Become a fan of Slashdot on Facebook

 


Forgot your password?
Close
typodupeerror
×
It's funny. Laugh. Entertainment Games

Grand Theft Auto: Myst 48

Posted by Zonk from the two-great-tastes-that-go-great-together dept.
j0hnyb1423 writes "Salon is running a "preview" for the next GTA title: Grand Theft Auto: Myst. You have to watch a short ad to see the whole article but it's well worth it. From the article: "Obviously, compromises had to be made. For example, if you've played "Myst" before, you know that go-go clubs are scarce and that there's no Little Havana, per se. Similarly, in "Grand Theft Auto," the only reason you might find yourself in a library is because you're hiding from the SWAT helicopter. Balance was key: Just the right amount of urban development -- followed by just the right amount of urban decay -- was needed to create a picturesque dreamscape that could also credibly be swimming in guns.""
This discussion has been archived. No new comments can be posted.

Grand Theft Auto: Myst More

Grand Theft Auto: Myst

Comments Filter:

  • Downtown Detroit (Score:4, Funny)

    by AtariAmarok ( 451306 ) on Wednesday February 02, 2005 @01:51PM (#11552290)
    " Just the right amount of urban development -- followed by just the right amount of urban decay -- was needed to create a picturesque dreamscape that could also credibly be swimming in guns."" "

    Ah. This explains the camera crews and digitizing teams combing downtown Detroit a few months ago.

  • Sodding Salon's sodding registration thing doesn't work --- the 'free pass' button isn't clickable. On my browser, at least. Someone hurry up and post the text.

    (And people can't understand why these jump-through-a-hoop-to-read-the-article systems annoy people so much... half the time they don't work! I've simply given up trying to register the NYT, for example.)

  • Old School (Score:5, Funny)

    by tiktok ( 147569 ) on Wednesday February 02, 2005 @02:00PM (#11552395) Homepage
    That's a lot more impressive than the last one that was in ASCII: Need For Speed: Zork Unleashed.

  • When two different stories just fit too well.... (Score:3, Funny)

    by ReverendLoki ( 663861 ) on Wednesday February 02, 2005 @02:02PM (#11552422)
    This sounds like it could have been the first video game review by the Onion AV Club....
  • "Grand Theft Auto: Myst" In the most gorgeously conceived AND ultraviolent video game in history, you can open fire on passing cars with a bazooka while exploring universal archetypes!


    By Jason Roeder


    Feb. 2, 2005 | Objective:

    Climb the ranks as a gangland sociopath by ruthlessly solving a series of intricate puzzles dispersed throughout the fantasy worlds of "Myst." But that's just the game's narrative dimension. Half the fun, of course, is exploration for its own sake, so if for some reason you'

  • Article Text (Score:4, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday February 02, 2005 @02:04PM (#11552449)
    "Grand Theft Auto: Myst"
    In the most gorgeously conceived AND ultraviolent video game in history, you can open fire on passing cars with a bazooka while exploring universal archetypes!

    Objective: Climb the ranks as a gangland sociopath by ruthlessly solving a series of intricate puzzles dispersed throughout the fantasy worlds of "Myst." But that's just the game's narrative dimension. Half the fun, of course, is exploration for its own sake, so if for some reason you're losing interest in, say, valves and knobs, just take a break from the storyline and wander. The realms of "Myst" aren't mere pixilated backdrops, but vivid and highly interactive landscapes. If you simply dash from screen to screen, you'll miss out on many of the game's treasures, not to mention some nicely situated sniping perches.

    Start: The game begins simply enough: You find yourself on an island. You don't know how you arrived in this magical place -- you've only been out of the joint three hours, and you hope to fuck you're not in Jamaica because you know way too many Rasta men with scores to settle. But unraveling the astonishing truth will take all your wits. Then, it will take the wits of smarter friends, and then it will take the wits of a shut-in who wrote a walk-through.

