(Some of this information has already been discussed in the Myst V forums, but I wanted to address the issue of what we can do as a community to help Cyan through this crisis.)
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Some bad, bad news.

Apparently, Cyan still owes Ubisoft more money than it was able to recoupe with Uru and its two expansions.
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Edit: Poor choice of words on my part! Sorry. Cyan is not in debt to ubisoft, per se. There are some fiscal responsibilities that come into play, regarding the sales of Myst 5, for example...
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I know it's more complicated than that, but I'm attempting to sum up the problem in as few words as possible. (Ubisoft and Cyan both invested heavily in Uru:Live.) For Cyan, the well has just run dry...

This from Ryan W.'s (GreyDragon's) blog:

quote:

Almost all of Cyan Worlds, Inc. was laid off today, including me. I know with the talent we have here people will find new places to go and do great things. It’s sad to see a company with such talented people to basicly expire. I don’t blame anyone for it happening. So today we had a company meeting in which Rand said some kind final words. Then we had a hamburger and goodbye gathering. Over the last few weeks leading to this point many of us had the hope that something would come up, but it didn’t happen. I will try to stay in Spokane as long as I can. I got some really good things going for me right now here and I hate to see that just dust in the wind.

So, as Green Days Time of Your life is playing on the company intercom system.

“Another turning point, a fork stuck in the road
Time grabs you by the wrist, directs you where to go
So make the best of this test, and don't ask why
It's not a question, but a lesson learned in time

It's something unpredictable, but in the end it's right.
I hope you had the time of your life.”

I did... (Raises glass) Here is to the future.

Peace.

Then this from Bill Slease:

quote:

Well, as Ryan reported, most of us at Cyan are going to have a reeeallly long holiday weekend.

I've heard horror stories of how things like this go down at other companies, but they're being very generous here. It's obvious it breaks Rand's heart to let everyone go.

The nice thing is, there are lots of jobs out there right now. The bad thing is, there aren't a lot of interesting projects. But there are some, and everyone at Cyan is so talented, I have no doubt that everyone will land on their feet.

As for the dream that was Cyan, man, that hurts. It's not quite dead yet...there's a skeleton crew manning the ship for a little while longer, and if something works out, they want to hire back anyone who hasn't moved on.

We've had a bit longer to process this stuff than everyone else, and what I've realized is that I'm still young...and I still have the energy to try to make a difference in this industry.

So I guess I'm saying, please don't forsake the dreamers though this dream is lost. We're still out here. Dreaming.

The only good news: "Laid off" doesn't mean fired.

Maybe we can look at it this way: CYAN has been put to bed. Bill says, "... if something works out ..."

We have to make sure Cyan wakes up. We have to make sure something "works out!"

How?

1) Buy Myst 5. Buy copies as birthday and Christmas gifts for your friends. Help Cyan recoupe their losses. Help Ubisoft regain its investment.

Cyan needs revenue to hire back its employees.

2) Sign people up for Until Uru. As many as you can. Encourage them to purchase the one-time $5.95 authorization key. GO install it on their computer FOR them. Bring more life to the cavern.

3) Buy other Cyan Myst titles! Lots of them.

I'll be doing a little more research into things and will be able to post more info soon. Meanwhile, lets mobilize the community and do some pre-ordering!

Thanks everyone.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Reverend Vader,

Yipes, I had no idea! I am off to buy the collectors edition now!
I live for these games

since cyan no more , none of that will do any good now, they needed more than one new game to sell and neven then they would not get anoff money to contiue cyan , myst 5 will be their last game as cyan and myst may not stop forever but for now it has.. may they can get some famus peoples like paris hilton to give them money to contiue their myst games, or not

or get paris hilton in a myst game playing as yessha , now that would be funny.. I think

quote:

Originally posted by robsmyst:
since cyan no more , none of that will do any good now

Yes, it will do them some good. Cyan still exists as a corporate entity, and any revenue received from these sources will go towards paying down their debt. If they make good progress on paying it down, and show some good sales figures, then they will look like a good business risk again to those who might be able to fund a new project.

I heard that they only have 2 people their now this a shell , for busness to take all the money they can get out of them and that it, they laid off all others their so , in no way will they every recover from this unless they get some rich people to give them money , like a hand out thing , to paid the rich people back money but this will never problem happen

cyan is now dead , no way one new myst game can save them , this time ,

They bit the bullet and lost, so the end has been written..

Sheesh!

Even if it were impossible to save cyan (and evidence suggests that there might be a slim chance)

we can still try and help them reduce the debt they're under! After all, they're largely in debt because they gave us something great that nobody picked up. (Uru live)

In any case, surely it's worth a try? Why be so defeatest Robs? If you don't want to donate money you don't have to, but why scream that everbody else shouldnt?

I'm game for the challenge of trying to save them. I know what I'm getting my brother and his wife for Christmas this year. Every little bit can help. We all need to do our part.

Please don't be a naysayer, Robsmyst.

I want to make it clear here that there is no official request to give money, coming from this site. Reverend Vader talked about buying Myst V, something many of us fans are going to do anyway, since we are looking forward to the game!

Just wanted to make that clear.

Exactly.

The only way that Cyan will be able to pull through this is sales revenue... lots of it.

If Myst 5 turns out to be a great game, that will help greatly.

My basic suggestion: We need to become - in essence - "evangelical" about Myst 5, Until Uru, etc. Cyan needs the support of its fans more than ever. The best way for us to support them in the most practical sense: Buy Myst stuff.

Well said, mszv and Reverend Vader et al.

