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  • October 2026 All Guilds Meeting Summary

    October 2026 All Guilds Meeting Summary

    Here is the summary for the 198th All Guilds Meeting, moderated by PodHopper, along with the chatlog!

    Contents

    Mysterium

    ☛ The Committee held a survey, and the results were very favorable to this year’s edition. Next year – a Spokane year! – the con-chairs will be Rahshahth and m13.

    ☛ The Creativity Prompt for October–November is “Money”. Entries for the “Time” prompt for September were from Floydman, Talashar and Kh’reestrefah.

    OpenUru

    ☛ In Minkata Alpha, Mahrngestoy and Rigilahs have been given a proper spot on the ring of podia in Chiso Preniv.

    ☛ Thanks to a combined effort from Dpogue and Hoikas, the Tiam and Elonin bookshelf books should now work and properly be shareable without lockups.

    If you’re a tester, please find a buddy and check that the Tiam and Elonin books on the bookshelf can be shared, making sure your buddy managed to link successfully. If you can, please also check other shareable books, to ensure no regression was introduced.

    ☛ Calum Traveler is also working on further refinements to Chiso Preniv’s textures for low VRAM machines. He recently re-UV-mapped the basement’s bookshelves, compressing multiple redundant repetitive textures into a single texture image, but more remain to do.

    ☛ An empty podium was added at the bottom of the circular staircases near the link-in point in Chiso Preniv: it will be used to hold flyers and other informational materials.

    ☞ For a list of Ages currently in the works, check the “Explorers Restoration Projects” page on the Archivists’ wiki. Ages that may be added to Minkata Alpha sometime in the near future are Pod 12 and the Rei’schu Apartment.

    Events in the Cavern

    ☛ IwonK will host a Wonky Talk (on her Twitch channel) on Friday 16 at 15:00 KIT in the Guild of Cookies’ Hood by the heek table. This month’s topic will be “American Games”. Feel free to suggest interesting games she could talk (and draw) about. As always, there will be cookies!

    Besides streaming, IwonK is making some games of her own as a year-long gamedev challenge, using Bitsy; you can find them at her itch.io page.

    She is also working with Kefrith on an idea originating from the Mysterium Discord: a Mysterium-like online event. The work title is “Rivenium”, they are looking for ideas, events and presentations or panels. If you are interested, you can find IwonK or Kefrith on the Mysterium Discord, at the dedicated forum.

    ☛ Babbel’s classical music program will be on Monday 19 at 12:00 KIT, in the Hall of Kings in Ae’gura. The theme will be “This music makes me happy”.

    ☛ Brooketh presented the Competitive Myst Online Group, hosting an Ahyoheek game every Saturday at 21:00 KIT in the Competitive Myst Online Hood. All players are welcome, regardless of skill level. If you don’t know how to play, they will teach you. Or you can just hang out and observe. Voice chat is encouraged, but not required; both are used.

    ☛ Jodok announced the opening of the Open Cave Elysium shard, an exact replica of MOUL, without any cheat KI command or additions like the City of Dimensions, but using the H’uru client with all its functional and graphical improvements. The shard opened on October 5. Note that TOC:Moul, TOC:PotS and TOC:Elysium need separate accounts each. For more info and questions, visit the Open Cave website, the forums or the Discord server.

    ☛ The Age Expeditions are hosted by Korov’ev every Sunday at 11:00 KIT. There’s also an (uncommented) Twitch stream.

    In the Open Cave they began this month by completed Ahnonay and visiting the Tree in the Watcher’s Pub. After that, they will do the full tour of the City of Dimensions.

    In Deep Island they will visit a few Ages by J’Kla: Noidrocca, Cidoirep, Nilodnam. Then they will dock at Zefora, by Justintime, and its connected Ages.

    ☞ For a more complete list of upcoming events, check the calendar. Times and events may change at the last minute; you can find the latest updates at:

    D’ni Language Classes

    Shokhootahn Rehn had two updates, one for the D’ni Language Classes and one for the Story Nights. Two student are taking the classes.

    Visitors are asked to not post pellet points into the hood imager: one of his former students and a close friend, Yutiel Yoshi, who passed away in 2018, is listed there. He has refrained from posting pellets to maintain her name at the top, as a form of memorial.

