Very minor quibble, and I'm not overly annoyed by it, but did anyone else get a bit bothered when you ride the elevators in the great shaft and it cuts to third-person camera?

I know it was probably done for technological reasons (I think the shaft is made up of more than one "map" as it where, to prevent it being too long) but I still miss the days of myst and riven where the camera never left your view for any reason. And I'd love to have seen the view of riding down the great shaft from my perspective, and get to look up and down and around, etc.

Anyone else agree? Or am I just being finicky?

Whole heartedly agree fib...but wasn't overly annoyed by it either. I already had no choice that the game itself was in 3-D which was my major irritation... so throwing in the 3rd person just fit right into its place.

I agree!

[Don't read further if you don't like hacking!]

I believe there may be a fly-mode patch out there on the COBBS website. If you've finished the game, perhaps that will be somewhat of a saving grace for you...

No, the shaft is entirely one huge map. And I honestly didn't think about the switch to third-person until a few days ago, weeks after I played it. So I guess it didn't seem out of place there. It wasn't a full-immersive Myst game, it was a cross between that and a more cinematic Myst game. There's a shot at the end that works the same way, IMO.

I liked the change of perspective. I think the view across the Shaft is too limited to convey much sense of grandeur. The clip of the elevator car disappearing into the depths of a seemingly infinite Great Shaft was both mysterious and dramatic---not to mention immersive! I don't think the sense of murky descent would have been the same without being able to see the headlights pierce the dark.

But then, I'm not dogmatic about first-person vs. third-person points of view.

Well, considering that it's a three-mile ride down, I don't blame them for having a minor time-jump

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Well, considering that it's a three-mile ride down...

I'm not so sure about that. Correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't the shaft only lead to a vast system of tunnels that led down much further before you reached the Cavern proper? That's the impression I got from the books. Once Atrus and Gehn had reached the bottom of the shaft, they needed Gehn's father's book of maps before they could continue on down to the Cavern. So the Shaft wouldn't necessarily have to be any deeper than we see it in EoA; but that depth, plus the tunnels below, would add up to three miles. I think that's what Esher meant; it wasn't three miles to the bottom of the Shaft, it was three miles to the Cavern, and the Shaft was only the first step.

Just speculating.

Do you want to know why this switch particularly annoyed me?

I was carrying a slate while riding the elevator, once, and IT STILL APPEARED IN THIRD VIEW!

Actually, I'm not that annoyed. I actually thought that was pretty funny. And yes, I agree it does give a much deeper sense of depth without sacrificing too much immersion.

Edit: another thing that somewhat annoyed me was the fact that every time I went down in the first elevator, the dramatic music would play. Darn elevator music!

I was annoyed with this to an unreasonable degree. In fact it angers me just thinking about it. Maybe i should get out more...

One of the things I realized about a first person view it that you just can't get a decent idea of size and scale. Not that I didn't love the first person goodness of Myst V, but it was hard for me to picture just how big the great shaft really was. I still have a screenshot (for when the great shaft was going to be in online Uru) of the great shaft with a person in it, on the edge of something - peering down. The great shaft looked so much bigger! It's a perspective thing.

So I guess the little flips in view didn't bother me.

quote:

Originally posted by the_fibber:
Very minor quibble, and I'm not overly annoyed by it, but did anyone else get a bit bothered when you ride the elevators in the great shaft and it cuts to third-person camera?

I know it was probably done for technological reasons (I think the shaft is made up of more than one "map" as it where, to prevent it being too long) but I still miss the days of myst and riven where the camera never left your view for any reason. And I'd love to have seen the view of riding down the great shaft from my perspective, and get to look up and down and around, etc.

Anyone else agree? Or am I just being finicky?

I completely agree with you. When the camera switched to third person, I felt like I had been totally ripped out of the game and it was no longer me in the elevator.

This is just one of the reasons why I quit playing the game within the first couple hours of game play. Being frozen in place and having the camera turn for me while Esher rambled on is another factor in my quitting. It boggles my mind as to why they didn't just make Esher and the other characters movies as they had in the past if they were just going to lock the camera. The only reason to model the characters in 3D is if they intend on letting the player walk around the characters.

There were just too many things that were divergent from what I had come to accept the Myst series to be. And from what I've now read on the forums about the game, it seems like I'm cutting my losses by quitting early.

With great expectations comes great disappointment.

I agree about the third person view not being very interesting. However, it is a long trip to the bottom. Click here to see a movie Elevator Shaft

Hmm.. saw the fly-mode videos, real nice. How do you capture the video sequence?

The video captures are low tech. Point the camera at the screen, a little editing in After Effects, add some sound, compress and voila!

quote:

It boggles my mind as to why they didn't just make Esher and the other characters movies as they had in the past if they were just going to lock the camera. The only reason to model the characters in 3D is if they intend on letting the player walk around the characters.

Having 3D rendered characters was not a big deal to me... but now that you mention it, it is pointless to have them that way if you can't move around them... I know my machine would have done a lot better playing a video than rendering a cheezy looking wireframe textured model.

Maybe the actors just weren't up to it... I suppose anyone could have done adult Yeesha since she has never appeared live, but you'd have to get [the character that appears at the end] in on it... I can't imagine that he wouldn't do that one scene...