which for some reason the bahro guy thought was the symbol for the last pedestal, and now that symbol has shown up on the base pedestal. What I drew looked NOTHING like the last symbol (except for the circle part I guess) and yet it took it there anyway.

I'm going to go there and retrieve it I guess, but not releash the tablet (I don't think it will let me anyway).

This reminds me of another thing on noloben... a couple of times I got the bahro to command rain by drawing a sun (well, a circle with four lines extending radially outward from it).

EDIT 3: too many edits someone reply... Anyway, I don't know what to do now. I can't just pick the slate back up because I don't want to risk heading to the end of the game. I could go back to an earlier save and just play it back out, I suppose. hmm. I guess that's what I'll do. Don't want to spoil it.

[Alahmnat]

If the controls work one of four telescopes, then what might the star-filled ovals on the controls have to do with the telescopes?

[pastle]

Well I'm assuming that's what the telescopes are looking at...

Anyway I've been working at trying to figure out what the deal is with the rotating four-paneled thingie with the two vertical columns of numbers on it. There are four sides, one with 0 horizontal hashes in each plate, one with 1, one with 2, and one with 3. There are also four stations that control four telescopes. Possible connection there.

Also in one plates on each side there is an oval and on another there is a line. I want this to have something to do with polar coordinates... like the oval signifies the angle (theta) and the line the radius (r). Which would fit with the radar-screen thingies that denote the quadrant of vision the telescope has. But perhaps that's reading too far into it.

However I don't know how to fit everything together... The symbols written up on the wall say six and one for the one control station, which might correspond to the side of the panels that has 0 hash marks where the oval is at 9,6 and the line is at 14,1. Then perhaps that makes that quadrant the 0th quadrant and the others going either clockwise or counterclockwise from there 1,2, and 3. But again, I don't know if this is right, and if it is, which numbers to use, which direction (CW or CCW to go around the radar screen), and what the deal with the moving arrow is. (except that when it gets to the top it switches sides.)


The main problem here is that I don't know what the goal of the puzzle is. I can see a possible cable car or something hanging above the doorway to the red room... so I either need to get up there or to get it to drop down, at some point.

[Dave_McB]

Ok, since you are trying so hard to understand these ovals and lines I'll take pity on you and tell you that this is a red herring. Also, trying different symbols (ones you've made up) on the slates is a recipe for disaster since, as you've already found, you can find yourself at the end of an age without completing the age. This is a bug which you can read about in one of the stickied threads at the top of the list. The only symbols that you should be drawing are those that you find in the game.

I agree that there shouldn't be areas left out but, remember that the Millers and Cyan Worlds have been working on these games for years. From things I've read I get the impression that they are tired of Myst and are ready to move on to something different. So, Myst V appears to have been rushed out to put a period to the series, Cyan Worlds was in trouble and closed their doors for a while after the game was released but, the latest news I've heard is that they have re-opened and are working on something new and different.

Now, the two places you're still having problems with;

Toldemer: I mentioned that you should take a closer look at those "vines" as you call them. You didn't mention them in your reply so I'll give you some more hints;

Does the path continue past the "vines"?
Are they really "vines" or something else?
What are they connected to?
Have you seen them, in an un-broken form, somewhere else?
Is there a connection between them and the telescope controls?

Noloben: In order to solve the entry to the lab, you need to see something at the table next to the rain symbol.

Hope this helps. Dave

[pastle]

"I see now that the "roots" are cables and control these four telescopes... "

That was in my first edit. Also I already beat noloben, but I'll go back and check that out. I didn't even realize that the rain table was it's own puzzle... when I beat the age I thought to myself "The weather had some function in the other two... why didn't it in this one?" I guess I'll check it out.

[Dave_McB]

Have you gotten past that bundle of cables yet? Dave

[pastle]

Heh, just did. That's weird, I thought that that control station was for the telescope off in the distance. Then I was like "oh right broken screen duh."

Now on to exploring what's beyond... if it turns out those telescopes and that entire room was pointless except for that... ugh that will be lame.

[pastle]

haha and now stuck again... is this winch thing supposed to be bringing me something? I guess I'll just keep pulling...

edit: well that worked, I suppose. Now only if I could get this thing to move. Or even be able to interact with the lever.

[Alahmnat]

Actually, I would suggest putting that back where it was to start with... that tram's gotten a lot of people. To put it plainly for you, it uses a different power system than the telescopes do, so it doesn't work from this end.

[Dave_McB]

Hehe, so many red herrings. Looks like the D'ni didn't always think things all the way through. Congrats on getting past the broken cable, pastle. We'll be here when you have any more questions. Dave

[Chuckles58]

Pastle, there is yet something to do in the red control room. You just need the settings. Fortunately, Todelmer provides the opportunity to "observe".

