Hi Gang......

My pleasure to pass along what I am allowed of a conversation this morning, with a good friend of mine who is a very active insider on CYAN's URU project. To quote: ...."the game is awesome!" It is highly addictive and worth getting DSL. It is a multi-player in that you can wander around and you can visit other players/people, take tours...etc. Being is the game is online, you can get the current ages, updated graphics and community new/stuff. "The exploration aspect is absolutely unbelievable."

This insider, who has virtually unequalled adventure gaming experience says, ...."To date, I haven't seen anything that resembles this game. This new online world will not only get MYST fans pumped, but introduce a lot of new people to a gaming experience unlike any other. It is the future of interactive gaming."

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Are you ready? URU: Ages Beyond MYST official site.

WELL, I FOR ONE AM REALLY TICKED OFF. LOVE THE MYST SERIES AND CONCEPT, BUT SINCE UBI SAYS 'WORLDS TO SHARE' THEY'RE NOT SHARING! WHY LIMIT THE ACCESS TO ONLY BROADBAND USERS? THIS IS NO ACTION CAPTURE THE FLAG TYPE OF GAME. IMHOP THIS STINKS.

Thanks for the update Witchie, I can hardly wait until they release this one !! I think this game might breathe new life into our beloved Adventure Game genre.

Of course, "worth getting DSL" assumes that DSL is available. DSL has been "coming within 18 months" every place I've lived in the last 6 years (California, Virginia, Connecticut). Oddly, though, DSL never seems to arrive. And with the telcos once again in charge of DSL, I doubt I'll ever see it. Ah, well.

Alright, my stupidity is showing, but will this work if you have cable, not DSL?

I think the only requirement is a connection faster than dial-up. That is, a connection faster than mine.

My understanding of the requirements were "broadband." Broadband includes cable, DSL, T1-3, any fast connection. In other words....NOT 56K dial up.

Cable can vary tremendously in speed. In peak use hours it can be as slow as dialup.

DSL isn't perfect either. My Dad gets DSL and connections sometimes stall out due to packet loss or something.

I can't afford either one. Especially not Cable, since I don't currently get Cable TV.

Would it be so unthinkable for Cyan to have subscriptions where they'd send you a CD or DVD every month which includes the new areas?

Hi there, Jenny.................I don't know if its "unthinkable" but its sure worth looking into, huh? Love, Witchen

Shorah

I live in a semi-rural location and am doing my level best to persuade the cable people (and whoever else I can get to listen to me) to send broadband my way. They say its getting to be most places now. They say it should be here in the next few months *hopes fervently*

Satellite is an option for some who are especially far from civilization but not for me (tall trees in the way).

And yes, some broadband is pricey but other charge around 50/month US. Since we dont subscribe to cable tv either, we should be able to afford it.

Most cities are getting broadband now. Hopefully you will find a place soon, MrLipid. This site identifies a few possible options:
http://www.orderdsl.net/index.htm

If they say you could get it, you may be able to get something even cheaper locally

>Would it be so unthinkable for Cyan to have >subscriptions where they'd send you a CD or DVD >every month which includes the new areas?

Even the "hub" area (D'ni cavern) is really huge and incredibly detailed. I dont think just D'ni city by itself would fit on a dvd, let alone process all the effects and let you move in good time. (How I wish!)

Maybe when pcs get even faster, they will let us swap dvds *chuckles*

Salar

I think that Witchen's right - Not everyone has even the access to high speed internet service. Maybe they will have or would consider a CDRom version for others to access.

Laura

Broadband service for me has always been the best. Never has there been any problems or it slowing down at all. Its Road Runner service. I am looking forward to this game. I do not think they would consider the CD option since it would be more expensive in the long run and as there would be so many updates there is no way they could keep up.

I recently tested my cable connection at www.bandwidthplace.com. I got 2.2 megabits per sec. I was told this will be plenty fast enough to run the game. Hope so.

Hi all,
I've followed every single thing about this game, and I tried to understand why you needed broadband. I found this quote on the Ubi Uru website ( http://uru.ubi.com/ - how's that for a tongue twister), in the latest press release.

..."Uru will take advantage of broadband to deliver a continually updated, immersive environment and storyline, with content that grows, changes and evolves constantly. It will also be the first persistent world to support real-time voice communication."

So, it looks like it needs broadband for two things, the "continually updated" content, which was mentioned before, as well as voice communication. Having tried some of those "long distance over the internet" phone calls, back when I had dial-up, I can attest that voice communication over dial-up is awful.

I'll also push my favorite Uru site here, Uru Obsession. Originally, the site was called "Mudpie Obsession", from the previous code name, but they have changed it to reflect the new name. If there is anything abut Uru out, anywhere, this site has it - http://www.uruobsession.com/ . The left link is for the site. They have screenshots that came out, over the years, that aren't on the "official" site. If you look around on the site, you'll see a little something I wrote for another board (some time ago), analyzing where I thought Cyan was in the development process, based on their job postings.

