
The company Sierra On-Line was once one of the biggest names in the adventure game genre. Eventually, their style of unforgiving third-person adventure stories fell out of favor, replaced by a new style of contemplative, first-person adventure games, popularized in 1994 by Myst. With the popularity of the genre shifting, they took one shot at making an adventure game in this new Myst-inspired style.
And it was, blatantly, inspired by Myst. Jon Bock, designer and art director of Lighthouse: The Dark Being, told me via email how the project got started. “[Sierra president] Ken Williams called me into his office one day, pulled out a copy of Myst and said; ‘Can you do this?'” Bock recalled. “I said yes, and the game went into development.”
On its surface, Lighthouse reads like it was designed by a committee trying to nail down what made Myst successful. You visit a bizarre uncharted world where you solve complicated puzzles in open-ended locales with complex mythology and lots of journals to read. In spite of that copycat-ery, Lighthouse manages to leave its own mark on the genre — partially because it manages the awkward feat of carrying Sierra’s frustrating, player-hostile house style over to this new style of adventure game, but also because of the world it creates, filled with risk, conflict, and a huge thematic swing for the fences that few Myst clones attempted. » Read more about Lighthouse: The Dark Being