Oh, I don't know - the whole idea is that it seems like it all hangs together. It's all made up "science" - if you will.

I'm sure you could do a "scientific" explanation of "dream time" in Myst IV if you wanted to.

It all seems kind of magical to me, in a good way!

If all the Myst linking books were meant to be Bahro technologies, we could say their presense was "felt" right from the beginning.

I wonder if somebody has replayed all the Myst games with this idea at the back of his mind and looked for well hidden clues ?

If Myst is a symbol of mystery then all the old mystery schools were about "mysticism" and more about spiritual matters than pure science even though general science was also part of it.

The "magic" of Quantum Mechanics, a quote from interview with RAWA, part 3 (see below)

quote:

First, if you haven’t been exposed to the weirdness of quantum mechanics, what I’m about to say may be difficult to believe. Take heart. Even though quantum mechanics is one of the most successful theories in history and is responsible for things we use every day like the laser in your CD player or the microprocessor in your computer, no one really understands exactly how it works. One of the “fathers” of quantum mechanics, Niels Bohr, is often quoted as having said “Anyone who is not shocked by quantum theory has not understood it.”

One of the interpretations of quantum theory is that until a state of matter is observed it exists in many states simultaneously - it exists as a “probability wave” that contains all of the possible states of that matter. Therefore, as was proposed in Schrödinger’s famous cat analogy, bizarre things happen on the quantum level that would allow things like Schrödinger’s cat to be both alive and dead at the same time, until one of the states is observed, thus locking it in the single state that was observed. When this observation occurs, all the other probabilities cease to exist, as the “wave” collapses.

[Trying to summarize 100 years of quantum theory in a paragraph or two can’t really do it justice. There are dozens of great books written to help explain the implications of quantum theory to the lay person. My favorites include: “In Search of Schrodinger’s Cat” by John Gribbon, “Quantum Theory” by Nick Herbert, “Parallel Universes” by Fred Alan Wolf, “Schrodinger’s Kittens” by John Gribbon, and “The Dancing of the Wu Li Masters” by Gary Zukav. There is also an excellent, though very brief, overview at http://www.faqs.org/docs/qp/ .]

What the D’ni seemed to have concluded (proved?) though, is that those probability waves don’t cease to exist altogether, instead each possibility continues to exist in an alternate quantum reality (read “parallel universe”), until a state is observed in that quantum reality, and the possibilities not observed in that quantum reality continue to exist in still another quantum reality, and so on ad infinitum. This means that every possible combination of quantum events since the creation of the universe exists in a quantum reality somewhere. The D’ni called this “The Great Tree of Possibilities”.

The Art of Writing allows observation of (thus locking of) and travel to those quantum realities.

For those who would like to learn a lot more about the games, the D'nis, the books etc,

click here

and their home page,

click here

Richard Watson interview part 1...click here

Part 2...click here

part 3...click here

About the fissure's location, quote from interview part 2

quote:

There are two main continuity related complaints that people have.

The most common is the location of the Cleft. The novels do not say where the Cleft is located, but gives several hints that it is in the Middle East. Uru pretty blatantly says that the Cleft is in the southwestern United States. People ask why we moved it New Mexico in Uru. The fact is that the Cleft has always been in New Mexico, and the red flags I raised when the hints about the Middle East were put in the novels were over-ruled. At the time, we never intended to reveal the true location of the Cleft, so the misdirection to the Cleft’s location being in the Middle East was considered acceptable, I guess. Frankly, I was very happy that the locale was finally set straight in Uru.

Another interesting fact from wikipedia...The novel Myst: The Book of Ti'ana implied the Cleft was somewhere in the Middle-east, near an evidently Arab or Ottoman city called Tadjinar, but it has been revealed that it is actually in the desert near Eddy County, New Mexico, United States, on the property of one Jeff Zandi. Due to the conflicting references, it could be up to debate. Its location suggests that the cavern system that supports the D'ni empire is somehow connected to the Carlsbad Caverns.


Carlsbad Caverns...
click here

Special picture (can be enlarge)...click here







Did you know that Australia has its own URU legend...click here

Did you know that the second age of the Sumerians was called the "Uruk age"...click here



All of this is not magic but only magical.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: nanoukmetal,

Hm. I think that this discussion has become rather pedantic.

What constitutes 'magic' is a matter of semantics (a magic spell for example is simply 'spelling', A grimoire is french (I think)for 'grammar'). I was not debating these semantics, I was enquiring as to opinions regarding whether magic (as it is commonly understood by the layman) is appropriate for a Myst game.

