KickStarter Firmament - steampunk adventure from Cyan (Myst series, Obduction)

[Boleskine]

Kickstarter: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1252280491/firmament

http://firmamentgame.com

Spoiler

 

[Wapcaplet]

The YouTube page that hosts the trailer describes the game as "A new VR experience from the company that brought you Myst and Obduction."

VR only, or VR optional? It is a mystery.

 

[Infinitron]

Yeah I think I saw this mentioned somewhere a week or so ago but didn't post because it was a VR game.

 

[Tom Selleck]

NordicShock

 

[Xeon]

Looks a lot like Vaporum.

 

[LESS T_T]

... because actually the teaser is "an attempt to garner interest and financial backing": http://www.spokesman.com/stories/2018/mar/02/myst-creators-surprise-with-announcement-of-new-vi/

‘Myst’ creators surprise with announcement of new, virtual-reality based game

The Spokane area’s little independent video game-developer-that-could is seeking help bringing virtual reality to the mainstream.

Cyan Worlds, creators of the wildly popular 1990s “Myst” computer game franchise, released an unexpected teaser Thursday morning for a new game, called “Firmament,” whose future remains up in the air.

“Honestly, it’s a really cool project,” said Rand Miller, chief executive officer and co-founder of the company. “Hopefully we’ll get to the point where we can make it happen.”

The team has developed what Miller called a working “experience,” similar to a demo, that will be shown later this month at the Game Developers Conference in San Francisco in an attempt to garner interest and financial backing. It features the Mead-based company’s signature puzzle-solving gameplay, he said, in a world built from the ground up to be experienced through a virtual reality headset.

A cinematic video promoting the title, clocking in at just under 2 1/2 minutes, features a voice-over from a mysterious, ethereal woman that tells the player she’s speaking from beyond the grave. Miller was coy about the woman’s identity, saying the team debated whether they should include an appearance from her at all for fear of giving too much away.

“It’s very mysterious what she is,” Miller said. “What kind of apparition is this? Is she dead, is she not dead, what are you seeing?”

A strange glowing device hovers above an ice-covered planet, an apparent key to unlocking strange devices in the game world.

The aesthetic, inspired by science fiction and fantasy stories that imagine futuristic technology adopting the 19th century’s fascination with steam energy, is more than just window dressing, Miller said, again alluding to the game’s mysterious plot.

“The steampunk aesthetic is kind of a throwback, but we’re embracing that in this really interesting storyline that will hopefully get a chance to unfold,” he said.

The end of the trailer features an ominous Latin phrase that loosely translates to “Preserving life requires firmament.”

“That phrase is meant to be a little vague,” Miller said. “It’s meant to induce some thought, for people who kind of want to dig in a little bit.”

Cyan Worlds is no stranger to mysterious, minimalist storytelling in its games. The massive early 1990s hit “Myst” told a story mostly through sparse, full-motion video cut scenes that revealed more of the plot as players completed challenges. The end result was a kind of visual storybook, praised at the time for its hyper-realistic graphics and selling not only millions of copies of software, but also CD-ROM drives.

The company returned to its roots with the 2016 release of “Obduction,” with development funded by a crowdsourcing Kickstarter campaign. The clamoring among the fan base for more “Myst”-like adventures led to the small, independent team raising more than $1 million.

Cyan isn’t using Kickstarter for “Firmament,” Miller said, but rather appealing to backers directly with its package of gameplay that they hope to be able to complete with financial assistance.

“We put all of our ‘Obduction’ money back into that, but ‘Obduction’ hardly pays the bills,” Miller said. “We’re using up our bank money as well, and we’ve gotten to the point where we’re out at this point.”

A port of “Obduction” for virtual reality devices was released in November 2016, and a console version for the PlayStation 4 was released last year. Reviews praised the game for its retro callbacks to the style of puzzle-solving gameplay that was in vogue in the heyday of “Myst,” while some reviewers criticized its technical performance and the game’s story, particularly its unsatisfying ending.

The team has been testing the game on the HTC Vive headset, backed by the industry giant Valve Corp., and the Oculus Rift, a device developed by Facebook. The goal is to develop a distinctly “Myst”-like experience, of solving puzzles and exploring worlds, with the typical trappings of the gaming experience falling away, Miller said.

“It feels like you have your own hands in this world,” he said. “Instead of mapping things to the controller, we want you to feel like you have hands in this world. And what you’re playing with are your hands.”

