Myst is a graphic adventure designed by the Miller brothers, Robyn and Rand. It was developed by Cyan, Inc., published by Broderbund, and initially released in 1993 for the Macintosh. In the game, the player travels via a special book to a mysterious island called Myst. From there, solving puzzles allows the player to travel to other worlds (“Ages”), which reveal the backstory of the game’s characters and help the player make the choice of whom to aid. The player interacts with objects and walks to different locations by clicking on pre-rendered imagery.

The game marked a segue for the Miller brothers from the kid’s games market to adult-targeted games. They wanted to create a graphically-impressive game with a nonlinear story and mystery elements. The game’s design was limited by the small memory footprint of consoles (the original intended platform for the game) and by the slow speed of CD-ROM drives. The game was created on Macintosh computers and ran on the HyperCard software stack, though ports to other platforms subsequently required the creation of a new engine.

The game was a critical and commercial success. Critics lauded the ability of the game to immerse players in its fictional world; it has since been considered one of the best video games ever made. Selling more than six million copies, Myst became the best-selling PC game until The Sims exceeded its sales in 2002. It helped drive adoption of the CD-ROM drive, spawned a multimedia franchise, and inspired clones, parodies, and new video game genres, as well as spin-off novels and other media. The game has been rereleased and remade using real-time 3D graphics.

Courtesy of WikiPedia