[pastle]

Yeah after scanning some of the other topics in here I realized my error and cranked it back over... Now to figure out how to get over there. I've scanned the place with the little telescope dealie up top and haven't seen a pedestal sitting around anywhere (although there is something that looks alot like one) so I'm not really sure what to do.

edit: also chuckles, after getting to the top of the first area and looking through that little telescope I realize that it's sort of like spire from Revelation... just gotta locate all the glowing letters and I guess once I've done that I'll unlock the last symbol or something which I already accidentally know.

edit2: slight update, saw what to do, and have gone there seen stuff, etc. I'm on the aligning the heavens phase, but unfortunately for some reason my slate has disappeared. Like, I dropped it in the middle of the tram ride so I could climb up top and see what was up there. When I got down it was still there, and I walked over it, and picked it up, except it didn't show up. Then later I heard the bahro returning the slate noise so I walked back to the starting point, the slate was there, I picked it up, and it didn't show up in my hands, although I'm pretty sure I'm carrying it. I don't want to have to go back to an earlier save but I will if need be.

edit3: so... how long is this aligning the heavens phase? I must've commanded the rotation power like ten times now and not seen anything through any of the telescopes, on any magnification level. I'm fairly positive they're set to the right coordinates.

[pastle]

Ok... beaten the game. Thanks for your help.

I wish they would have waited an extra year before releasing it and really ironed out the bugs... and added the sound features from revelation (footsteps and the tapping noises). And perhaps made it harder.

[Dave_McB]

Congratulations on finishing Todelmer pastle. Did you go into the red room while the time was advancing? Dave

[pastle]

many, many times. I see that I guessed sort of right about the clock thing.

[cyoung66]

I was thinking about your original post, and one thing confused me.

Did you get into the lab without figuring out what the various symbols mean, and what the rain does?

If so, then you may have either run into a bug, or found a way to brute-force your way through to a solution, by trying random combinations of the pillars on the plateau above. I had heard that this was possible, but it must have been a tedious process.

But the good news, then, is that you can still enjoy the game some more, because there is a puzzle that you haven't solved yet: the intended way to find your way into the lab. You should start by making it rain, and then having a look at the bowls next to the rain symbol on the beach. What do you see in them when the rain stops, and how does what you see indirectly relate to the symbols on the four movable pillars up on the plateau?

[nanoukmetal]

Since I could not make the connection between the rain "symbols" and the ones in the dome, I did it the long way by turning one top symbol at the time and going at the entrance to see what was happening. I will not tell you how much time it took me. Btw I still do not understand how to translate the symbols. Was there a hint somewhere ?

http://forums.ubi.com/images/smilies/cry.gif http://forums.ubi.com/images/smilies/88.gif http://forums.ubi.com/images/smilies/88.gif

[hogarth...]

Easy-peasy...sort of.

Go to the big dome and close all the windows except one. (First make a note of the symbol on the outside of that window.) Then walk around to the other side and open a window to see what is written on the opposite wall nearest the window you opened initially. This becomes your Rosetta Stone. You can then go back and close the original window, and open the one next to it, and repeat the whole process until you have a list of the exterior symbols matched up with their counterparts inside. It soon becomes apparent that the symbols inside are numbers of some kind, since they progress in a logical sequence from simple to more complex, in a rational order.

Next, did you notice the table of bowls next to where you found the Bahro symbol that makes it rain? Did you notice that they reflect certain of the symbols on the wall behind when they are full of rainwater?

Make a note of these symbols. Remember the order that they appear - the physical arrangement of the symbols is important.
Match the symbols in the bowls' reflection with the Bahro symbols on the little domes up on the plateau that surround the big dome - in the same sequence as the bowls.

Voila.

[nanoukmetal]

Joly good thinking hogarth...Thank you for that.
My sleep is going to be a bit better. http://forums.ubi.com/images/smilies/16x16_smiley-very-happy.gif

to all...http://bestsmileys.com/christmas5/18.gif

[Mowog]

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Remember the order that they appear - the physical arrangement of the symbols is important. </div></BLOCKQUOTE>Interesting, that didn't play into my solution. I figured out the rain element, noted the reflected symbols, and eventually figured out how to use the Lab as a "decoder ring." Then when I went to set the dials on the four pedestals, I noticed that some symbols appeared on some pedestals, but not all. So this made me retry settings until I found the only combination (I presume) that would allow all four symbols to be set, and that was the right combo.

[hogarth...]

Looking at the bowls and reflections, I took the scene to be a rough model of the layout of elements up on the plateau - the big rock in the middle as the Lab, and the four bowls representing the "locks" that open the tunnel.

A couple of pics will demonstrate what I mean:

http://www.stereographic.net/clue.jpg

http://www.stereographic.net/clue2.jpg

[Mowog]

Ha... hilarious! It seems so obvious when you point it out, but I never made that connection.

[Mr Zebe D]

That connection is extended. Think of the last symbol.

[nanoukmetal]

I see that hogarth... is slowly being taken over by the Myst V fly mode virus like I was in Uru.

What about all the "magic" of the Myst games you were telling me about in an other post ?

http://forums.ubi.com/images/smilies/88.gif http://forums.ubi.com/images/smilies/88.gif http://forums.ubi.com/images/smilies/88.gif

[Mowog]

After seeing Hogarth's fly mode pic above, I've finally decided to go for it myself. I had thoroughly enjoyed fly mode for Uru, and plan to do the same in EoA. Trouble is, even after a diligent search on the COBBS site and others, I can't find where to get it, along with installation instructions.

Do any of you know? Thanks in advance.

[Edit: Cancel that, I found it myself. Finally... Thanks!]