Miller didn’t provide a release date, or price point for the title, saying the company needs to figure out how much financial support it can muster for the project.

Oh well.

 

[agris]

Yeah, unless they're getting some eXXXtreme financial incentives to be a VR-only release (which Occulus and their like have been known to do), this will be a non-VR game as well. Otherwise, they're just leaving money on the table. And no one likes money left on a table, it's either in their wallet, or on the dresser.

 

[Anthedon]

How big is the market for difficult/serious VR adventures? Two or three people?

Unless this turns out to be a walking simulator.

 

[Boleskine]

https://www.pcworld.com/article/3267104/gaming/cyan-firmament-demo-gdc.html

Cyan’s brief Firmament demo feels like Myst without the Myst name
Here's hoping Cyan can find funding and get the rest of it out in the world.

By Hayden Dingman
Games Reporter, PCWorld | Mar 28, 2018 7:31 AM PT

A few weeks ago Cyan surprise-announced Firmament with a short teaser and next-to-no details otherwise. We knew it was built for VR, knew it hewed closer to Myst’s pseudo-steampunk trappings than Obduction did, and...that’s it.

Lucky for me the Firmament demo was at GDC last week. Unlucky for me, there’s not much more to say yet. The demo apparently represents a few months’ work, and Cyan was mostly at GDC seeking funding to turn it into a full project. That means the previous teaser was less an “announcement” and more a “Let’s pique your interest, hopefully.” Keep your fingers crossed, in other words.

Most of what’s built is what’s been shown in screenshots already. I woke in stasis, encased in ice. Seconds later a machine came and chiseled me out, at which point I entered a dusty abandoned room with a dead body sprawled across a table. A robot floated over to me, and I heard the same lines about “forming a firmament” from the trailer.

Then I learned the basics of interacting with Firmament’s world. The floating robot is actually a key of sorts, in that you use it to power switches. It goes wherever you point, and raising your hand summons it back to you. Most of the puzzles in the demo revolved around these two actions. “Oh, the power is out on this side of the bridge? I can send it to the conduit on the other side, and then the bridge will lower.” That kind of stuff.


The final puzzle was a bit more complicated, requiring the player to send the robot to a series of conduits in a set amount of time—or just teleport around really fast, like I did. Regardless, none of them were real head-scratchers. Not only is it clearly the opening tutorial area, but I get the feeling that’s not what this demo was about.

Instead, it’s intended to convey the feel of Firmament, which is considerably more Myst-like than I expected even from the trailer. Lonely snow-capped peaks, off-kilter music, overcomplicated gear-clad contraptions. Obduction felt like Myst transposed to a more alien setting. Firmament feels like Myst minus the Myst name.



There were the usual demo-build problems—the little robot getting lost, getting stuck on some scenery, breaking the final puzzle by teleporting around like a wizard who uses VR a lot. (I heard Cyan’s Ryan Warzecha say “That shouldn’t work” when I did it, which is always exciting.)

I’m intrigued by what I saw though. Firmament builds on Obduction in some cool ways, and the art is incredibly evocative. It’s amazing how much enjoyment a developer can wring out of simply climbing a mountain when that mountain’s well-realized, when the snow is whipping around and bits of ancient machinery hint at ancient secrets to discover.

The demo ended with me reaching the enormous locked door from the trailer, with the disembodied voice from the trailer hinting at other lands for me to explore—a fire realm, an electric realm, and so on. Whether we’ll ever get to explore them? As I said, fingers crossed.

 

[toro]

Looks a lot like Vaporum.

Or Elex.

 

[Boleskine]

https://www.pcworld.com/article/338...ns-to-kickstarter-for-new-game-firmament.html

Myst developer Cyan returns to Kickstarter for new game Firmament
And contrary to last year's VR-only stance, there's a traditional PC release planned now as well.

By Hayden Dingman
Games Reporter, PCWorld | March 26, 2019 06:00 AM PT

It’s been almost precisely a year since Cyan unveiled the first trailer for Firmament, and a busy year for Cyan at that. 2018 marked the 25th anniversary of Myst, which resulted in a celebratory Kickstarter for limited-run merchandise, plus re-releases of Myst III and IV, which had been missing from storefronts for (pun intended) ages. It’s no wonder Firmament faded into the background for a while.

But now it’s back, and Cyan is once again turning to the community to make it happen. This morning Cyan launched a Kickstarter campaign for Firmament, asking for $1.3 million, which is a bit higher than the amount Cyan initially requested for Obduction but matches up with the sum that campaign eventually raised. In other words, you can expect Firmament to aim for the same size and scope as Obduction.

