The map is of Myst Island and features its key landmarks: the library, gear room, spaceship, clock tower, and observatory. However, surrounding the island are the connected Ages accessed through gameplay: Channelwood, with its treehouses emerging from the water; Stoneship, a stormy, maritime region of lighthouses and wrecks; Mechanical Age, a rotating fortress; and Selenitic, a sparse, sound-based puzzle world.

Ex Carta

Released in 1993, Myst revolutionised gaming with its contemplative approach to exploration and puzzle-solving. The map of Myst Island anchors this experience, situating key landmarks and opening gateways to the game’s mysterious Ages.

When Myst first appeared in 1993, it was startling in its originality. Despite being a composite of static images, the game design at least gave the impression of 3D immersion, making it stand out in a field of 2D scrollers and shoot ‘em ups. Instead of frantic action, button mashing, and health bars, this was a sedate and cerebral game of exploration, puzzle solving, and painstaking trial and error – sometimes exacerbated by a point-and-click control system straining against the technological constraints of its pre-rendered visuals. It was created by brothers Rand Miller (b.1959) and Robyn Miller (b.1966), who made ground-breaking use of the new CD-ROM storage format to create high-resolution, filmic environments featuring snippets of full-motion video to facilitate its elliptical, slow-burn storytelling. Although originally only available for the Mac, it was soon ported to Windows PCs and had sold over 6 million copies by 2000. Since its release, it has been frequently updated, remastered, and refined, most recently as a VR experience. It spawned many sequels and imitators, and is still accessible on a variety of platforms, with contemporary gamers by turns delighted and frustrated by its oblique mysteries and sometimes counterintuitive puzzles.

The world and lore of Myst were inspired by the Miller brothers’ appreciation of classic fantasy literature such as The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, as well as their Christian faith. Its metatextual conceits – particularly the in-game notion of worldbuilding through texts – evoke the philosophical literature of Jorge Luis Borges (1899–1986).

Beneath the surface-level serenity of the gameplay lies a rich lore concerning the D’ni, a fallen civilisation with the power to link to other worlds – called Ages – through the act of writing. Playing the game and solving its puzzles is an act of recovery of this lost knowledge. Myst Island serves as a hub to the Ages, each with distinct geography and symbolic architecture.

Map of Myst Island