    D’ni Language Classes schedule (click to expand)
    • Those who would like to attend the lessons should contact Rehn, preferably on Discord (r’Tayrtahn#1317), or via KImail (@80428). Be sure to include your KI number, so that Rehn can send you a reply!
    • The Guild of Instructors’ Hood will be open and public unless a class is in session. Classes are individual.
    • Daytime openings are on Monday to Friday, at 10:00, 11:00 or 12:00 KIT, depending on the student’s schedule.
    • Evening openings are on Tuesday to Thursday, at 20:00, 21:00 or 22:00 KIT, depending on the student’s schedule.
    • Daytime availability is subject to change with little or no notice. Last-minute changes to class times will be announced via Magic Bot (@27527) or Mimi Bot (@71459); to be notified, add both as buddies, then PM them “advert”.

    R’Tayrtahn’s Story Nights

    Story Night Europe and Original Story Night are currently telling “Jae’s Journey”, written by explorer Janai and posted to the Mystonline.com forums in 2009; if anyone is still in contact with her, please let her know she is inivited to hear her story performed live! Eventually they will cover all of the books and games, as well as the three human attempts at the restoration of D’ni.

    At the end of October, r’Tayrtahn will host the bi-annual Bahro Glyph Tour.

    R’Tayrtahn records videos of the sessions (via an avatar named “I’m a bot, do not message”), that he will eventually upload to his YouTube channel. Be careful if you PM r’Tay or the bot during the events, as messages will be visible in the videos 😉

    Videos now also come with auto translated captions in French, German, Indonesian, Italian, Polish, Portuguese and Spanish. Automatic translation often has trouble with words like “D’ni” or “linking books”, so your mileage may vary 😉

    Story Nights schedule (click to expand)
    • Story Nights are held every Saturday in Tsahno’s Hood, gathering at the fountain at around 23:00 KIT, with the story starting at about 23:30 KIT.
    • For Story Nights – Europe, the gatherings are on Saturday starting at 13:30 KIT, with the story starting at about 14:00 KIT.
    • On All Guilds Meeting days, the event will begin at 14:30 KIT or 30 minutes after the meeting, whichever is later.
    • The stories are told using voice chat, so you will need to have your speakers, headphones or KI devices on. If you would like a reminder, please send r’Tayrtahn (@58324) a KImail with your KI number included in the text, so that he can add you to his buddies list.

    Miscellanea

    ☛ Skyisblu held a Cooking Session on Monday 5, in which she cooked up a speedy but tasty snack, assisted by her new cat! You can find past recipes and recordings at Skyisblu’s blog and YouTube channel.

    That was it for this month. Please consider donating to keep the Cavern open!

    The next All Guilds Meeting is planned for Saturday, November 7 (Leevofo 15) at 13:00 KIT.

    Until then!

  • September 2026 All Guilds Meeting Summary

    September 2026 All Guilds Meeting Summary

    Here is the summary for the 197th All Guilds Meeting, moderated by PodHopper, along with the chatlog!

    Contents

    Mysterium

    ☛ The Creativity Prompt for September is “Time”. Entries for the “Friendship” prompt for August were from Vanta, Kh’reestrefah, Floydman, and Talashar.

    OpenUru

    ☛ If you were having issues linking to the Ae’gura Messengers Pub, you should now be able to get there without needing to lower your textures slider to half. Make sure to get any Mysterium shirts you’re still missing, before the Mysterium wing closes until next year!

    ☛ A new, temporary linking book has been added to Chiso Preniv in Minkata Alpha: the Rigilahs Pod by Ametist! It’s another entry from the 2025 Rapid Age Development Contest coming to MOULa, after Jalargura by Semjay.

    ☛ New signage is also being tested in Chiso Preniv: most of the standing signs are being replaced by engraved metal plates on the shelves, and on the remaining standing signs the handwritten text is being replaced with a typewritten one for legibility reasons. Korov’ev, Semjay and Dpogue contributed to the design, while Calum Traveler is doing all the modelling work.

    When the new signage will make its way to MOULa, the plan is to initially have it deployed only to e.g. Mir-o-Bot’s Chiso Preniv (@32319, PM “to Chiso” to get teleported there), so that people will be able to compare and contrast them, and pick which one they like more.

    ☛ Along with Descent, Calum Traveler has also started to work on the second Kirel rebuild in Blender, or Kirel 3. Importing and rewiring existing Ages and locations like Kirel is necessary to fix bugs and improve visuals.