It’s similar in concept, as well. Once again Cyan’s pitching new worlds and new concepts, but ones rooted in Myst’s ideas. As I wrote last year, after we played through Firmament’s proof-of-concept demo:

[ Further reading: These 20 absorbing PC games will eat days of your life ]
“Obduction felt like Myst transposed to a more alien setting. Firmament feels like Myst minus the Myst name. Lonely snow-capped peaks, off-kilter music, overcomplicated gear-clad contraptions.”

Most of what’s visible in the Kickstarter trailer comes from that same demo, so you can get a peek at what I mean—and hear Rand Miller use the phrase “callbacks to Myst,” as well. There are a few new snippets in the trailer though, mostly concept art for the other worlds, which as I noted last year seem to be themed around different elements like fire, electricity, and so on.



The most important change since last year: Upon release in 2020, it’s going to come to regular ol’ PCs in addition to virtual reality. Last year Cyan pitched Firmament as a VR-only experience, which was interesting to me as someone who owns a few VR headsets but not perhaps the best tactic when you need to raise funds from the community. Now that’s been changed to “designed for and built from the ground up to take advantage of VR,” but with multiple assertions that everything will function just fine on a traditional monitor.

If you play in VR, Firmament’s core mechanic will probably feel more natural. You’re accompanied by a little robot which you can for instance send to a nearby power conduit by pointing, or return to your location by raising your hand. But that seems doable with a mouse-and-keyboard as well, so it’s nice to know the rest of the audience won’t be left behind, if funded.

Of course, “if funded” is the key here. Kickstarter’s a much different place in 2019 than it was in 2013. I can’t even tell you the last time I wrote about a video game’s crowdfunding campaign, though I suspect it was Wasteland 3 back in...2016. That’s nearly three years ago. We also wrote about Cyan’s Myst Kickstarter last year, but that was more for collector’s items than a new and untested game.

On the other hand, I really liked Obduction and I like Cyan. My rule with crowdfunding these days is essentially “If they’ve proved themselves once, then why not?” and I feel like Cyan fits that bill. Does that mean Firmament will definitely be a great game? Of course not. Nothing’s certain in game development. But I’m at least confident Cyan will finish Firmament, that the game will release, that your pledge items will be fulfilled, and that Cyan won’t just take the money and disappear.

If anything, the fact the team made Obduction on a similar budget makes Firmament seem like a safer bet. Cyan’s already worked with a team this size and knows how far $1.3 million gets them—and where the limitations are as well.

We’ll see if the community shows up though. Cyan’s been one of the more successful developers on Kickstarter, with last year’s Myst Kickstarter raising more than $2 million on a $250 thousand goal. But then again, people tend to flock to the Myst name. Will they have the same faith in Firmament? As a Cyan fan myself, I hope so.

 

[Dexter]

Backed it after I played Obduction in VR for a few hours and liked what I saw. Mostly interested in a similar game being developed with VR in mind and I wanna see this funded, everyone better come through!

Here's some interesting parts from some of their late Updates:
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1252280491/firmament/posts/2464169

Cyan at PAX East this weekend.

We don’t often get a chance to meet our Kickstarter backers face to face, but if you are at PAX East this weekend, please come by and see us. You can find us in several locations.

Kickstarter Games Forest

Stop by the Kickstarter Forest between 12:00 and 2:00 and get hands on experience with our latest game concept Firmament. This is a brand new title that we are really excited about. Try our VR demo and experience an amazing new world with a certain callback to the steampunk roots of Myst.

Kickstarter invited us to show off Firmament at PAX because of our previously successful campaigns that you helped fund. Please continue that support by checking out our latest campaign http://kck.st/2UWiRNN and sharing with your social network.

ZED at Indie MegaBooth

ZED, the first title to be released under our new publishing arm, Cyan Ventures, will be at the Indie MegaBooth. There are plenty of demo machines to give you a chance to play the game on PC or in VR. You can also continue to support ZED by wish listing it on Steam.

Rand Miller at “30 Years In Games” Panel

On Sunday, stop in to see Rand Miller, founder and CEO of Cyan, talk about his years in gaming with fellow veterans Chuck Carter [Eagre Games], Tim Cain [Obsidian Entertainment], Karthik Bala [Vicarious Visions]. Hear these four industry veterans (Myst, Command & Conquer, Skylanders and Fallout franchises) reflect on their adventures in the field and share their insights into where things are going in the medium we love. (10:30 AM - 11:30 AM, DRAGONFLY THEATRE)

Here's the panel:


Clarifying some stuff: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1252280491/firmament/posts/2471597

50% and some Firmament clarifications

Almost Halfway there!

