Myst for iPhone: You Must be Joking

Lonnie Lazar ()

Myst, once upon a time the world’s most popular graphic adventure video game, has arrived at the App Store. The $6, 730MB piece of mobile bloatware, requiring a whopping 1.5GB of free space on Apple’s iPhone or iPod Touch, isn’t likely to revive the title’s popularity, in this reviewer’s opinion.

Even the trailer demands nearly an egregious seven minutes of a curious person’s time to sit through, an eternity in our fast-paced modern world. Over a minute and a half to get past the credits?

This is a group of developers who must think very highly of themselves indeed.

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About the author

Lonnie Lazar

Lonnie Lazar is a writer-musician-web designer-attorney. He writes about Apple for Cult of Mac and Mac|Life, and about VoIP and telecommunications for Voxilla. Follow Lonnie on Twitter @LonnieLazar, join the Cult of Mac on Facebook, and find Lonnie's photos on Flickr.

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Posted in Advertising, Gaming, iPhone, iPod Touch, Opinions, Software |

  • Justin

    I just bought it today.
    It’s terrible.

  • http://www.joshsunshine.me.uk jobbogamer

    You missed (Myst) out on a wordplay joke there – “Myst for iPhone – You MYST be joking”. Sorry, had to mention it. o.O

  • Wolf

    Well, judgeing by your attempted sarcasm you are certainly not the target audience then, are you?

    What is wrong with some sound introduction to a game, that gives you nothing more than this very introduction, since the rest of the game is for the player to figure out?

    How come 90 seconds of credits are too much in a fast paced world? Are you sure you are enjoing your life to its fullest extent if you can’t wait 90 secs? I remember the demos at the beginning of some Amiga games, certainly longer than 90 secs and sometimes more enjoyable than the games themselves. But then, by saying that I’ve already stated to be from the pleistocene of computing, thus having enough time at hand to enjoy a game like Myst. Seems, I am the target audience.

  • Chris

    Yikes, Myst hater!

    You have to remember Myst was before the time of AIM and Internet-caused ADD. The game itself is extremely slow but almost in an artful way – it’s meant to craft the experience of the tome referred to in the game’s title. It all made more sense in 1993, sure, but don’t knock it because it takes 700 MB and would put a child to sleep.

  • MacRat

    “Even the trailer demands nearly an egregious seven minutes of a curious person’s time to sit through, an eternity in our fast-paced modern world.”

    The same could be said of the original Myst.

    Who really had that amount of time to sit and play a game for hours?

    Note that with the iPhone, you could at least play when you are stuck on a plane.

  • http://netninja.com BrianEnigma

    Although the intro movie is a bit long, it only displays once, and returning to the game from other applications brings back to where you were in a matter of seconds (as opposed to, say, PuzzleQuest, which makes the user sit through screens and screens full of opening credits every time.) It feels like they put a lot of time and effort into switching into and out of the app.

    The gameplay? Well, it’s a long game that requires patience and problem-solving. It’s not for everybody. If you only have a few minutes to play a game, pick something else more appropriate.

  • DBL

    What a nonsense review. Cult of Hack!

    Can’t clear 1.5GB of space — don’t install the damn game! You obviously don’t have the patience for this type of game anyway, go review something with a crosshair, and leave this sort of game to better men.

  • Justin

    Well they could have stated that it’s boring beyond belief.
    They assumed that everyone has played Myst back in the day.
    I have never played it before, and I know why.

  • http://mustardhamsters.com Dean Putney

    Lemme lay this down real quick.

    Myst holds some serious emotional love with me. That game devoured days of my childhood. DAYS. Being able to play Myst again at all without finding an ancient Mac is a dream come true.

    Sure, 700 MB is pretty big for an iPhone game, but it’s worth it for such a finely crafted one. I expect that as the iPhone starts to be considered as a serious gaming platform we will see more games with real stories and worthwhile play like Myst.