    Down the line, a game room is planned to be opened in the area between the Ahyoheek plaza and the bridge, first in Kirel, then at some point in the neighborhoods. In particular, the room will include an additional Ahyoheek table.

    ☛ More testers are needed in Minkata Prime and Alpha, with older computers and Windows versions (or even Linux/MacOS). The bug in the Messengers Pub wasn’t caught partly because there were no testers available with the kind of computer configuration that was affected by it. More info on the OpenUru’s web page and Discord server.

    ☞ For a list of Ages currently in the works, check the “Explorers Restoration Projects” page on the Archivists’ wiki. Ages that may be added to Minkata Alpha sometime in the near future are Pod 12 and Rei’schu Apartment.

    Events in the Cavern

    ☛ Skyisblu’s Cooking Sessions are on the first Monday of the month at 12:00 KIT, via Twitch, in the Guild of Caterers’ Hood. You can find past recipes and recordings at Skyisblu’s blog and YouTube channel.

    ☛ IwonK will host a Wonky Talk (on her Twitch channel) on Friday 18 at 15:00 KIT in the Guild of Cookies’ Hood by the heek table. Feel free to suggest interesting games she could talk (and draw) about. As always, there will be cookies!

    Besides streaming, IwonK is making some games of her own as a year-long gamedev challenge, using Bitsy; you can find them at her itch.io page.

    She is also working with Kefrith on an idea originating from the Mysterium Discord: a Mysterium-like online event. The work title is “Rivenium”, they are looking for ideas, events and presentations or panels. If you are interested, you can find IwonK or Kefrith on the Mysterium Discord, at the dedicated forum.

    ☛ Ereshkigal is on holiday until the 19, so there won’t be a story session for the first two weeks of this month. Every Saturday, she hosts an Ancient Stories event at 15:00 KIT in Chiso Preniv, reading folktales, translated ancient texts, historical fiction from all over the ancient world, as well as the occasional historical-inspired fan fiction.

    ☛ Babbel’s classical music program will be on Monday 21 at 12:00 KIT, in the Hall of Kings in Ae’gura.

    ☛ Brooketh presented the Competitive Myst Online Group, hosting an Ahyoheek game every Saturday at 21:00 KIT in the Competitive Myst Online Hood. All players are welcome, regardless of skill level. If you don’t know how to play, they will teach you. Or you can just hang out and observe. Voice chat is encouraged, but not required; both are used.

    On the Open Cave shard, Ayohiker holds an analogous event every Monday at 14:00 KIT in the Ayohikers’ hood. There are also new games in the City of Dimensions: Tic-Tac-TOC and Connect Four.

    ☛ The Age Expeditions are hosted by Korov’ev every Sunday at 11:00 KIT. There’s also an (uncommented) Twitch stream.

    In the Open Cave this month they will undertake the Fifth Journey, first in Er’cana then in Ahnonay.

    In Deep Island they will visit quite a few Ages: first Ahrkane by Ekimmai, with a small but intensive set of puzzles, along with Cass and Fahets by Tweek, which will be significantly expanded for their eventual MOUL release. Then a few beaches: T’vel (sunny and stormy) by Race, Ahreeuhtahv by Cherish & Race (in its Restoration version by Tikibear), and the eveocative Llantern by Nye Sigismund.

    ☞ For a more complete list of upcoming events, check the calendar. Times and events may change at the last minute; you can find the latest updates at:

    D’ni Language Classes

    Shokhootahn Rehn had two updates, one for the D’ni Language Classes and one for the Story Nights. Two student are taking the classes.

    Visitors are asked to not post pellet points into the hood imager: one of his former students and a close friend, Yutiel Yoshi, who passed away in 2018, is listed there. He has refrained from posting pellets to maintain her name at the top, as a form of memorial.

    D’ni Language Classes schedule (click to expand)
    • Those who would like to attend the lessons should contact Rehn, preferably on Discord (r’Tayrtahn#1317), or via KImail (@80428). Be sure to include your KI number, so that Rehn can send you a reply!
    • The Guild of Instructors’ Hood will be open and public unless a class is in session. Classes are individual.
    • Daytime openings are on Monday to Friday, at 10:00, 11:00 or 12:00 KIT, depending on the student’s schedule.
    • Evening openings are on Tuesday to Thursday, at 20:00, 21:00 or 22:00 KIT, depending on the student’s schedule.
    • Daytime availability is subject to change with little or no notice. Last-minute changes to class times will be announced via Magic Bot (@27527) or Mimi Bot (@71459); to be notified, add both as buddies, then PM them “advert”.

