Riven (2024) is a remake of 1997's landmark title Riven: The Sequel To Myst. Much like its predecessor before it, Riven was highly lauded critically for its beautiful pre-rendered vistas, fiendishly difficult (but immersive) puzzles, and its engaging worldbuilding that you could really get lost in. Now, 27 Years and several remakes of the original Myst later, it's now finally time for this gaming classic to come into the 21st century, rendered with real-time visuals for the very first time. Still, there's one thing I've got to address before we get onto the review itself.
As Atrus himself has said, "There's a great deal of history you should know". As the road to this remake was in fact, quite long and worth mentioning. Back in the Early 2010s, a fan project known as the Starry Expanse Project was conceived to remake Riven in real time, using Unreal Engine. This basically went on for years until Cyan had the resources to remake the game themselves. However, a bit of the work for Starry Expanse did go on to be used as a basis for the official remake, so a huge thanks to everyone involved with that project for keeping the dream alive.
So, is Riven (2024) a worthy refresh of a timeless classic? or are you just better off playing the original release (Which is still available, mind you.) Let's find out together!
Fans of Cyan's other First-Person Puzzle-Adventure Games will be right at home here. At its most basic, you move around the world, and interact with the environment using your interface of choice. The bulk of the gameplay is exploration based, and puzzle based, though it has been modernized. Gone are the days of having to keep a paper notebook to write down puzzle solution, as the developers have provided the option to take screenshots to refer to later to ease in solving some of the more observation based puzzles. Riven veterans, don't think that you're going to breeze through this just because you played the original, Many key puzzles have been changed, either for immersion reasons or so they work better on a VR platform. You will be VERY surprised!
If you told someone from 1997 that Riven's visuals were being rendered in real time, they'd probably lose their minds. Aesthetically, Riven looks almost exactly how you remember it looking back when it was a pre-rendered slideshow, which is to say, absolutely gorgeous. Even the new additions fit seamlessly into the re-imagined world. The only aspect that looks a little odd is the models for some of the humanoid characters. The facial animations can look a little uncanny, and they don't quite look at home in the world itself. I understand why they couldn't do FMV, so they do serve their purpose, even if they do look a little odd.
As always, Robyn Miller's soundtrack oozes atmosphere and sounds fantastic, and there are a few new tracks to help flesh out some of the added content, which sound so seamless that you'd think they were part of the original game. The soundscapes are updated and sound even better than before. Although there is a lot of Archival audio for dialogue, it's hard to tell that it is. Rand Miller, however gives us an updated performance as Atrus, and he sounds great.
Unlike the Age, the game Riven is remarkably stable, during my time with the game I experienced no game-breaking bugs, and it's very well optimized. It's hard to imagine that a game that once spanned 5 discs in the 90s now only takes up 30 gigabytes of hard drive space. Load times aren't too terribly long either, so you're never sitting there waiting for Atrus to finish writing for long.
Riven is a masterful re-imagining of a 90s Adventure game classic that updates it for the 21st century without compromising the essence of the original work. It is as haunting and captivating as it has ever been and is well worth your time and attention.