    Just wait until they come out with Riven. *swoon*

  • Lonnie Lazar

    I’m really not a Myst hater, I promise. In fact, I’ve admitted elsewhere in this forum that I’m not really a gamer at all, having survived my adolescence with nothing more than Pong and (barely) Pac Man and Centipede to lure me off of the pinball machines and pool tables.

    As an old fart, then, my beef with Myst has far more to do with the idea that its iPhone developers would think it’s a good idea to ask people to devote 20% of an 8GB iPhone’s disk space to the app.

    If it works for you, party on.

  • http://torley.com Torley

    I want The Manhole and Cosmic Osmo back!

    What makes this game bigger than the original CD-ROM version?

  • silencer

    So… the best selling game of all time doesn’t meet with your approval, huh?
    I like to think of it as a “duh I am a fucking moron” test. People who don’t like to think at all HATE this game.
    Fuck all ya’all.

  • http://graemeadamson.com Gray

    Wouldn’t it be a great idea to be able to play our apps through iTunes on Mac? I mean, they’re all there in the iTunes library and sometimes you just don’t need them taking up space on the iPhone or iPod, yet wouldn’t mind using them.

    And I don’t think the sheer size of the Myst download and length of the credits screen is due to “a group of developers who must think very highly of themselves indeed,” it’s more a reflection of the huge amount of gameplay therein (including plenty of video footage, if Myst 3 is anything to go by) and the remarkable amount of development work that went into creating the game.

    Don’t just insult the developers – and certainly don’t judge the game – unless you’ve actually bothered to play it and are therefore equipped to provide an accurate and reliable review.

  • firesign

    condescending review from an admitted non-gamer: you’ve got to be kidding. i’m an “old fart” too. i’m almost 54 and have been gaming since the atari 2600. you have no idea of the history of myst or cyan worlds, it’s developers, or the fact that they are one of the last independent game developers. on the iphone, myst has the potential to be brought to a whole new generation, who just maybe might enjoy using their brain instead of mindless shooting. i’m sure people would enjoy more reviews of fart and lighter and flashlight apps for our fast paced world. god forbid anyone do something that’s of real quality.

  • Thestrangered

    mmm, you give the impression that everyone hate it and shouldn’t play it.

    Surprising considering it made it to top 10 in the app store in 3 days (6th), and 1st in puzzle games (and 11th in overall).

  • parcar

    I remember playing this for one weekend solid with my husband when it first came out – we could not pull ourselves away. Having played for a couple of hours tonight on my iPhone I’ve gotta say I’m not feeling it. The play feels very slow, static and often repetitive – even to me, and I am NOT a fan of shooting or action games (Glyder, Virtual Villagers more my speed). However, once you start to figure things out, it does become fairly addictive, and you do have to use a few brain cells. (That’s even with the excellent ‘hint’ options which I confess I resorted to only 2 hours in.) I expect I’ll hang in there, but the game is showing its age and I doubt I’ll be captured like before. Can’t really see this winning over a new generation either.

  • Thestrangered

    1st in dauch appstore of all apps, now :)

  • http://twitter.com/tarmus Tarmus

    Who held a gun to your head and forced you to download it?

    HAHAH this guy spends $6 for Myst, and then is shocked when he discovers it’s slower paced and atmospheric, and not all “PEW PEW LAZERS EXPLOSIONS”

    Rubbish.

  • Eleri

    “This is a group of developers who must think very highly of themselves indeed.”

    Yes, yes they do, and for darn good reason. Thank the Maker there’s still a game company out there who values more than being trigger happy, and is willing to make games that require their players to actually *think*.

  • Barbara

    Myst is a tranquilizer, a retreat into a slow-paced world that is peaceful. It was not meant to be like monkey ball. The music is almost hypnotic. It’s a mystery, which requires thought. It’s not for people who want a race-car paced game. It truly is in a class of its own.