Recommending Riven - General

[video=youtube;bsh_vyAfMuE]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bsh_vyAfMuE[/video] (hopefully wasn't posted already) I loved Riven. I played through it as a kid with my dad who normally hates video games but he got really into it.

seems fun

I first played Riven when I moved out of my house and into an apartment with a couple really old computers. Riven is basically Myst with a more present and understandable plot and a more consistent and gorgeous visual design. I loved it to death, and if you can tolerate its naturally frustrating puzzles sometimes, it's a guaranteed immersive fun time for fans of the genre.

Hell yeah, Riven was the best game in the Myst series. Those who don't know, there's a [URL="http://www.starryexpanse.com/"]full fan-made 3D remake[/URL] being developed right now (with Cyan's blessing, too!). So hopefully this would get some new interest in the game once it comes out.

[QUOTE=Cool Tapes;52040917]Hell yeah, Riven was the best game in the Myst series. Those who don't know, there's a [URL="http://www.starryexpanse.com/"]full fan-made 3D remake[/URL] being developed right now (with Cyan's blessing, too!). So hopefully this would get some new interest in the game once it comes out.[/QUOTE] Cyan should hire those guys and make realRiven: The Sequel to realMyst. :v:

Still got the discs for this and Myst. I got through Myst alright but I didn't catch on to the big over-arcing riddles he talked about and didn't play through the whole thing until I was older. This is one of those games where the atmosphere can be really unnerving and you get more freaked out than in a game that's trying to scare you. There were some places that I just wanted to get through as fast as possible even when I'd played it before.

Riven is like, in my top tier list of games that I consider absolute masterpieces. It has the best tone and atmosphere out of any of the Myst games, and really any adventure game IMO.

[QUOTE=Amakir;52041291]Cyan should hire those guys and make realRiven: The Sequel to realMyst. :v:[/QUOTE] That's pretty much what they're doing, they have more than just Cyan's blessing. The Starry Expanse devs and have some kind of secretive relationship with Cyan and are also working with them to determine the game's distribution method and price.

One of the best parts of Riven is its soundtrack: [sp]Ghen's[/sp] Theme is a constant, dominating leitmotif across the soundtrack. [video=youtube;ITObGdvx7x4]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ITObGdvx7x4[/video] [video=youtube;aouzEAym22k]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aouzEAym22k[/video] [URL="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UwVIwTAwZ-4"]Spoiler title for the theme that the leitmotifs draw from.[/URL] The result is that when you finally get to this point in the game and hear this music, it's familiar but still a new arrangement. What I loved the most about Riven was how so many of its "harder" puzzles had simple solutions. For example, at the beginning of the game you find a locked gate in front of a cave. Clicking on the gate plays a brief QuickTime animation of the gate swinging until it hits its latch's tautness and then it snaps back into position. But then you notice that there's a fairly significant gap [I]under[/I] the gate. Clicking in that gap lets you into the cave because you "crawled under it" -- you have to think of puzzles as if you're really there. The video describes how Riven broke ground on environmental storytelling, but it goes deeper than that because the interactions themselves expect environmental suspension of disbelief. At one point I was stuck for an entire day, unable to figure out how to progress into something new, since I had done everything I knew how to do and I had puzzles that very clearly needed clues from elsewhere/missing components that I hadn't been able to find. It turned out that I needed to go to one screen, and then click on either margin of the screen, in these 30-pixel-wide gaps in the sides of the big open doorway the sceen presented -- this [I]closed[/I] the doors and revealed a passage off to the left (or right? whatever) that led to a critical thing two screens away. I had been on this screen at least 30 times and didn't think to close the doors, despite the game showing me, very clearly, that this was a [I]doorway[/I] and not a cave entrance. Thinking about the game as if you're really there is also integral to seeing one of the easiest-to-miss easter eggs in the game. [sp]As soon as you gain control after the opening cinematic, walk outside the 'cell' and click over the edge of the cliff. You'll see the body of the dude who stole your book and then got shanked. Coming back to this place later reveals the same view but without the body.[/sp] That screen is also home to another easter egg: [sp]One of the programmers' kids are photoshopped into a corner of the background and blended in.[/sp] There really are only two major puzzles in the game, it's true, but the first challenge is just figuring out how to come up with the answer. The first is deviously clever and masterfully subtle. The second is very impressive, but a hell of cross-referencing about eight different variables. I figured out HOW the game wanted me to come to the answer, and then I cheated because I didn't feel like spending 2-4 hours doing the legwork to get the exactly correct answer. :v:

Now I really got interested. Riven is 74% off on gog too.

Riven is an absolute masterpiece. I never beat it (though I beat Myst) but it has an incredible charm to it that really is the culmination of what Myst started. Just an amazing journey through a new world, tinkering with shit to find out what it does. Still go the discs but I also have it on GOG. I really have the urge to play it through now.

The only right way to play Riven [img_thumb]http://i.imgur.com/9RushLl.jpg[/img_thumb] [img_thumb]http://i.imgur.com/cRSDn2a.jpg[/img_thumb] [img_thumb]http://i.imgur.com/31FbSVy.jpg[/img_thumb] [img_thumb]http://i.imgur.com/y64zSs7.jpg[/img_thumb]

Riven and Exile were the most breathtaking games I had ever seen when I played them as a kid. Exile especially, when you first link into J'nannin as you chase Saavedro at the very start of the game.

[QUOTE=haloguy234;52043801]The only right way to play Riven (notes)[/QUOTE] See there's no way I would have thought to do all of this shit when I was little. I got through Myst alright because for the most part it's individual puzzles.