    R’Tayrtahn’s Story Nights

    Story Night Europe and Original Story Night are currently telling “Jae’s Journey”, written by explorer Janai and posted to the Mystonline.com forums in 2009; if anyone is still in contact with her, please let her know she is inivited to hear her story performed live! Eventually they will cover all of the books and games, as well as the three human attempts at the restoration of D’ni.

    R’Tayrtahn records videos of the sessions (via an avatar named “I’m a bot, do not message”), that he will eventually upload to his YouTube channel. Be careful if you PM r’Tay or the bot during the events, as messages will be visible in the videos 😉

    Videos now also come with auto translated captions in French, German, Indonesian, Italian, Polish, Portuguese and Spanish. Automatic translation often has trouble with words like “D’ni” or “linking books”, so your mileage may vary 😉

    Story Nights schedule (click to expand)
    • Story Nights are held every Saturday in Tsahno’s Hood, gathering at the fountain at around 23:00 KIT, with the story starting at about 23:30 KIT.
    • For Story Nights – Europe, the gatherings are on Saturday starting at 13:30 KIT, with the story starting at about 14:00 KIT.
    • On All Guilds Meeting days, the event will begin at 14:30 KIT or 30 minutes after the meeting, whichever is later.
    • The stories are told using voice chat, so you will need to have your speakers, headphones or KI devices on. If you would like a reminder, please send r’Tayrtahn (@58324) a KImail with your KI number included in the text, so that he can add you to his buddies list.

    That was it for this month. Please consider donating to keep the Cavern open!

    August ended with the CavFunding at 122% (CavCon 4.2) and the reserve at 570%.

    The next All Guilds Meeting is planned for Saturday, October 3 (Leevot 16) at 13:00 KIT.

    Until then!

  • August 2026 All Guilds Meeting Summary

    August 2026 All Guilds Meeting Summary

    Here is the summary for the 196th All Guilds Meeting, moderated by PodHopper, along with the chatlog!

    Contents

    Mysterium

    ☛ Cyan posted a recap of their presentation for Mysterium. The main topic was a slideshow of cancelled projects and ideas, most notably Anglerfish. They also showed a teaser for their current project, Mudfish. For more details, check our dedicated Mysterium post!

    ☛ Another interesting project shown during the presentation was a model of the whole Cavern being done in Unreal. While it’s not meant for release, it may come handy as reference for future projects in the D’niverse.

    ☛ During Cyan’s panel the location for next year’s Mysterium was announced: Spokane, WA. It will be Cyan’s 40th birthday and Riven’s 30th birthday!

    ☛ Many panels were streamed on the convention’s official Twitch channel and will later be exported to their YouTube channel.

    ☛ The Creativity Prompt for August is “Friendship”. Entries for the “Haven” prompt for July were from Vanta and from Talashar.

    OpenUru

    ☛ Calum Traveler and Murry also hosted the Descent Restoration panel, in which Calum gave a demo of the latest development build of the location, fruit of the collaboration with Tweek, Ametist, Ehren, TikiBear, Semjay and Maurus.

    ☛ Korman 0.18 is almost ready for release, and Calum has been testing the Descent build file to ensure it’s compatible.

    ☛ Some people are experiencing issues with the Ae’gura Messengers Pub, due to unexpected troubles with low VRAM and texture sizes. A hotfix should go live very soon to fix the issue.

    ☛ Ages still in the pipeline, with no set deadline yet: – phases 3 and beyond of Descent; – Pod 12, needs some more work and retexturing; – Reischu Apt is waiting for the final background music; – Overflow Station is on hold while Calum Traveler is completing other projects; – Mahrn Gestoy needs more testing and updating.

    Events in the Cavern

    ☛ IwonK is back and will host a Wonky Talk (on her Twitch channel) on Friday 14 at 15:00 KIT in the Guild of Cookies’ Hood by the heek table. This month’s topic will be “Non-human characters in games”. Feel free to suggest interesting games she could talk (and draw) about. As always, there will be cookies!