We are into our second week and almost halfway to our goal. Thank you for your support. We need everyone’s help to bring awareness and keep the momentum going. Please keep spreading the word. The sooner we reach our goal the sooner we can start development of this awesome game!

We've been reading your comments and emails, and realize there are a few issues that are of concern within the community. Here’s an update on a few of those points:

• Not just VR - Yes, we keep talking about how excited we are about VR, but to make it perfectly clear: You can play Firmament on your PC (normal flat monitor) without VR. This will not be a sub-par PC experience. Firmament will be an incredible game experience for PC users (as much any other Cyan game). The difference is that the game will play in VR the way VR should be played. We have experience in this process. We built Obduction for PC first, then created a VR version. While it was a terrific first VR title, we learned a lot. The biggest lesson was, if we build a game in VR from the ground up, we end up creating a better and more optimized PC version. We’re extremely excited about how Firmament looks and plays no matter how you play it. It is going to be gorgeous and fun on either platform. One more time - you will not need VR to play Firmament!

Flatscreen PC monitor gameplay demonstration

• Mac Version? - This Kickstarter is focused on getting Firmament developed and released first and foremost on PC and VR. We're committed to Virtual Reality's future possibilities. At this stage, PC is the platform that best supports VR development. While this is our current focus, we remember who helped us get started and who continues to offer their support every day: the Mac community. With the help of our industry contacts, we're looking everyday at ways to initiate and support the development of Firmament for mac OS. As we learn more we'll bring you news about it in future updates here in Kickstarter. Please don’t let this stop you in supporting Firmament. We are turning to our fans to help develop the game first and foremost. Without your funding Firmament will not be developed for any platform.

1. Where can I get it? - We are aware of the angst right now around what appears to be “Store Wars” in the game industry. To set your mind at ease, our plan is to have Firmament available on Steam, GOG, Viveport, and the Oculus Store - just as we have with Obduction and many other games. Since we’re more than a year from shipping Firmament, it's a little premature to be discussing specific distribution at this stage.
   

We love hearing from you! Please continue to share your thoughts and concerns in our Kickstarter Comments section. As always, we ask that you be kind to each other. We all want the same thing, to make Firmament an awesome game for all the fans.

Thank you!

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1252280491/firmament/posts/2476754

Firmament Stretch Goal for MAC, PS4, PSVR, and EFIGS Language Support!

EXCITING NEWS! A Firmament Stretch Goal!

Woohoo! We’ve passed 50%! We’ve been able to do some budgeting and estimating, and we’re ready to announce an awesome Stretch Goal that adds these platforms and languages to Firmament...

• Mac Support
• PS4/PSVR Support
• EFIGS Support (English, French, Italian, German, Spanish)

We need to push the funding to $1.4 million to cover all of that. That’s just a little over $100,000 more to add all of those items. We hope this helps to add support to the Campaign. Please help us spread the news!

Stretch goals are here!

Mac Details

You want to know what Macs will run Firmament, right? We’ve stated that we believe that Windows computers that could run Obduction should be able to run Firmament. The Mac situation is not as cut and dried. Because Mac users can’t just replace the graphics card, or even add more memory to many Macs, we will try to be a bit more specific.

Here is our Mac philosophy: We will build Firmament as efficiently as we can, and we really hope that it’ll run on any Mac that will run the Metal framework (the same as Obduction) but because we will be focusing our QA resources, we will only be recommending more modern, higher-end Macs with performance-oriented graphics support (for example, and depending on the specific configuration: 2015-ish and later iMacs, 2016-ish and later MacBook Pros, the recently introduced Mac Mini) and NOT MacBooks or MacBook Airs.

Since Rand still uses his Late 2013 MacBook Pro every day, we might be able to provide some feedback (as we progress) as to how Firmament is working on a Mac that old, BUT…

WE CANNOT GUARANTEE THAT FIRMAMENT WILL RUN WELL ON YOUR OLDER MAC. If you have an older Mac, and you don’t plan on updating it anytime soon, there is a very real possibility that Firmament will not work well for you.

(If you have any questions about the model or year of your particular Mac, please select your “About This Mac” menu option and/or check Apple’s web site.)