    How did this game come about?
    With the release of "Revelation," the fourth installment of "Myst," not to mention several derivative novels, the creative team at Cyan worried that the title had played itself out. For a jump-start, the company turned to collaborations with long-standing video game icons. Those early partnerships, however, failed to produce the desired synergy. In other words, there's a good reason you haven't played "Ms. Pac-Myst."

    But the "Grand Theft Auto" and "Myst" series seem so aesthetically opposed. How did the programmers manage to integrate them?
    Obviously, compromises had to be made. For example, if you've played "Myst" before, you know that go-go clubs are scarce and that there's no Little Havana, per se. Similarly, in "Grand Theft Auto," the only reason you might find yourself in a library is because you're hiding from the SWAT helicopter. Balance was key: Just the right amount of urban development -- followed by just the right amount of urban decay -- was needed to create a picturesque dreamscape that could also credibly be swimming in guns.

    "Myst" is pretty much uninhabited, while "GTA" is all about the characters. How did they get around that?
    To be honest, there wasn't any coherent, plausible way to populate "Myst" within the existing mythos. Instead, the game's creators took a bold meta approach. All the inhabitants of "Grand Theft Auto: Myst" are the virtual presences of players who attempted a previous version of "Myst" but gave up forever after 45 enchanting minutes. Without a directing intelligence to guide them, these "afterimages" eventually coalesced into a crude, benighted society -- prostitutes, drug lords, tourists.

    What about Atrus?
    For those of you unfamiliar with the name, Atrus is the architect of all the "Myst" realms. He's wise, avuncular, and needs your help -- a lot, and for free. The folks at Cyan wanted to keep him that way. Rockstar Games, which puts out the "GTA" series, wanted to go in a different direction with "Myst's" most important character. In the end, an agreement was reached: Atrus -- still wise, still avuncular -- would be recast as a harmless rare-book dealer who occasionally troubled players with small errands: picking up 700 kilos of rare books at an abandoned quarry, connecting a rare book to the ignition of a Russian mafia lieutenant's car, and so on. In addition, Atrus' ether addiction could be toggled on and off.

    There's something so pristine and nonthreatening about "Myst." I'm worried that it will resensitize me to violence.
    I know what you mean. There's that one-of-a-kind "Grand Theft Auto" moment when you've beaten a hooker senseless with a golf club, dragged a to
  • Best Game you will Never play.

    From the fine article:
    There's something so pristine and nonthreatening about "Myst." I'm worried that it will resensitize me to violence.

    I know what you mean. There's that one-of-a-kind "Grand Theft Auto" moment when you've beaten a hooker senseless with a golf club, dragged a tourist from his station wagon, and sped off down a crowded sidewalk, only to realize your sole regret is that you jacked a car with such crummy acceleration. Meanwhile, one of "Myst's" strengths is

  • Just a bad joke (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Friar_MJK ( 814134 ) on Wednesday February 02, 2005 @02:15PM (#11552571)
    They almost had me on this. I thought it was going to be a real preview of the next sequel. I remember an interview with a Rockstar developer saying that the next (real) installment was going to be nothing like the previous three and will be about as big of a jump technically as going from GTA2 to GTA3 was.

    Instead, I get treated to a crummy article mixing two games that are so different this could never even happen. I think the next GTA is a few years off anyway, hardly past the storyboard sketching phase yet I'm sure.

    • I hope it does come about. Imagine, Povray [povray.org] quality GTA. Everything looks real, not like some simulation.

      Of course the system requirements will make Doom 3 look simple. Multiple 64 bit processors, lots of memory. Lots of bandwidth inside the machine.

      It would look nice though.

    • I'm really hoping for Mass multiplayer online GTA, form your own gangs or crime organisations. Unfortunately they'd have to charge if they did that :-/ But it would be cool trying to take out rival busineses, driving along only to have another player try to jack your car not realising you were packing :)

  • It's a Satire (Score:1, Redundant)

    by Miaomiao ( 618330 )
    This article is posted in the Satire section of Salon, so isn't really meant to be an example of something that will actually be released. So you don't have to worry about random explosions, and feeding the creator of the world for a horrible book addiction. I just wonder what you would do with 200 kilos of books... arn't they better if you use small print?