    Besides streaming, IwonK is making some games of her own as a year-long gamedev challenge, using Bitsy; you can find them at her itch.io page.

    She is also working with Kefrith on an idea originating from the Mysterium Discord: a Mysterium-like online event. The work title is “Rivenium”, they are looking for ideas, events and presentations or panels. If you are interested, you can find IwonK or Kefrith on the Mysterium Discord, at the dedicated forum.

    ☛ Every Saturday, Ereshkigal is hosting an Ancient Stories event at 15:00 KIT in Chiso Preniv, reading folktales, translated ancient texts, historical fiction from all over the ancient world, as well as the occasional historical-inspired fan fiction.

    ☛ Babbel’s classical music program will be on Monday 17 at 12:00 KIT, in the Hall of Kings in Ae’gura. The theme will be “Cool Classics”.

    ☛ Brooketh presented the Competitive Myst Online Group, hosting an Ahyoheek game every Saturday at 21:00 KIT in the Competitive Myst Online Hood. All players are welcome, regardless of skill level. If you don’t know how to play, they will teach you. Or you can just hang out and observe. Voice chat is encouraged, but not required; both are used.

    On the Open Cave shard, Ayohiker holds an analogous event every Monday at 14:00 KIT in the Ayohikers’ hood. There are also new games in the City of Dimensions: Tic-Tac-TOC and Connect Four.

    ☛ The Age Expeditions are hosted by Korov’ev every Sunday at 11:00 KIT. There’s also an (uncommented) Twitch stream.

    In Deep Island, this month they will visit quite a few Ages: the works of Jamey (Tsoidahl Sheegahtee, Writers’ Niche, Crater Concept, Vogokh Oglahn); a few Ahra Pahts shells they missed (#336, #126, #111), along with Pakin and Spiro; and will conclude the month in Hayal & Ria.

    In the Open Cave, they will visit the two missing pods, Payiferen and Tetsonot, along with the recently released Pod 56; then they will look for kivas in Minkata, the Fourth Journey.

    ☛ PodHopper is planning to hold the Summerfest on August 24–30. Currently they have four events pinned down: an explorer memorial, a music quiz, a Wall competition and a cone race. A few other events needs to be confirmed. Participants are asked to sign up early for competitions, to help planning and make sure there are enough people to actually hold them.

    ☞ For a more complete list of upcoming events, check the calendar. Times and events may change at the last minute; you can find the latest updates at:

    D’ni Language Classes

    Shokhootahn Rehn had two updates, one for the D’ni Language Classes and one for the Story Nights. Two student are taking the classes.

    Visitors are asked to not post pellet points into the hood imager: one of his former students and a close friend, Yutiel Yoshi, who passed away in 2018, is listed there. He has refrained from posting pellets to maintain her name at the top, as a form of memorial.

    D’ni Language Classes schedule (click to expand)
    • Those who would like to attend the lessons should contact Rehn, preferably on Discord (r’Tayrtahn#1317), or via KImail (#80428). Be sure to include your KI number, so that Rehn can send you a reply!
    • The Guild of Instructors’ Hood will be open and public unless a class is in session. Classes are individual.
    • Daytime openings are on Monday to Friday, at 10:00, 11:00 or 12:00 KIT, depending on the student’s schedule.
    • Evening openings are on Tuesday to Thursday, at 20:00, 21:00 or 22:00 KIT, depending on the student’s schedule.
    • Daytime availability is subject to change with little or no notice. Last-minute changes to class times will be announced via Magic Bot (#27527) or Mimi Bot (#71459); to be notified, add both as buddies, then PM them “advert”.

    R’Tayrtahn’s Story Nights

    Story Night Europe and Original Story Night are currently retelling the first two human restorations of the Cavern. Eventually they will cover all of the books and games, as well as the three human attempts at the restoration of D’ni.