Yes, quantum physics can be said to be 'like magic' but that is completely irrelevant to the topic. I'm not insisting on 'realistic science' in a Myst game. Why would I do that? I would also like to know how quantum physics enables a hominid/insect like creature to rotate the entire cosmos around the axis of a single planet. Answers on a postcard please.

I do agree with mszv regarding Serenia. I had no problem with the elements of mysticism because like science, mysticism has its own internal logic. The Bahro's power have no logic whatsoever.

Again, I am not a strict rationalist. I 'believe' in science but I also have spiritual and mystical 'beliefs' that go beyond science. Yes, the boundries blur but what I am NOT is credulous. The Bahro were not an attempt to explore these issues, they were a lazy cheat to cobble together a recycled game (Cyan have said that the Myst V ages were originally intended for Uru).

I do plan on playing all of the Myst games again in sequence at some point (if I can get a copy of RealMyst)but I don't expect to find any clues relating to the Bahro. This is because Cyan were making it up as they went along and there aren't any. There's nothing wrong with this but i'm not gullible enough to believe that they had any thoughts regarding the Bahro when they first produced Myst 1. Cyan created them for Uru. The backstory was ret-conned to fit in with it.

Call me a cynic but Myst V was clearly a very rushed attempt to wrap up what had gone before in the Uru games (which is another discussion in itself: is it dishonest of them to label the game as 'Myst V' when it reality, it was a conclusion to Uru? If it had been labelled as an Uru game I wouldn't have bought it. Thus you could argue that they took my money under false pretences) and a not very successfull one at that. The word I am grasping for is 'contrived'.

Over to you.

Best wishes
'Da BoatMan

I do agree with many of your points.

I was only trying to show that all the myst books, games and Uru were coming out from the "creators" fascination with the "quantum theory" and their views about some of the possibilities from which eveything about myst is coming from as opposed to a king of dogmatic "beleif" or "religion" where everything fit well together. Now, was it all a big mistake, that is a question which will never be answered properly because we would be arguing after the facts. Could we could go back in time to make some changes without creating some new paradoxes ? That would be another debate.

If all the the illogical "bugs" about the theory and the games (or any other game for that matter) would affect too much, I would not be here at this moment. I am not the masochist type.

Same thing for the world of PCs and Windows.

Yes, I don't think the difficulty lies in 'magic' per se - Nanouk, you've shown how fascinating this area can be, and linked it with both mythology and quantum physics. The problem, for me, was the nature of the magic and the way it intruded into the Myst games in a way that seemed strangely out of context. I still enjoyed the later Myst games, but for me they didn't have the immersiveness of the earlier titles.

The fascination of Myst was the proposition of a civilization that had existed beneath the Earth for centuries - their culture, their history ... and their Art, which gave us, as explorers, the opportunity to visit a range of imaginative Ages, as well as the earth-bound reality of the city of D'ni itself. Uru began well. I recall the experience of visiting Eder Gira, and then linking back to the city and the sounds of restoration taking place. This gave a credibility to the experience. The cones were a symbol that reminded us of the reality of the city beneath the Earth. It's how we imagined it might have been ... until the Path of the Shell. Magic intruded into the city itself, and I could no longer believe in the experience.

However, having said that, at the very end of all the Myst games (assuming we make a wrong choice!) we return to Myst Island. And Myst Island has become more real than it ever was. We are exposed to the storm. Nothing works any more. All the magic has gone - and for that very reason, the magic is still there. It was a fitting and poetic culmination.

I would say that my problem is because I am not anywhere near being an artist or a poet but more like an explorer cruising around the universe looking for new out of the "normal" worlds. If ever we discover new civilisations up there, i still hope of finding one that is much different and kinder than our "greedy and violent" one.

Nicely put Nanoukmetal.

I agree with Thietris to a point but for me, the core brilliant idea of the Myst series isn't the D'ni (A subterranean Atlantis like civilization is not a terribly original idea. It is quite common in literature. Even the Nazis had their 'hollow Earth' theory), it's the concept of a technology allowing one to imagine and then write about a fantastic world and then use the book to actually go there. Perfect. That is what every writer strives for, so what better kind of a book could there be? This was an inspired idea. There is endless potential for stories there.

