Cyan Outlines "Hurdles" In Reclaiming Myst Online

Cyan Worlds said it's formulated a plan to bring Myst Online back to its fans, after GameTap shunted control of the property back to its creators.

Cyan CTO Mark "Chogon" DeForest said in a community board letter that despite having a plan in place, cheerfully titled the "Myst Online: Restoration Experiment (MORE)," there are some "hurdles to overcome." Among the necessary compromises will be an implementation of a $25 fee for a six month subscription.

"We are not trying to make any money on this at this stage - but we do need to cover some of the costs," he said.

"You should know that the roadmap does not involve any new content from Cyan at this time. The plan is to start to move the content creation - the 'Art' - to you. In addition the guilds themselves will start to exercise some authority in monitoring, approving, communicating, etc."

Kotaku also spoke to Chogon about when the bigger, better, faster, MORE Myst Online might be up and running:

American McGee Gives Gamers Free Grimm

Once Upon A Time, American McGee decided to create an episodic game based on fairy tales like Little Red Riding Hood, Cinderella, Jack and the Beanstalk and Beauty and the Beast with a dark twist.

Better still, McGee decided that those episodes, their are eight in the first volume, will be free to play for the first 24 hours of release. The best is that the very first episode, A Boy Learns What Fear Is, will be permanently free when it hits on July 31.

Those who want to play the rest of the games episodes at their leisure will have to sign up for the GameTap Gold service. Not a bad idea. It certainly shows just how much faith GameTap has in the game.

Hit the jump for the break down of episodes and scans from the press release story book that GameTap sent along today. Be warned, it ends with everyone dying!

GameTap: Myst Pass-Back Benefits Fans

As we reported earlier, the latest twist in the long and difficult life of Myst Online: Uru Live now sees the game handed back to its creators, Cyan Worlds, who said they'll relaunch the game later this year. The reason for GameTap surrendering the project? The company says it's just better for the fans.

“Cyan Worlds has been a great partner to GameTap," said content VP and creative director Rick Sanchez. "It’s just the right thing to do, giving Cyan and the fans the opportunity to continue to enjoy this rich universe that has become a second home to many of its inhabitants.”

The fan-favorite Uru Live getting shifted out of GameTap's portfolio for good comes just after Turner's content delivery network shuttered its editorial division and canceled its Galactic Command publishing deal with outspoken developer Derek Smart.

Amid all these issues, we asked Sanchez if there might be some difficulties at GameTap:

GameTap Passes Myst Online Back To Cyan

Myst Online: Uru Live has had somewhat of a difficult life. The online multiplayer component of Uru: Ages Beyond Myst never made it out of the beta testing phase before being canceled in 2004. Then in 2006, Turner Broadcasting's GameTap service revived Uru Live, officially launching the game in February 2007 only to discontinue operation a year later. Now GameTap has given the publishing rights for the game back to Myst creators Cyan Worlds, who plan to relaunch Myst Online later this year.

Cyan president Rand Miller says that the newly relaunched game will include features that will allow players to create their own content, which was hinted at during the game's first relaunch. The revitalized title will carry a fee ($25 for 6 months was suggested) to cover the cost of maintaining servers.

There's something to be said for tenacity, but I fear in this case that something is "Just let it die already."

GameTap gives Myst Online back to Cyan. Cyan says it's opening the game to fan development [TXT - Thanks Kyven]]

American McGee’s Grimm has been somewhat of a mystery to me since it was announced. The concept sounded good, I mean anything based on Grimm’s fairy tales always catches my interest. I had been anxious to see exactly what it was going to be like and today I got my chance. It was certainly different than what I expected it might be and way more as well.

As you may have heard, Grimm is going to be an episodic game, with new episodes appearing every week. Episodes will be free for the first 24 hours and from there you can either purchase them individually from GameTap.com/grimm or get them free via a gold GameTap subscription. Each episode will take on a different fairy tale (some well know and some not so well known) with the first being “The Boy Learns What Fear Is,” and others to follow including “Red Riding Hood” and “The Girl Without Hands.”

