Myst tipped to be coming to a TV near you

Those who remember a time when you put in CDs, not DVDs, into PCs in order to install and play a game may have just jumped for joy or at the very least sported mild amusement on their faces. Myst, one of the unexpected successes of the gaming industry in the last two decades, is now rumored to be making a return to mainstream consciousness. Not as a remake, not as a remaster, and not as a film either, but as a new TV series. Well, maybe with a new game as well.

Myst might be puzzling to today's gamers, so used to the fast-paced action, photorealistic graphics, and deep characters of modern games. But when it launched back in 1993, Myst took the gaming market by surprise and by storm. Like already popular shooters of that time, the game is played in the first person. But more like adventure games, it revolved around solving puzzles instead of killing baddies. In fact, there isn't any sort of killing in this game at all. But what really endeared it to gamers was, at that time, the beautifully pre-rendered graphics that really put the then nascent CD-ROM technology to the test and even helped drive its popularity.

Myst is definitely ripe for a TV adaptation or spin-off, and there won't be any lack of possible content. The Myst game world revolves around different book worlds called Ages and in the original game, the player controls the Stranger, the game's protagonist, in unraveling the mysteries of the world and of the family that once lived on the island. But even beyond the game's sequel, Riven, and the canonical novels that followed, there is definitely enough content to work with and to even expand. Plus, today's technology is pretty capable of executing the visual and graphical effects that Myst's original creators could only dream of back then.

Word is that Myst developers Cyan Worlds is partnering with Legendary Entertainment, whose long list of movie titles under their belt speaks well of the company's fantasy production chops. Now all that's left is for the dream to become reality. Unfortunately, there has already been talk in the past of taking Myst to a more cinematic experience, which never came to fruition. Hopefully a comparatively smaller scale production will give it a better chance.

VIA: CNET