When I first played Myst and Riven I was under the impression that Atrus and his family were some kind of metaphysical Merlins. I imagined them as a family of unique science-gods, playing with the fabrics, manipulating them, to create wondrous, incredible worlds. They were isolated and unique and dysfunctional and they had such a great knowledge of how things worked that they could 'write' these worlds. Their art was a science, albeit one beyond what we can fathom. But they were all-too human. There was much tragedy in their family. They had such power yet it yielded them nothing.

That was my conception of them (admittedly it was mostly my own interpretation than anything that was suggested within the games). I thought it a wonderful idea.

Then I found out about the D'ni. Dissapointment. Atrus' family was demystified (pun intended) A lost race. Yawn. Well, i've heard that one before. Still, it didn't alter things too much. The central concept of the Ages still remained except that now there was a race of people manipulating the metapyshic aethyrs rather than one family. And it opened up many great ideas: How would such a race use that power: prisons, pleasure gardens, slave holdings, farm worlds, war worlds, storehouses, family homes - we've seen many imaginitive uses. Note that:I don't find the D'ni culture itself terribly interesting but the science-art they have devised.

Then I played Uru. I realized that D'ni was on Earth. Dissapointment again. This is one of the reasons I dislike most sci-Fi. Why does everything have to involve Earth? What makes Earth so important? Suddenly the D'ni seem less exotic. A stale old Atlantis myth. They're not creating the worlds, merely links to them. The idea degraded, less wonderfull. But the core idea is still there, the ages, the linking books.

Then we get the Bahro. I'm on K'veer. There are insect men all around me in a giant bore-hole city and I can think of nothing save the selenites from HG Wells 'the First men in the Moon'. Disapointment.

The D'ni didn't invent the Art. The Bahro did. Except that it is an inherent, natural ability they posses, a cosmic 'superpower'. There are many ways to link now. The original idea is gone, borne away on the fossil wings of dinosaurs. The old magic (that wonderful, enticing, magic of imagination Nanouk described above) is gone. There is a new magic now (the stale, cliche, plot device magic I described above). It is distinctly less interesting. It is distinctly less wonderfull. The games become distinctly less enjoyable.

Perhaps this is what I was trying to say above. The Myst mythology no longer seems magical. It seems cliched. I can no longer truly imagine that I am visiting these worlds. They no longer make sense.

Maybe it is just a strange quirk of my personality but I can believe in the family of Atrus. I cannot believe in the Bahro. I believe in metaphysics. I believe that 'only nothing is'. I do not believe in the Bahro or their powers.

Just to hammer my point into the ground (deep, deep down into the D'ni city) the Bahro detract from the mythology to my taste. They detract from the mythology to the point that I am glad there will be no more games (although whether that's really the case, we will wait and see)

I think that this is probably the best i'm going to make my point. I should sign out before I burst into poetry!

Farewell until next time

ChinaBoatMan

Just a little very friendly note.

In all the legends, the greatest hero could be only "you" the Merlin, and in the Myst games you the Avatar. "Know thyself" they would say.

Like it or not, you have been "the" one who has climbed one more step up the ladder to....?
One small step for humanity, Cyan and Ubisoft but a big step for chinaboatman.

Evolution is almost a revolution and always painfull.

But evolution can also be a dead end. 99.9 percent of species that have existed are now extinct.

Unlike the D'ni there is no chance of restoring the neanderthals.

And a small step can also be a step bacwards.

If we are to beleive quantum mechanics, it is the observer who changes the results. So your present and your futur should be a result of your choices. The decision is yours only. Do what is best for you and good luck.

The thing is - there's no quantum mechanics or explanations like that in the games. That's really "after the fact" - it's an explanation outside of the games. It may be fun to speculate on how it all works (and heck the developers do, they have whole theories on it), but it's not in the games. In the games, linking books seems to make as much sense as "dream time". I'm not saying it doesn't make sense in the game - it all makes the same kind of sense, if that makes sense!

The Dunny Hut...click here

In regard to the ability of the Bahro to tilt planets, it makes perfect sense to me to think that they may have discovered a magical stone - or holy grail - which controls the universe (if you're pure of heart and clever enough to learn its powers). No more difficult to believe than that you can transport yourself using nothing more than a book. As for what they look like, insect/hominid, we know not much about intelligence can be deduced from that, except that their brain pans seem large enough to contain a complicated brain. To me the most enjoyable part of the game was Teledahn, and if a story had to be constructed out of whole cloth to explain it, then so be it. By the way, a la Hitchhiker's Guide, they could be pan-dimensional beings whose temporal appearance they can manipulate at will and perhaps serves them to learn about other species.