  • uhh yeah... (Score:1, Redundant)

    by drunken dash ( 804404 )
    i think the word "preview" was in quotes for a reason - the /. editors clearly knew this was a joke :P
    • Not to mention the foot as a topic icon. By the way, whoever is marking everything as redundant can stop, these guys are clearly trying to clarify some stuff, and they're hardly being redundant while doing so.

  • meh (Score:4, Interesting)

    by WormholeFiend ( 674934 ) on Wednesday February 02, 2005 @03:56PM (#11554019)
    satire bleh

    What would be interesting is if Rockstar decided, for their next GTA title, to give everyone a little surprise...

    If, under the base-layer of GTA-style missions, there was something else lurking, like an evil cult bent on summoning Dagon or Cthulhu, except that Rockstar would have to not tell anyone about it.

    It could even be a series of ultra-secret missions that aren't even covered by the commercially released completist guides.

  • Tepid. (Score:1)

    by 1019 ( 262204 )
    Was this really worth the effort? It's not funny at all. Really, you could achieve the same level of 'humour' by combining GTA with any older game. GTA:NBA Jam! GTA: Mortal Kombat! I'm LOL'ing my socks off. Truly.

    Good thing /. went to all that trouble to link it and throw hundreds of idiots who don't RTFA into a desperate state of assumption.

  • Mash-ups seem to be the new big thing in music (The Beatles vs. Jay-Z, Linkin Park vs. Jay-Z, Conway Twitty vs. The Sex Pistols (j/k)), why not take it to video games?

    GTA vs. SimCity - city building determines the locations and type of missions, successfully becoming a bigger crime lord brings down property values and drives out sims.

    Halo vs. Master of Orion - fight out those inter-empire battles in the first person

    Quake vs. Home Architect 3D - design a nice home... and have a huge fragfest in it and des
    • GTA + SimCity = Streets of Sim City

      I loved that game and its wacky physics engine.

      Accelerate to max speed, throw car into a 180 degree spin, release the slide button and shoot in the other direction at max speed.

      That gave me a head on collision with someone chasing me so many times.

      They need to make a Streets version for the newer sim city games.
  • Since the early days of anticipating GTA Vice City, I have discussed with friends and online gamers various ideas for mixing the Grand Theft Auto visual and gameplay structure with other types of games:

    * The similarities of GTA with 007-style shooters that require more stealth are already obvious, so let's move on.

    * Applying the physics engine of driving games like Gran Turismo (or insert your favorite here) could make the driving elements a bit more enjoyable.

    * At some point I want to drive a vehicle in
    • Me and my friends have discussed this at length too. A few improvements that WE figured out:

      Realistic physics (you already mentioned this). This could be negative though. If I'm running from the cops, I want some sort of arcade like physics to enhance the experience. There's something about driving slow (as most realistic cars are) that isn't fun.

      Replay mode. This could be amazing because there's been a lot of stuff that I wish I had a video of. Add a director's mode for some truly stunning replays
      • If you just want to improve GTA, here's the best thing I can imagine: options to replay missions.

        The developers could decide whether this is available after completing (a) any mission, (b) all missions at any location, (c) all core missions in the game, or (d) every mission in the game up to 100% completion.

  • Been done before. (Score:3, Funny)

    by njord ( 548740 ) on Wednesday February 02, 2005 @09:41PM (#11557801)
    Well, almost: Myst III Arena [geocities.com]

    Circa 2000

  • I glanced at that "article" yesterday... it's annoying garbage, but more important it's pretty clearly fictional. No source for the "interview" is noted. The author's credit at the bottom, IIRC, notes he's some fiction freelancer.

    In related news, subscribe to Salon, a leftist/aggravating but at least independent voice on politics and corporatization!

Slashdot Top Deals

It is easier to write an incorrect program than understand a correct one.

Close