For example, that weird spider-like chair is actually a 3D recorder used to project messages to his amazed followers in his temple. There are still a few inexplicable gizmos just lying around to give your brain some trouble, but that’s what puzzle games are for, right? To be fair, the majority of machines have actual in-world uses, most of them being devices employed by Gehn to cement his power. It is somewhat odd that you can hear chickadees on Riven… it doesn’t seem like the kind of bird you’d find in an alien universe, but hey, it’s nice to know the little guys are finding their way in the world. The music is once again quite sparse, leaving place for the gorgeous ambient noise of the wind blowing, insects buzzing and birds singing. ![]() The effects are much more natural and sound much less like they were processed through a computer. The sound quality has been ramped up quite a bit as well. A gilded temple, filled with food offerings to an animal god. A lonely bay inhabited by sunbathing aquatic dinosaurs. A tiny forest, lighted by paper lanterns, filled with strange flora and golden scarabs, the only area somehow spared from destruction. A fishing village filled with round stone huts built on piles. Most of the vistas show a breathtaking amount of detail. Subtle signs can be seen of Gehn’s despotism and obsession with writing ages, as one island has been razed to produce paper and another has been turned into factory to manufacture the tools needed to further Gehn’s ambitions. All of the islands are interconnected, and a lot of little things have their story to tell. This seems to show that Cyan’s talents had really matured in a few short years. When it comes to immersion, coherency and overall quality of the world, Riven is really a step above Myst in terms of worldbuilding. Speaking of numbers, the mythology of the D’ni is fleshed out much more in this game and one puzzle will require you to learn the basics of the D’ni numerical system. This could make a good drinking game – anytime you see something related to the number five in Riven, have a drink. That doesn’t stop Gehn from obsessing over the number five, which is a magic number in the context of this game. You see, Riven is Gehn’s fifth age and his best writing work, which isn’t saying much considering the world is falling apart on a structural level (bad grammar, maybe?). ![]() The fact that there are five CDs and five islands is not just a gimmick, as that number is a recurring motif throughout the game. Look at the artwork closely, as it contains some veiled hints about the puzzles and the context of the story. Riven has a similar, but somewhat subtler approach. Some adventure games provide printed documents like journals and codebooks with the CDs to create puzzles before the game has even started. The original packaging includes a very well done box for the game discs and each CD sleeve has some interesting artwork on it. Unlike its predecessor, this game has only one main age, the eponymous Riven, which is separated in five islands. Riven starts out where Myst ends, with Atrus giving you the mission he was alluding to in the previous game: save his wife Catherine from the age of Riven and make sure his father Gehn remains trapped there and unable to cause trouble. The game featured many more videos, fullscreen ones, including mine cart and hover train rides between the game’s islands which were eye-poppers for the day. The game was once again made out of stills created with HyperCard, but the level of detail increased exponentially and the black borders around the game window are almost gone. The 2500 images of Myst would become 4000 images on an adventure spanning five islands and an equal number of CDs. Riven was the best looking game of its day, and reaches levels of photorealism very praiseworthy even by today’s standards. In 1997, it was something the world had never seen. After the game was finished, Robyn Miller decided to leave Cyan to pursue personal projects, which means that Rand Miller would then become the sole spiritual father of the franchise. The development of the game was apparently pretty tense, as it understandably is for a relatively new team thrust into a big-budget project that lasted four years. This was not going to happen with a rag-tag team of seven people, so the Miller brothers hired new 3D artists, bought new computers and upgraded their offices. Since they were now basically drowning in money, Cyan decided that their next project was going to be bigger, better and more expensive – as in multi-million dollar expensive. Myst was a runaway hit and sold millions of copies.
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