Myst EoA gets Reviewed By Gamespot. And Im not to impressed. | Forums

[LordAkira110]

Today being the first day that EoA is out on the shelfs(at least in Iowa)Means that theres now some reviews of the game out. Theres one from game spot that has me a little worried. The overall tone of the review was pretty good with a 7.9(heh not great) but theres a few comments out of the review that have me worried and reflects what Ive been worried about. Heres a couple.

"Last year's Myst IV: Revelation was created by Ubisoft Montreal, which did an excellent job of following in the footsteps of Myst's original developer, Cyan Worlds, who returned to the helm for this final chapter. Ironically, then, Myst V omits a few of the key presentational features that made last year's game so captivating, and its fully 3D graphics aren't necessarily a superior alternative to the prerendered scenes of most previous Myst installments."

I know you Uru nuts loved playing something myst realted in "3D". But Im telling you 3D does not work in Myst. You lose to much of the photo realistic quality that prerended offers to realy immerse you in the game. WAIT. I know youll say that the ability to walk around is more realistic. But my counterpoint to this, is that in Exile and Revelation you did have Free Look or Panning which gave it some "3D" characteristics. And whats the point of having EoA in 3D if Im going to end up using the Classic Plus node anyway?!?

So you weigh it up. 3D, were the graphics dont have the same realistic quality that prerendered graphics offer and the only advantage is the ability to walk around. Or you can take a game like Revelation that has Photo realistic graphics AND some ''3D'' in the very fact that you have panning.

Dont get me wrong I like flashy 3D games and what not... and I do have good computer(pentium 4 3.2 512md Ram and a 128mb Radion on PCI express, If you were curious) so its not that.
I just simply believe that Full realtime 3d does not belong in MYst, OK?

Heres one more quote that makes me cringe.

"You also can't hear your character's footsteps, so all the unusual textures you'll be walking (floating?) over make no sound. Myst V is certainly pretty to look at, but it doesn't wholly succeed at making you feel like you're really there in its imaginative worlds."

Im a extremely worried for Cyan's future. In future years I want to be able to play more of their titles. Again the overall tone and rating for the review was good.
Please Comment and if you want to see the review for yourself its here http://www.gamespot.com/pc/adventure...es/review.html

[Eat_My_Shortz]

Hmm... this has been an ongoing debate for some time... do remember that Cyan has ONLY worked with 3D engines since 1998, and did not have the technology, or expertise to do a game like Myst 4.

The 3D environments give the game more than Myst 4 - not just freedom, but also much larger scale environmental changes - day/night cycles, weather patterns, and the major fundamental changes required by certain slate actions.
See the website for more of cyan's "advantages" of the 3D engine.

I'm not sure which is better- but I think 3D helps to sell it more to a crowd that only wants 3D games, and as I said originally it was all that Cyan could do.
(Remember they had to devleop this game in an extremely short time window - just over one year!)

[Ziyal]

I had no problem getting imersed in URU.
If the opertunity ever came up that a real place like the city ever existed I would be there in a heartbeat.

[Alahmnat]

I wouldn't say that nobody in the art department at Cyan was capable of making a pre-rendered game, as many of the artists - including the more experienced art directors at Cyan - have portfolios filled with high quality, high-poly pre-rendered stuff. The trouble is that a) they don't have an engine even remotely up to modern standards... the last pre-rendered game they did was Riven, and they sent it to the publisher as a Hypercard stack, and b) pre-rendered games take an insane amount of time to finish rendering all of the stills and especially the animations, not to mention making sure you've got all the states correct for all of the moving elements in all different locations. In addition, I don't think the 3D engine makes the game inherently better or worse than any of the prior installments. I will say, though, that if you're expecting it to look and feel like realMYST, which was pretty stiff and lifeless in a number of places, you're seriously under-selling the game, and the tone and feel of the game are also very different from Uru as well. It might be 3D, but both the story and the puzzles utilize the technology in ways that pre-rendered graphics simply can't handle. I don't want to give away too much, because a lot of the really unique stuff in this game is integrated with the story, and I'm loathe to give that away, but suffice it to say that a large number of the puzzles in this game rely on the environment being more dynamic than pre-rendered can manage. Don't knock the game for not being pre-rendered... the screenshots really do not do justice to these Ages, and to be honest, there's much more impressive things to look at than the grass in Noloben.

I'll be honest, when I first heard about the game being node-based and realtime I was a bit confused, and determined that I would play in free mode if the option were available. However, I gave it a shot in the demo and was very pleased by how well Cyan did with blending realtime and node-based navigation. It serves to "frame up" the game a bit... there are a number of truly lovely shots that get shown off in Classic mode, and it gives the game a bit more of a sense of artistry because so many of the camera angles are so well composed. It also makes getting around a bit easier, and it does help distinguish between useful items and unnecessary background scenery, much like Myst and Riven, where there's always a gadget or object just slightly out of reach.

As far as footsteps go, they originally wanted to implement them, but according to Tim Larkin, Cyan's music and sound composer, it wasn't possible to include them because of the speed with which you can zip between nodes when you're in a hurry, and it tended to overload the game and create nasty blends of random footstep noises as you rush across various surfaces.