Thank you for the support!

 

[Dexter]

 

[Dexter]

$850k with barely over a week left.

There was a Q&A: https://www.facebook.com/firmamentgame/videos/357735031514117/

 

[Dexter]

They made it with 24 hours remaining:


Newest Update: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1252280491/firmament/posts/2490335

FUNDED! And ALL IN for MacOS, PS4/PSVR, and language support!
Posted by Cyan Worlds, Inc. (Creator)

WOOHOO!!!! You did it!!!

You all did it together.

I hope you’re all as happy as we are today! We can’t thank you enough! Because of you and your hard work Firmament will become a reality - a virtual reality. Now it’s our turn for the hard work to get you this new world that you can immerse yourself in.

Thanks everyone - from those who have been here since day one of the campaign to everyone who joined today, and everyone in between!

Thank you for sharing the campaign with all your friends, family, and fellow fans.

Thank you for trusting us to make another new world for you to explore.

Very Big News!

Good news! We really want the Mac, PS4, and EFIGS versions to happen. We’re now on our way to the stretch goal, but we’ve decided to commit to find a way to make up any shortfall, so we can guarantee Firmament for Mac, PS4, and EFIGS. If you’ve been holding back on pledging, we’re hoping that this decision will help get you to jump in now - knowing that you will definitely get a version for your language or platform - and you can still get it with the exclusive campaign content! But you’ve only got a day to do it - you’d better hurry!

Stay in touch with the team after the campaign during dev here in Discord:

https://discordapp.com/invite/N75H64X

Planned events for the Final Day (tomorrow)

We hope you all can join one or more of these events tomorrow to help us celebrate!

Here are the planned events for the final Kickstarter day (Friday, April 26):

10:00 am - 11:00 am PDT: Ryan W. streams Firmament with developer Q&A session

11:30 am - 12:00 pm PDT: CyanChat Discord in General Chatter - a Fireside chat with Rand

2:30 pm - 3:00 pm PDT: Live stream on the Facebook Firmament page

Thank you for being part of Firmament from the ground up, and for all the incredible support.

The Cyan Team

 

[Dexter]

The KickStarter ended with over $1.43 million reached: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1252280491/firmament/posts/2491611

Thank you! Kickstarter over!
Posted by Cyan Worlds, Inc. (Creator)

Thank you! Thank you!! THANK YOU!!!
What an amazing month of support from our fans!

If you didn’t see the end of the Firmament campaign you can see it here...

https://www.facebook.com/firmamentgame/videos/431368997674573/

And now the burning question...

I missed the Kickstarter! Can I still give you money?

Good news! Because of the success of the Kickstarter campaign we’re looking into ways to allow people who may have missed out to still help us get Firmament made. We’ll have more information next week, and the latest information will be here… www.firmamentgame.com

Other news!

• Obduction - we launch in China today on PS4! What a day.
• ZED news coming next Thursday! Stay tune.

Here's some of the Dev Streams from the final day:

Playing the game with Mouse&Keyboard:


VR Playthrough:


LiveStream from the end of the KickStarter:

 

[Jenkem]

Honestly considering getting a VR unit for this game (and several others that support it like The Invisble Hours)

 

[Dexter]

 

[Boleskine]

 

[Darkozric]

December update
https://www.kickstarter.com/project...RVFi4F0zCwKydfF6bhtbDNCwkaU476ddQm9gFJRcaXfYE

It's time for the last Firmament Update of 2022! We're looking forward to delivering the game to you early next year.

To tide you over until then, there are some beautiful images and an extended video in this December Update.

Those are just a new taste of some areas in Firmament. We’re not going to spoil them with names or further description for anyone who decided to look them over…
We’ll leave it to you to piece together which areas they are when you play the game next year!

 

[Darkozric]

Shilling time bros, reject Pentiment embrace Firmament

 

[Darkozric]

 

[Dexter]

 

[Darkozric]

Jesus wept... Just look at these requirements. Cyan wants us to own a quantum PC to play their shit. I hope the Riven remake is not the same (who I'm I kidding, it will be the same shit).

 

[Maxie]

Jesus wept... Just look at these requirements. Cyan wants us to own a quantum PC to play their shit. I hope the Riven remake is not the same (who I'm I kidding, it will be the same shit).

I have a friend who's paid four thousand dollars for a PC he plays only Minecraft and Genshin Impact on. Meanwhile I have a $200 laptop I wanna play Firmament on. The duality of man