I presume by 'Pan-dimensional' beings you mean to suggest that the Bahro are from 'higher space'. The idea of the Bahro being 5 dimensional (or higher) entities is interesting and it would indeed give them unbelievable power over our 4 Dimensional universe (in the same way we would have tremendous power over 2 Dimensional existance. Anyone read Edwin Abbot's 'Flatland?)

However, good idea as that may be, there is no suggestion of it within the game, as mszv says.

I also have to disagree regarding the tablet. You say that a magical stone (or grail) that controls the Universe makes perfect sense to you. Fair enough but I cannot agree. I cannot see what 'being pure of heart' has got to do with the mechanics of the Universe. I do not think abstract notions such as morality have much currency on a cosmic scale. And that's assuming that there is any such person who is 'pure of heart'. I'm certainly not and I was supposedly the one playing the game!

As for the insect/hominid appearance that I mentioned, that was more matter of fact. I meant to say that NOTHING could perform such feats, merely by making a few sounds, whether human, insect/hominid or a cloud being from Par Relphex. All words are magical. I don't think that there are special 'magic words' that posess more magic than others.

The linking books require suspension of disbelief it's true. The Bahro require a much greater level of acceptance.

ChinaBoatMan

After thinking about this thread some more and cooking up more theories about the Bahro in my head, I realize how having read so much science fiction has colored my view of the real world, for the better, I would add. I remembered something my five year old son said after seeing the Star Trek transporter for the first time: "Mom, let's get one of those!" I explained that they hadn't been invented yet and that maybe he would invent one when he grew up. Obviously he didn't, but I can see someday someone's child making it a reality. (He did turn out to be a talented designer/inventor with his own very successful company - if you're a gun afficianado you may have seen some of his products). So I guess my point is that all this "unscientific nonsense" is great fodder for developing brains which haven't yet bought into the "it can't be done" mode of thinking.

ps chinaboatman, you seem to me to have a very constricted view of possibilities. With some research I could point you toward Sci-Fi stories which would meld perfectly for you the ideas of magic and science, but I leave it to you to broaden your thinking about such things. "There are more things in heaven and earth than are dreampt of in your philosophy".


"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic"

The Hitchhiker's guide was an utterly horrible movie and I'm not surprised that it tanked. I literally walked out of the theatre...

I'm at work at the moment so forgive me if the post seems hurried...but this is a cool post and just wanted to add. Ultimately I've heard whispers of immersiveness...traces of the former games MYST/RIVEN/EXILE/REVELATION being more "realistic" and believable. I think both story and presentation have an awful lot to do with it. The beauty of the former games is that even the most critical minded could "buy it" or believe it...even if the "explanation" wasn't there. It still made sense and was highly immersive. There was depth because regardless of speculation and philosophy there was significant time and thought put into them.

There are people who may be more scientifically oriented who are drawn to these games... or people who are more "religiously" or spiritually oriented...and of course there are those capable of both orientations and whomever else feels called to these games. Overall...seems to be a lot of critical minded (in a good way) Myst gamers out there. It just seems like URU/MYST V are just the less sophisticated... weaker games of the series...period.

I love fantasy/imagination and such...but I love it when it is made believable/realistic. Bouncing Bahro that are so powerful meanwhile so stupid that they are slaves just doesn't cut it for me. I'm not even looking for an explanation with regard to the Bahro...I'd just rather not have to deal with them at all. Sometimes you just can't believe in something - like the Bahro because it/they just rub you the wrong way or just doesn't do it for you....thereby breaking your interest/immersion in the game. I think this touches on what Nanouk mentioned about choice as well. The fact of the matter is though...when something is a hit it just naturally draws you in or should I say..draws in the majority...when something isn't...it doesn't. The angle is.... there was a lot of "being drawn in" prior to URU & MYST V - so expectations naturally became higher or looking for particular elements that have already been established. When you divert too far from the path you created... you start having problems....especially when time, attention, financial strain, motivation and/or interest in other areas begins to enter into the equation.

Opinions vary but that's how I see it...haven't been concentrating enough at work...gotta' go.

neo, I was talking about the BOOK. I heard the movie was bad, but some of us still read, lol. It's too bad a whole generation may pass it by dismissing it as 'that movie'.

...let me clarify...I didn;t like the book either. I read too...

Well, I suppose some of us belong to the hard-headed realist camp and some to the thinker-dreamer camp and never the twain shall meet.