I would disagree about the ending being a let-down too, but I imagine a lot of the impact of it is lost on people who aren't fans of the series. It's not all fireworks and explosions, but then, since when has Myst been apocalyptic fireworks and explosions (and especially when it's the right ending )? It's an ending that fits in with the tone of the series, and it's a great way to conclude the adventure, if you ask me . I expected a great deal from this game, and I feel it delivered.

[ZeusmeisterX007]

I don't care what Gamespot says about Myst games. They are obviously biased against them.

[Eat_My_Shortz]

Ending a letdown? Arrg... that's not what you said on your blog, which I was about to link to, and I will anyway
http://www.dpwr.net/alahmnat/2005/09...d-written.html
(Relatively spoiler free)

Here's Alahmnat (the previous poster)'s review for the game, overwhelmingly positive. And as a true Myst fan, I trust his word well over the chaps at GameSpot, simply because they are reviewing for the everyman, Al is reviewing for Mystites.

So, if you consider yourself a true Myst fan, trust in his review, I guess... (I haven't played it yet... HOPEFULLY it comes TODAY! )

[Alahmnat]

I didn't say it was a let-down (in fact my wife and I were rather an emotional mess between the intro and the conclusion ), I was just pointing out that the payoff probably has a lot more of an impact on you if you're a fan of the series and not someone on staff who got stuck reviewing it for Gamespot .

[LordAkira110]

Hey Nice to see everyones thoughts on this review.
To Alahmnat,
The enviroment being more Dynamic? Why? because theres clouds that move? OK I know you cant give away spoilers. But you wouldnt call picking up clues from animals that are alive and moving in Haven Dynamic? yea the puzzels were Eh at best but Im not talking about the puzzels. And it utilizes things that a prerendered games cant? Why, when you play in Classic plus mode its the same as revelation. Except revelation looked better. So obviously they werent going to add anything puzzle wise that you oculd do in free node that you couldnt do in the other modes.
To EMS,
I do understand with the short time they had to get the game out ,they had to recycle Uru's engine. I just wish that even if there was a small delusional chance of a miracle that if they could of used Revelations engine, they would have.
To everyone else,
I think that Gamespots review should be taken seriouly just for the fact that it is a review for the "everyman". Look its easier for a MystHead to get immersed, were already fans.
But when someone whos nonbiased and plays everthing that comes out, there going to have a better overall perspective.And remember we need more than myst fans to buy the game. So its a true test when someone new trys to get immersed into the game. And for this reviewer(whos supose to be nonbiased) he simply didnt see it as immersive as Revelation. Sure I think the whole ending being a "let down" thing was WRONG. But thats because for the reviewer theres no emotional stake in it. For us there is.Everything else I think was right on

[Alahmnat]

Originally posted by LordAkira110:
And it utilizes things that a prerendered games cant? Why, when you play in Classic plus mode its the same as revelation. Except revelation looked better. So obviously they werent going to add anything puzzle wise that you oculd do in free node that you couldnt do in the other modes.

I didn't say they had utilized puzzles that required realtime navigation, I said they utilized puzzles that benefited from the freedom that realtime grants developers. There's more ways to utilize realtime than by adding jumping/running puzzles (a fact Cyan has thankfully caught on to after Uru ). Some of the things you need to do in this game would have been incredibly difficult to do in a pre-rendered game, especially anything having to do with the Slate, and some of the environments would have been much less impressive if they had to be scaled back to fit into the restraints of what a pre-rendered gaming engine can do.

As I've noted on numerous occasions in other threads, this isn't something that can be argued about because once someone has made up their mind about the presentation style of the game, it's difficult if not impossible to change their minds. If you haven't downloaded and tried the demo (keeping in mind that it's an older build of the game and the full game will run considerably better on most systems) simply to look at what Cyan has accomplished, you owe it to yourself to try it before taking the word of someone at Gamespot who doesn't seem to care as much about the series.

Ultimately, though, I would recommend that you play the game for the story, the characters, and the payoff. Yes, the graphics are important and Cyan has a history of producing breath-taking visuals (something which I think they continue to do in realtime, if you can look deeper than the polygon count), but at the core of every Myst game is a good story, with well-played characters, and both are present in this game. Play it for the story, not for the graphics, and I think you'll be more impressed than if you spend your time looking for texture seams and polygon facets.

[LordAkira110]

Ive Played the Demo.(and uru)
I can see the slate being a problem. But can you be a little more specific whe nyou say "scaled back" I didnt think the enviroment in revelation was scaled backed???? Nor were the puzzles??

Oh Iam going to play it and enjoy it. I was hooked on myst ever since I bought my first Cd Drive to play the darn game. You can read my other posts to see my perspective on way I dont like 3D in Myst at all. But your right in saying theres no point arguing about it. Its already out and oyur not changing my mind and I dont think Ill change yours or anyone elses.
But I am worried about the amount of new people that are going to get in the game when thye read reviews like that and its realyr scary when it reflects what I already feel(not just me either) I would like Cyan to pull out of the ditch there in so that way the next time I see its on Latus' forum. But at first look it appears that sales are doing well EB games already has limited edition back ordered and I think the game is like 4 or 6 on gamespots web site. I hope this is a good sign of things to come but we'll see.