Giving now is doing so without asking for anything in return in hopes of future games, etc., but to help Cyan in the only way we know how.

We have given already, for what we've received in all the Myst/Uru series.

Yet, if there are any of the Myst/Uru games we want to give to others, now is the time to purchase them.

We have perhaps received more than we've paid for in terms of our enjoyment, and we are indeed grateful.

For what it's worth, thank you Cyan!

I was not trying to say that people should not try to save it, but I did like uru a lot , but I a more of a offline type of computer player , and so I prefer to play games offline , like in single player types, I idea of needed more than one , game for cyan to pull it off really came from my dad say that they would need more than one to do this, since he is older I think his wisdom would be better than mine, I am only 25 after all, I don't undersand how busniess works 100% so, sometimes by posts are underdeveloped , or off target a little to the point a person , does not understand that I am not saying that they is not able to bring it back but even if they do get more money does not mean that they will make more myst games ever after this has happen , They may deside anyway that myst is a fail of a product after what happened with uru, so even if cyan lives thought this it does not mean , that they will contiune with myst based games
Also my birthday was on 9-1 so I just turned 25

also my name is not robs it is rob
or robert to be extact . the post name is not my real one, but that all I will tell you on this

Actually, Myst 5 was billed as the last Myst game anyway.

We know that Cyan had a couple of other (non-Myst related) ideas they were in the process of developing...

We're just hoping (as the online fan community) to be able to help Cyan survive this crisis.

I already pre ordered the limited edition of Myst V and the calender and now I shall see if I can find more Myst stuff to buy. And as a freshman college student who is just learning that college students have no money this is a big thing for me. And as soon as I am done with Uru I will be joining Until Uru. I hope my contribution helps and I will be talking to as many of my friends as I can to get them to buy Myst stuff too. I don't want to see Cyan die.

well ive got myst 5 already preordered, just need book of marrim when its coming out... then ill have nothing of the myst canon to buy

is the calender already done? good thatlll be bought
is there any official myst/cyan t-shirt? there were a couple in uru, why not make them in reallife? ahh yes that costs money too...
esher goggles?
d'ni halloween clothes?
uuhm watches?
a mail opener in the form the moyety dagger (how do you write that name..)
uhm what else? fan products selled by fans with the entire money going to cyan?

im out of ideas now

a moiety dagger? that sounds cool. sadly i think it'd be too expensive to produce and sell, it probably wouldn't be worth it.

t-shirts, though -- you can get print-on-demand ones, so they should be fairly cheap...

OK well, I'm not entirely sure if Cyan is saveable at this stage, and if so, if the fans can influence that.

Robsmyst:

quote:

I heard that they only have 2 people their now this a shell , for busness to take all the money they can get out of them and that it, they laid off all others their so , in no way will they every recover from this unless they get some rich people to give them money , like a hand out thing , to paid the rich people back money but this will never problem happen

cyan is now dead , no way one new myst game can save them , this time ,

It isn't like theres only 2 people workng there so they can't get any revenue. Let's not forget, when you make a game, you get ZERO revenue and spend heaps of money until it's released. Cyan are about to release a huge game, which is sure to generate SOME revenue. The employees have already put the work in, the game will generate revenue.

What Vader is saying is, we need to make that revenue engough.

I really don't know if its possible to save Cyan, and even if it were, surely the industry will still keep sliding... BUT in any case, the more copies of myst 5 sold the better. So that's what we need to do.

Adventure games are a dying genre. PC gaming seems to be a dying genre. I'm happy about NEITHER of these developments, but I cannot change it. For my part, I have bought nearly all the versions of the Myst games and I have all the books. I think I only lack the normal version of Myst IV released in the US (I bought the collector's edition from some friendly Canadian forumites), and I have ordered the Limited Edition of Myst V.

It seemed a very bad sign that Presto, the makers of Myst III, went out of business not long after Myst III's release. I had a feeling that Cyan would not be able to long avoid this trend in the industry.

Personally, I find Cyan's reduction in staff very disheartening, and the fact that it seems very likely to result in their demise as a game developer and company.

It makes me wonder a little about URU. When they said that the number of subscribers wouldn't "pay the bills," did they mean the operating bills or the debt. 6 years is a pretty long development cycle for any game (not mentioning Half-Life 2). I wish (now more than ever) that URU had survived, and further that it led to Cyan's success. According to what I've read.. MMO games take a while to turn a profit, versus investment capital, but there's no saving it now!

What makes me even more sad is that the industry as a whole probably will barely notice their passing, to say nothing for mourning the loss. This is a tragedy.

Adventure games are a dying genre. PC gaming seems to be a dying genre
thats just somones beafs , the same can be said about consols like x-box , ps2 and gamecube , gamecub which I use once in a while, but console games are the real dying genre , no new good games have been made for them in months , so you could say that they are the dying genre, when the last time you saw a new sonic game, come out ,no more only 3 for gamecube no more being made, also pcs have other uses besides gaming , so in fact they will been use more than consoles system console can only be use for gaming and when no new games, are made for them like gameboy advance then they become a dying breed, because console end up being playable on pc with emulator they console makers deside too stop making games, because pc users end up downloading say gba roms with emulator , and so they stop making real gba games.. I think you get it , also doom3 , unreal 2 and thought type of games don't stay fun forever , at somepoint you get tired of playing shoot and kill games

PC gaming is not dying. I recemmend you go check out Age of Empires 3 and Black and White 2. (which is going to be in the 2006 Guinness Book of World Records for most intelligent character in a video game)