Title:
  • Riven: The Sequel to Myst

Genre:
  • Graphic Adventure

Developer:
  • Cyan

Publisher:

  • Brøderbund Software (as Red Orb Software)

Release Date:
  • October 31 1997

On Wikipedia:

Systems:
  • Mac, Windows, PlayStation (a little later), Sega Saturn (a little later), Pocket PC (later still),
    iOS (much later), Android (much later)

Box Art Credit:
  • Mobygames

Mini-Review
I previously wrote a bit about Riven: The Sequel to Myst here, and it was on the short list of games that I wanted to get back into (I was reorganizing my list of games that I owned and needed to play/finish). The BradyGames guide is great (by William H. Keith Jr. and Nina Barton) and deserves to be talked of its own, and Riven is one of those games of childhood that I wanted to be take into the modern world (though if you wanted to experience something new, there is a remake released in 2025, simply called Riven). Between ScummVM, well-crafted emulators, and source ports, I'm able to put those old Mac games alongside modern games I enjoy. However, I can't really write this review because part of it would be waxing nostalgic for a time and place that no longer exists. I mean, of all of the new features ScummVM offers, I do miss the idea the buzzing of the CD drive asking me to insert Disc 3. I still think of the way the PowerWave's disc drive sounded.

That's why I'm cutting this review short. Here's what happened: at some point after at least one restart, I came back to it in April 2024, not really knowing where I was beyond that I was on Plateau Island. I checked my notes and realized I didn't know Riven numbers beyond ten, and sat back and thought about my situation:

  - If I restarted, I would have my old notes and maps. And I believe many elements like the eye patterns on the Fire Marble Domes don't change. It looked that way in 2000, it looks that way now.
  I have the full guide so I could also use a walkthrough to get up to where I was, then work from there.
  However, I know enough of some of the secrets (like the first "eye" location and what it is) and I could sequence-break.
  I remembered that I DID actually beat the game with the walkthrough some years ago with the actual disk-swapping. I had experienced most of the game again that I really wanted to do, so at this point, who was I trying to impress?

The end result—I KNOW I like this game and have seen enough of it to know everything of it.

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