    R’Tayrtahn records videos of the sessions (via an avatar named “I’m a bot, do not message”), that he will eventually upload to his YouTube channel. Be careful if you PM r’Tay or the bot during the events, as messages will be visible in the videos 😉

    Videos now also come with auto translated captions in French, German, Indonesian, Italian, Polish, Portuguese and Spanish. Automatic translation often has trouble with words like “D’ni” or “linking books”, so your mileage may vary 😉

    Story Nights schedule (click to expand)
    • Story Nights are held every Saturday in Tsahno’s Hood, gathering at the fountain at around 23:00 KIT, with the story starting at about 23:30 KIT.
    • For Story Nights – Europe, the gatherings are on Saturday starting at 13:30 KIT, with the story starting at about 14:00 KIT.
    • On All Guilds Meeting days, the event will begin at 14:30 KIT or 30 minutes after the meeting, whichever is later.
    • The stories are told using voice chat, so you will need to have your speakers, headphones or KI devices on. If you would like a reminder, please send r’Tayrtahn (#58324) a KImail with your KI number included in the text, so that he can add you to his buddies list.

    Miscellanea

    ☛ August 1 was the anniversary of The Open Cave, 16 years for the PotS version and 15 for the MOUL one. The occasion was celebrated with an over 9 hours, non-stop music and fireworks event in the City of Dimensions.

    That was it for this month. Please consider donating to keep the Cavern open!

    June ended with the CavFunding at 45% (CavCon 2.5) and the reserve at 591%.

    The next All Guilds Meeting is planned for Saturday, September 5 (Leetahr 23) at 13:00 KIT.

    Until then!

  • July 2026 All Guilds Meeting Summary

    July 2026 All Guilds Meeting Summary

    Here is the summary for the 195th All Guilds Meeting, moderated by PodHopper, along with the chatlog!

    Contents

    Messengers Website

    ☛ Korov’ev made a brief introduction to this website’s new additions. Swifthawk has been hard at work at migrating the existing posts, but also at modernizing the way readers and writers interact with Uru news:

    • you will be able to comment on posts simply by providing a name and email: contrary to what was mentioned at the AGM, registering is currently not open yet;
    • for now there are no plans to re-open the forum: we think the comment sections under individual posts should suffice, but of course we’re open to add one if there’s demand;
    • the AGM chat log archive has been reworked too: we thought cleansed logs were redundant, so we’re now providing just the raw ones, in both HTML and pure text format; the latter includes all months up to 2016, plus a few from 2015, 2014 and 2011;
    • We’re also not currently planning to open a dedicated Discord server: you can find us in most Uru servers, including Cyan Chat, MOULa Events, OpenUru, Mysterium, and The Open Cave; many of these do have a specific GoMe channel;

    We especially would like to have more post writers: if there are events you want to present in more details, interviews, summaries of gatherings other than the AGM, etc., you’re welcome to get in contact with us!

    Mysterium

    ☛ The registration deadline is July 20 (and not, as previously reported, July 1st). Please follow the check-in and logistics guidelines detailed in the dedicated page.

    There is an air quality alert for those attending: it’s wildfire season, so depending on which way the wind blows, the air might be smoky. Masks will be provided at the registration desk free of charge.

    ☛ The schedule for the convention is available here. The “Cyan State of the Union” presentation will be hosted in person by Hannah Gamiel and Eric A. Anderson, while the panel “The Trial of Daddy Atrus” will be hosted by the people behind the YouTube Channel Giant Bomb.

    Many panels will streamed on the convention’s official Twitch channel and later saved to their YouTube channel.

    ☛ The Creativity Prompt for July is “Haven”. Entries for the “Matchmaker” prompt for June were from Talashar and from Redwoodrroad.

    OpenUru

    ☛ Calum Traveler reported on the Restoration’s current projects. The East Wing of the New Messengers Pub, also known as the Mysterium Con Room, is now open and you’ll be able to pick up the Mysterium 2026 shirt from there!

    If you are having troubles linking to the New Messengers Pub, such as crashing on link or shortly after arrival, you may have a low VRAM situation on your machine. The fan devs are at work to pin down extraneous textures and oversized textures inherited from the original build file. In the mean time, as a workaround, before linking you should lower the texture quality slider in the graphics settings.

    ☛ In Chiso Preniv various new tomes edited by Korov’ev have been added to the library (as previously reported in February and March this year), along with new section signs and the new rug and desk in the basement. The archive of DRC forums and chatlogs will be added at a later time.

    A new book was added to the bookring: Jalargura (or Pod 56). Semjay opted for not having a release ceremony, to let people have the surprise of finding it on their own. Vothol Gallery was moved to the bookshelf on the right of the bookring, along with Serene and Tre’bivdil.

