Unlinked

Slump Virus · **Posted:** Thu May 13, 2010 3:40 pm

My Myst Story

It started when my dad had borrowed Myst and later Riven from a friend. I was about 6 or 7. It took a long time for my dad to return the two games, and so when I was 8 we still had Myst sitting in that drawer with the computer games. That's when I then tried to play the game. I liked the game even though I didn't get anywhere besides finding my way accidentally into the tower when I had rotated the tower to the rocket. So even though I didn't ever connect the tower rotation, I still got my way into the selenitic age where I was then of course stuck.(and yeah, I don't think that musical puzzle is really that hard) And after the game was remembered and returned, I never played it again.

When I was 15, my oldest sister and my two oldest brothers (actually, I'm older than all of them) wanted to get a PSP.
They put their money together to purchase one, I was less enthusiastic about getting a PSP, but I agreed to help get some games. The PSP never was worth getting, but when looking stuff up, I found that Myst was available on PSP I was interested in getting it until I realized the price. So, never mind. But then we found it on some website for only like 7 dollars or something. It was described as being a legit English copy of the game, but guess not. We received a real Myst game, (not realMYST, just a real Myst game) but it was in Japanese. The cover says a few things like "FOR JAPAN ONLY" and "This game is for sale and use in Japan only, anywhere else..." I still played it. After a long time of getting stuck and finally figuring it out and then getting even more stuck like any Myst player would, I got (without understanding any story) to the point where I had returned every red and blue page. Funny, I think players usually choose the red pages first. Well now what? What about the fireplace? Is what's on the torn paper very important? It was interesting, not knowing anything as I wandered through the game's ages. It was in some sense a better game that way. More mystifying, and I guess even a little more scary. I had developed my own theories as to what was written on things, what the journals in the library said, and what Sirrus and Achenar were all about. I had concluded that they were either brothers, or that Achenar and Sirrus were the same person, just that the blue book guy is older, and something has distorted him. (I supposed them to just be recordings, with each page getting more of the message, rather then guys talking to me.)
I wanted to experience the rest of the game, not just with a walkthrough, I wanted to get the whole story. I wanted to hear and see all of the game. So I tried to find a good walkthrough of the game on youtube or somewhere, I could only find somewhat detailed walkthroughs for later Myst games. So I just forgot about it.

I don't know if it was influenced by playing Myst or not, but around that same time I started wanting to create worlds (real worlds, I wasn't thinking Myst ages at the time).
A little later got the desire to try and make a first person adventure game. Something quite possible to do cheaply with some software I found called "Point and Click Development Kit". http://www.adventure-creator.com/index.php?lg=e It's pretty good, and what it wasn't meant to do, can still be done if you use you imagination a bit. I used it to create what for a noob could be considered an epic game. I called it "The Weekend". It was what I call "real life prerendered graphics" mixed with a little photo editing to create things that aren't there (those graphics were cheap, if I was to make it now it would look much better.). It had a pointless, and somewhat comical story, but was still turning out to be a great game and it had about the same amount of depth as the first Nancy Drew game did. But, as you notice, I am phrasing this the way I am; because I only got about a third of the way done with it, when it was destroyed by a virus. I was an idiot to not have backed it up. I still have some project files, and if I wanted to I could start over creating close to the same exact thing, but it's not worth it. I had come up with more story for a part 2 and how it would lead into a part 3. I figured that since the first game didn't have much story I could ditch it and make a game using part 2's basic story. After thinking about it, I realized I might be creating a story of what happened before Myst, and how the art was invented. (Well, I now know enough about Myst, to know that my ideas were pretty far off to become a prequel to it.)
This got me wanting to learn about the Myst series.

So it was then, maybe 3/4 years ago, (I'm almost 17 now.) that I had the desire to try again to find a detailed walkthrough. I thank Shadyparodox http://www.youtube.com/user/shadyparadox so much for posting it. I really liked it so I then finally played Riven, Exile, Revelation, and End of Ages -I loved Riven. Now I've realized URU live is free, and so I'm starting to play it, and am slowly learning what I should know about the D'ni, However I haven't been focused much on it, as I have been doing other things.

But here's what I have begun:

I have a notebook slowly being filled with concept work which could be involved in a Myst game.
I really don't know what I am creating, but as more information is filled into those pages, the more I can see these world(s) being formed. It started with just doodles, and then a few puzzles and map layouts. I have so many ideas. It is slowly coming together; as some simple doodles that I didn't think could have any use, become more meaningful when something is added that could relate to them. Whatever it is I'm making, it's definitely interesting.
I don't wish to show my ideas to the internet just yet, but what are your thoughts about a planet with a core made out of a honey like substance?

For now I am calling this whole thing "Unlinked", after my many ideas that are not yet fully connected.
Also, if this is a Myst game I'm creating, "Unlinked" would be an appropriate name for it.

Nalates · **Posted:** Thu May 13, 2010 6:37 pm

Planet with honey for a core? :shock:

Where is the chocolate?

