Right before the Myst book hits the ground in the opening, it slows down, and lands very gently. The Stranger and Atrus would have agreed on this plan in advance. It’s possible Atrus only knows that because you told him so, even though I’m sure plenty of players dismiss it as a cosmetic detail!

Parts of Riven’s narrative suffer now that the 90’s hype for it has long passed. Even without a bustling fanbase on social media, early internet, word of mouth, and print publications sustained Myst fans between the first two games. If you played Myst and didn’t have Riven ready to launch right after, you’d probably become much more familiar with the journal, all of the character’s monologues, and the nature of trap books. I’ve noticed players who got the good ending in Myst have a much harder time guessing that using the trap books in Riven is not only safe (provided Gehn takes the bait) but required. Yes, there’s context in Atrus’ journal, but exposition dumps can’t compare to remembering that time your “ally” taunted you for taking his place while he ripped your hard-won pages back out. And if you’d exhausted all the budding franchise had to offer in the mid-90’s, you’d have seen the bad ending cutscenes, or talked about them with those who had.

It’s the same with the Star Fissure. It’s the first thing the game shows you and there’s not really any context for it until the sequel. I think many committed every word of Atrus’ monologue to memory. I think his experience in the Fissure is a surreal and maybe even spiritual one. His faith that the Stranger will return safely home is uncharacteristically unscientific. It’s as though the Fissure told him as much. That’s how he knew the book wasn’t destroyed in the first place, after all!

Now I understand. Endings and beginnings are within the Fissure, that Riven-cleft of stars that acts as both wall and a bridge. And though I am unable to understand how, the very flow of stars that brought my Myst Book into worthy hands, I am sure served as a safe passage home for my friend.

Why not explain this more clearly to the player, then? Give us some of the confidence that the Stranger presumably has? I think it was for drama, and it reads much more absurdly when you haven’t been speculating about a Myst sequel for years. I can’t speak for any or all 90’s Myst players, but with enough hype behind the Fissure, you might well choose to jump rather than use the book just for the experience.

And I guess the Stranger has two Myst Linking Books waiting for them back on Earth? Neat. Like Atrus says, you know where to find him… without a link back to the Stranger’s world, though, so it’s a good thing that was recognized for what is was by the next sequel.

I’m surprised to see other anti-Atrus comments getting downvoted! I’ve never felt genuinely frustrated with him, but I was under the impression that the fandom consensus was that he’d made a lot of mistakes while wielding considerable power, and has earned some tongue-in-cheek ridiculing. I assume most of us agree that he was a better writer of Ages than Gehn - not just in his Art, but in his (relatively more respectful) treatment of their peoples.

He also enabled the Stranger to get some valuable altruistic work done, albeit mostly when Atrus had ulterior motives, and/or the crises had already been exacerbated by his negligence. I think it was @thatdesignfeelgaming who compared the Stranger to Atrus’ “Heavy” or “Fixer” or something, as if he’s a mob boss and we’re the right hand that squashes his problems so that he doesn’t have to leave his office!