In the game, you take on the character of Grimm, an evil little troll who is sick of the happy endings that most fairy tales seem to have. So he takes it upon himself (and you) to wreak as much havoc as possible on the rainbow colored fairy tale worlds. Each episode starts out with a “puppet show,” with Grimm telling you the good version of the tale. Once the show is over, you are set loose in the land of the story to see exactly how much of it you can turn dark.

Go Play Fallout & Descent On GameTap

More free stuff on GameTap? Sign me up. Interplay have announced a deal with the service whereby some of their older titles - like Fallout, MDK and Descent - will be made available. And not just on the subscription service or download store, either. In the totally free, ad-supported bit as well. While I imagine most of you will head on over to give Fallout one last try before the third game hits later this year, I'd recommend a quick spin on Descent first. Only two games have ever made me literally dizzy. Even a little bit sick. But in a good way! Descent is one of them.

GameTap to Offer Classic Interplay Titles [Shacknews]

Deus Ex Free Next Week

Been a while since a game really worth playing (beyond Super Baseball 2020) turned up on Gametap's free-to-play service, so it's nice to be able to report on one. Deus Ex. Starting next week, anyone who downloads Gametap's launcher program can enjoy the game without paying a cent. There's worse ways to get hold of one of the best PC games of all time. Like, you know. Paying for it.

Deus Ex Coming to GameTap's Free Game Roster Next Week [Shacknews]

Turner's GameTap Shutters Editorial, Boots Staff

GameTap, the on-demand game portal owned by Turner Broadcasting, is closing the books on its editorial division to focus solely on games, according to a community post by content vice president Ricardo Sanchez.

Sources have confirmed to Wired that all staff members not involved in developing game content will be laid off beginning in June. GameTap's editorial division has been operational for less than a year, and Sanchez said that "while we have been very happy with the work done by our editorial and video teams, we’ve made a decision to focus the business on our biggest strength, which is our game catalog."

"As a result, we will be restructuring the site to focus exclusively on gameplay."

Sanchez's full statement follows the jump:

Sam And Max - Sometimes The Paranoid Are Right

American McGee's Grimm Looks Grimm

Just days prior to the one-year anniversary of the launch of Myst Online: Uru Live, the publisher responsible for bringing Cyan Worlds' MMO to the masses (well... ) has announced its termination. GameTap's Vice President of Content and Creative Director Ricardo Sanchez broke the bad news to fans on the game's official forums, writing that the MMO has 60 days to live, at which point the game servers will be shut down and tears will begin to shed.

Myst fans will be glad to read, however, that "Cyan is still a very valued partner of GameTap, we are on excellent terms, and we look forward to continuing our relationship in the future." Stay strong, Mysties.

Myst Online: Uru Live Season 2 Status [Myst Online Forums]

Sam And Max Versus The Nipple Ring Vampire

While GameTap extended an olive branch out to intel-based Mac users a few months ago, today they are expanding their offerings to the Mac community in a big way. With the new GameTap player, Mac users will now have access to both SEGA Saturn and Dreamcast games. And to be honest, Crazy Taxi on my Macbook Pro doesn't sound like the worst way to waste an afternoon.

PC users will benefit too with the the GameTap player's updated, streamlined interface. I mean, you're not getting any new games or anything. But you've already had your fun while the rest of us were pouting in the corner, acting interested in our iPods.

GameTap Sets Daikatana Free

GameTap really hates us. Don't believe it? Just look what they've given us for Christmas. From now until December 31st, John Romero's masterpiece Daikatana is free for everyone to play.They've even posted a retrospective covering the game's history for you to giggle at. If you missed out on what some game reviewers at the time called "BWAHAHAHAHAHA", and "Is this a joke?", then now is your chance to experience all the pulse-pounding terror of robot frogs! *insert horrific violin squealing incidental music here*. Seriously though, you can't make fun of it unless you've played it, so there it is. This article is the gaming equivalent of eating something bad and going, "Ew, this is horrible! Taste this!"

Play Daikatana Free [GameTap]

Bushnell Defines "Pure, Unadulterated Trash" Gaming