The idea is presented a little too stand-alone to give a 'go-no-go' opinion on. If your having fun with it, keep going.

Slump Virus · **Posted:** Thu May 13, 2010 7:12 pm

well, it's not exactly a candy age.

I just don't feel like I should post much info yet.

Nalates · **Posted:** Fri May 14, 2010 6:15 am

I couldn't pass up teasing you.

That you want to avoid spoiling the story is typical of writers and the community, understandable. While what you have expressed sounds interesting, its not something we meaningfully say is a good or not so good idea.

Slump Virus · **Posted:** Fri May 14, 2010 2:44 pm

Okay, I've given this some thought. As the idea for this age is coming together I'm realizing this is huge. I don't know what the typical size is for a fan created age, but this is big. I have no experience creating ages. I have played with a trial of 3ds max, but that certainly doesn't make me knowledgeable about building an age for Uru.
I've figured this; I'll try creating a simple age (or more, however many it takes to gain the experience necessary), and when I have finished that, I'll see if I really want to put the time into making such a detailed world.

http://mystonline.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=21151

Charura · **Joined:** Wed Oct 14, 2009 4:14 pm **Posts:** 1773

I'm not sure...I might not be giving the correct place...or even if I'm allowed to do so...but maybe you can ask here...
http://guildofwriters.com/

Nalates · **Posted:** Fri May 14, 2010 10:37 pm

You may get an idea of size constraints by considering that OpenSim and SL use areas 256x256 meters with building up to 1,000m high and a max ceiling of 4,000m, I think. OpenSim can be used to make mega regions 512x512 and even 1,024x1,024, but lag becomes a problem. Blue Mars considers a small area 4,096x4,096m. The max is 16x16km, but one can make them larger. The gotcha is no matter how big you make it avatars can only walk around in the maximum 16x16km area. But, larger ones allow you to make distant horizons. According to the hype, there is no lag in Blue Mars... ever... even with 1,000 av's...

I don't know how units are handled in Max. In Blender they are arbitrary. A unit can be thought of as a foot, a meter, or whatever. On import and export one can scale up or down to suit your work style and project.

I think of MOULa as more like Blue Mars. I suspect the limits in MOULa/Open Uru are imposed by performance, lag. Charura, is right. The best place to get good information is GoW and GoMa. At GoMaAndy is posting new tutorials almost everyday. Plus in the evening he will usually answer GoMa shout-box messages. More projects are opening at OpenUru.org, but it is not active as GoMa and GoW.

Slump Virus · **Posted:** Sat May 15, 2010 1:15 am

Nalates wrote:

You may get an idea of size constraints by considering that OpenSim and SL use areas 256x256 meters with building up to 1,000m high and a max ceiling of ...

Thanks for the info.

it seems to me that 16km would be enough.
it's not really that it's a big map, it's that it would take a lot of work.

Slump Virus · **Posted:** Fri May 28, 2010 4:56 pm

I turned 17 yesterday.
Seems the events of that day have given me some more inspiration.
Pretty important information too, it just changed an entire part of the age's story.
I have to make this.

Slump Virus · **Posted:** Sat May 29, 2010 4:22 pm

I will name the age Bleen.
The name came from me thinking of the fact that the age doesn't contain a lot of red, it's mostly blue and green.
Bees do not see red; instead they see in a spectrum of ultraviolet, blue, and green.
It seems now, I just gave out more info.

andylegate · **Posted:** Sat May 29, 2010 5:50 pm

In Blender, 1 Blender Unit = 1 Foot

In Max, it depends on what you set it to, however, in order to use Cyan's Plugin for Max correctly, you need to have 1 Max unit set to 1 foot.

So, if you make a box that is 10 x 10 x 10, it will be 10 foot by 10 foot by 10 foot.

As for how big something is: sky is the limit. You will have some problems however, for example, in Blender, the maximum you can set you "View" settings to is 10,000, so the furthest you will see in Blender itself is 10,000 feet.

Each Age in Uru has settings also based upon how far you can see. For the Age over all is controled by the .fni file (yes, I can talk about this because this is how it is done in MOUL:a also).

You also have the ability to limit how far the player sees in game by several means that you use in Cyan's plugin.

Plasma will let the player see quite far when needed. This is very apparent in Myst V in the Age of Todelmer. I can't go into details on this forum about it, but rest assured, when you link in there and look out and away, those things you see a FAAAAR away. :wink:

If you want more details on how all this works, please visit either the GoW forum or the GoMa forum, and we can give you better info there.

Slump Virus · **Posted:** Tue Aug 03, 2010 9:09 pm

I'm coming pretty close to finishing the concept of all of this.

I had played Riven again and got some inspiration from it.

Slump Virus · **Posted:** Tue Aug 10, 2010 2:00 am

Here is the story.

For now, the story is not something I'm looking at fully writing out. It is instead meant to be a possible guide for the creation of one or more ages in URU. The amount of story that is given away, will be what is found in the journals.

I had a little trouble with this, because I came up with the story completely backwards.

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