Thanks mszv! I think there's no way to escape that broadband is the coming standard. I guess the best way to approach the dilemma of wanting it and not being able to get it, is to complain in our own areas to the local telecommunications companies, urging them to install broadband facilities. Perhaps (and that's a big perhaps) when enough complaints are registered they'll get moving, get it installed as system standard, and give us a reasonable price! Its happened before and no matter what, I think standard broadband transmission is inevitable in the strategic view. In deference to URU: Ages Beyond MYST.....CYAN has never been behind the eight-ball when it comes to progress. Love, Witchen

An afterthought that came to mind here is that we are now positioned like the three blind men dutifully trying to describe an elephant. LOL When we know what that elephant really looks like; that is, what URU really is, I'm so absolutely sure we'll have a much better understanding of why broadband was the only and obvious carrier. Love, Witchen =O)

I must be old-fashioned, but I don't like the requirement of getting on-line in order to play an Adventure game.

from JENNY100.

In response, SALAR OF MYST wrote:
Are you implying that it wouldn't fit on a hard drive or that the RAM would be too small to handle the processing of effects and could only handle it in bits and pieces fed from the net? What numbers are we talking about? I wonder if the programers have not really thought enough about handling it. They may be just taking the easy way out. It's a little like the conversion from having to write very efficient programs, since computers had so little memory, to the rise of easy, but inefficient programs with the advent of huge memory resources. Tell me I'm wrong.

Some broadband providers in the UK at least are beginning to impose download limits per day like 1GB. By the sound of things such a limit would make running URU impossible.

If single-player mode wouldn't work from a DVD it's not going to work running over the Internet. We'll have higher capacity DVDs in time.

The biggest downside to an online-only game, of course, is that the day will come, as it came for FOG and it is coming for Motor City Online, when the company-run servers are permanently shut down. It may be a world to the players but it's only a budget line item to the company.

Ever see the first four hours (two installments of two hours each) and then miss the third two hour installment of a TV movie? Were it not for VCRs this sort of thing would probably happen all the time. I tape all of a "continued" movie just to be sure I can watch all of it. If I miss the last part I forget about watching the first part. It relates to the idea that if I buy something I want to have it "in my pocket", so to speak, to use when I get around to it and to re-use when I want. In other words, I want to own what I buy. Even now we do not own what we buy in the way of, for example, games on disk. We own the disk, and that's all, but we can, at least, use it more than once. I'm waiting for the day when the disks have a "time out" built into them where they erase themselves automatically. I'm quite sure I've read that is already technically possible.

Although I have DSL I don't think I'm going to go for the online games. It's equivalent to helping them save costs that will not, undoubtedly, pass the savings on to me, the customer. After all, did "do it yourself" gas stations really help us. I can still remember having my radiator, tires, oil, etc. checked just for being nice enough to buy gas at a gas station. Now they want us to check our own groceries, take responsibility for our safety deposit boxes (so the bank doesn't have to pay for insurance, I guess), wash our own car at the car wash, and the doctors (and others) want to limit how much the courts can give us for their screw-ups.

I have to feel sorry for the younger people who think what is happening to this society is necessary. By the time they figure out what's happening to them it will already have happened.

"....afterthought that came to mind here is that we are now positioned like the three blind men dutifully trying to describe an elephant."

Hi Gang...... In keeping with the above, previously stated, we are discussing the negatives (and the possible demise) of an online game we haven't even seen or experienced yet?

There's surely a downside (or two) to every step of progress in technology....but just from my personal perspective, I'm already prepared to get DSL in a heartbeat to play this one. So, i'll just hang here with my "glass half full," with the full expectation that URU is going to knock my socks off!

In defence of Cyan supposing they made this so that it would work at a reasonable speed for modem users, wouldn't it be a completely different game then and would we be excited about it and how many of us would complain about the graphics being rubbish and not fitting in with the whole Myst thing, or complain about some other feature that was no longer there?

I will say about URU what I said about Syberia 2...because it is not my cup of tea, the line for purchasing it will be one person shorter.

For everyone for whom it is their cup of tea, enjoy!

I don't care so much one way or the other about the real-time voice communication part. But I do not want the story "evolving" during those times when I don't have time to play the game. I don't want to feel totally left behind when I get back into the game. Or even halfway left behind. This actually bothers me even more than the requirement for a fast connection. I could always go over to my Dad's house and play it, but I certainly can't do that every day. I do not want the game "growing and changing constantly" while I am not there. I like playing games at my own pace.

And about storage space:

From the look of the screenshots at http://uru.ubi.com, it appears you play as a little man who walks around detailed prerendered screens. This seems similar to what you have in TLJ and Syberia - a 3D character walking around a 2D screen. This kind of setup would take up much less space than something like Schizm, where you have movie transitions play with every step you take. With Uru, there wouldn't be the need for the transition movies because you'd just have the character walking around the same screen or move to a different screen. I don't see any reason why you couldn't fit the beginning parts of the game on a DVD, and when updated areas were made, you could buy the updated area on another DVD.

The way it is now, with people having to pay for a broadband connection to play the game, Ubisoft and Cyan should get a kickback from the broadband companies.

I know that some are disappointed that it's broadband, I'm actually happy about it. If there able to make a game I can play online and can add new worlds, I say great. I admit if I couldn't get broadband for some reason I'd be disappointed too. Remember though, rumor has it that there will be a Myst 4 that will be different than URU.