Interesting discussion -- the android OS issues. I'll be looking to see how that gets resolved, since I'm planning to get the Droid.

Looks like the iPhone/iPod is developing into a nice little gaming platform.

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Chogon wrote:

And it is interesting that the article does mention Myst as one of the apps that would not fit on the Driod. Even with the update that decreased the app size of Myst to 560Meg, it still would not fit.

Sounds like a challenge, to me! Use the SD card, make it work, and once again Cyan breaks ground and thumbs noses at all the people who said it couldn't be done

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Chogon wrote:

Eleri wrote:

We can haz Myst for Droid, plz?

Not until it can handle bigger applications.
Article: Google fails to address app storage issue
And it is interesting that the article does mention Myst as one of the apps that would not fit on the Driod. Even with the update that decreased the app size of Myst to 560Meg, it still would not fit.

I'm certainly no expert on these things.What I have read is the solution for Android apps is that while the executable must fit into the handset memory, resources for the executable can be put on the SD card. So, as part of the install process, have the executable installed on the phone and have all of the bulky data - art, sound, video etc. downloaded onto the SD card.

While this means you do have to have the right SD card in order to play the game, this isn't a huge issue for the Droid, imho. On the Droid, the SD card isn't really used as a data device for quick swapping. The SD card is actually behind the battery, so you have to take things apart some to swap cards. So it really acts as more like a second HDD than a floppy disk.

On the other hand, I also read that the Droid was never designed for high-end mobile gaming, rather that it's targeted at the geeky power user set. For example, you can actually install apps on an SD card, if you have root access on the system and with a little tweaking. But that's definitely far from a plug and play situation.

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Another "I can't wait!" fan here, good news!

Malfhok wrote:

Can we have iCosmic Osmo and the Worlds Beyond the iMackerel next?

Seconded!

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Sigh. Eleri, I do hope you get a job working directly for Cyan one day. You seem to want that so bad.

Getting back on track. Yes, read that too -- about how the ap as to be on the device, but the resources can be on the SD card. The question to me -- how much work would it be to reengineer Myst to do that, and is it worth it? That's how I'd play Myst on the Droid, without having to hack it. When I get my Droid, I'm not planning to root access it (hack it), at least for now.

I'm on several Droid forums. There's a lot of ap talk, some about games, but not an overwhelming amount of talk about games. My take is that, right now, there's an interest in games on the Droid, but it's not a big huge thing. The Droid is new though. We'll have to see where it goes. And for those of us who will not buy an iPhone ('untill hell freezes over" is probably too strong, but you get the idea) -- those Android OS phones are looking really, really good.

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Amazing news, Cyan!

Would love to know if you're rerendering the graphics at better color definition. If you are rerendering the graphics, that would indicate to us that the original 3d models are still stored at Cyan HQ and not lost.

Question: If that is the case, and this iPhone port sells as well as the Myst one did, and the GOG version sells well too, could you also - at some point - rerelease Riven as a multi-DVD game (or downloadable game) on Mac/PC, with higher-res rerendered graphics and panoramas - a version of Riven with resolution and immersion comparable to Myst IV?

Riven is one of the best Myst games ever made, but it's seriously limited by its slideshow 640x480 format. It's been the second-biggest seller in your company's history and is well worth a rerelease if that rerelease can be done at a reasonably low cost.

The impression I got from the iPhone Myst suggested to me (and if anybody knows I'm wrong, I'd love to hear it) that they have easy access to the original images used to make the game, but perhaps not such easy access to the original 3D stuff. All of the special-case close-ups to certain control panels have a pronounced blur to them, indicating that they were enlarging from an image with a set resolution, rather than re-rendering. It could be that the original 3D data has been lost, or is incompatible with current computers, or perhaps they just didn't have enough man-hours to rerender that stuff... but I guess what I'm saying is that just because they have all of the source images in an uncompressed form, doesn't mean that they have the whole 3D worlds handy. Although the things that you suggest would of course be awesome.

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mszv wrote:

Sigh. Eleri, I do hope you get a job working directly for Cyan one day. You seem to want that so bad.

Oh great Maker, no. Then i wouldn't be able to tell them what I really think

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I do believe this news could sway me into purchasing an iPhone.

I've done some early experiments with Gamesalad's iPhone toolset, and I can say - confidently - that it is possible to have partial-screen animations in an iPhone game, not with Quicktime, maybe, but definitely with sequences of still images.



The trick is integrating the animated hotspot so it doesn't look like a hotspot - difficulties with testing animated partial-screen hotspots, i.e. the hotspot looking different in web preview than in standalone apps - looking fine in the early tests and then being a bit "off" in the .app export - has led me to sometimes prefer full-screen animation on "Isola" to avoid too many iterative difficulties with bad-looking hotspot edges.

That said, animated partial-screen hotspots are definitely possible with image sequences.

Which means that for (partial-screen) hotspots, maybe Cyan Worlds could consider animated efficiently compressed animated .png sequences instead of Quicktime video? Worked for me...

Can't wait until Riven (I have been looking for it on the App Store ever since I saw Myst, I am probably going to get it as soon as it appears)! Chogon, I have three questions. 1. Do you have an approximate time that Riven will come out for the iPhone? 2. Does Cyan Worlds have any plans for the rest of the Myst series? 3. Can you tell me what month that Uru Live is going to come back online?

matthornb wrote:

Which means that for (partial-screen) hotspots, maybe Cyan Worlds could consider animated efficiently compressed animated .png sequences instead of Quicktime video? Worked for me...

Considering that using a series of (losslessly-compressed) png frames rather than a (lossy-compressed) quicktime animation would increase the filesize of the animations in question at least 5x, potentially up to 20x, and considering the already not insignificant size of Riven as-is, I'm not so sure this is such a feasable idea.

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Chogon, you and Cyan Worlds are having compression problems with Riven, right? Here is a suggestion, post Riven as a lite version and then allow the consumer to buy the rest of the game as an in-app purchase expansion pack (it just adds to the lite version, it does not download the full game all at once), which would probably work as long as the size restriction for the game does not apply to the game's in-app purchases.