    ☛ In Descent, the entrance of the Eder Tomahn has been blocked off, as work is undergoing to fix the elevator tracks in the Shaft (i.e. to smooth the transition from the single-track MOUL Shaft to the two-track Myst V Shaft). You may also notice that marker coordinates are a bit off; perhaps the Great Zero detected the restoration works and recalibrated the markers a bit?
    More news on Descent will be disclosed at the “Restoration of The Great Shaft” presentation at Mysterium, so stay tuned for more!

    ☛ The Gahreesen Wall English commenter audios have been replaced, as the previous ones were perceived to be a bit too snarky and harsh, so they have toned them down to be more encouraging. If people prefer a deeper voice for the announcer, there are a couple of options to replace them again.

    ☛ Still in the works, but with no set deadline yet:

    • various areas of Descent are undergoing quality assessment by Tweek;
    • Pod 12 needs some more work and retexturing;
    • Reischu Apt is waiting for the final background music;
    • Overflow Station is on hold while Calum Traveler is completing other projects;
    • Mahrn Gestoy needs more testing and updating.

    Events in the Cavern

    ☛ IwonK is back and will host a Wonky Talk (on her Twitch channel) on Friday 17 at 15:00 KIT in the Guild of Cookies’ Hood by the heek table. This month’s topic will be “Male characters in games”. Feel free to suggest interesting games she could talk (and draw) about. As always, there will be cookies!

    Besides streaming, IwonK is making some games of her own as a year-long gamedev challenge, using Bitsy; you can find them at her itch.io page.

    She is also working with Kefrith on an idea originating from the Mysterium Discord: a Mysterium-like online event. The work title is “Rivenium”, they are looking for ideas, events and presentations or panels. If you are interested, you can find IwonK or Kefrith on the Mysterium Discord, at the dedicated forum.

    ☛ Every Saturday, Ereshkigal is hosting an Ancient Stories event at 15:00 KIT in Chiso Preniv, reading folktales, translated ancient texts, historical fiction from all over the ancient world, as well as the occasional historical-inspired fan fiction.

    ☛ Babbel is back from the holiday and has prepared a new show. The next classical music program in the Hall of Kings in Ae’gura will be on Monday 20 at 12:00 KIT. The theme will be “Cool Classics”.

    ☛ Augur’s Speculative Fiction Book Club will meet in Nezetahn(1)’s Hood’s Eder Delin on July 18 at 12:30 KIT to discuss three novellas: “The Emperor’s Soul” by Brandon Sanderson, “Story of Your Life” by Ted Chiang, and “The Lies of the Ajungo” by Moses Ose Utomi. Everyone is welcome to discuss their opinions on the book, using either voice or text chat.

    ☛ Brooketh presented the Competitive Myst Online Group, hosting an Ahyoheek game every Saturday at 21:00 KIT in the Competitive Myst Online Hood. All players are welcome, regardless of skill level. If you don’t know how to play, they will teach you. Or you can just hang out and observe. Voice chat is encouraged, but not required; both are used.

    On the Open Cave shard, Ayohiker holds an analogous event every Monday at 14:00 KIT in the Ayohikers’ hood. There are also new games in the City of Dimensions: Tic-Tac-TOC and Connect Four.

    ☛ The Age Expeditions are hosted by Korov’ev every Sunday at 11:00 KIT. There’s also an (uncommented) Twitch stream. In Deep Island, this month they will visit the chain-letter Age of Rell-too; then they will visit a few Ages by Jamey: Tsoidahl Sheegahtee, Writers’ Niche, Crater Concept, Vogokh Oglahn. In the Open Cave, they will visit the four main Pod Ages, part of the Third Journey.

    ☛ PodHopper is preparing two events for the summer: Celtic Night and Summerfest:

    • Celtic Night will be held on Friday 31 from 12:00 KIT to 14:00 KIT in the Guild of Healers’ Hood’s Eder Delin. Since the lead singer of Irish band Clannad died in April, there will be a number of Clannad songs.
    • For Summerfest, there isn’t a set date yet, but for practical reasons it will be at the end of August, maybe early September, depending on how long it will take to prepare it. PodHopper would like to have a Wall Game this year, but is still looking for someone to organize it.

    ☞ For a more complete list of upcoming events, check the calendar. Times and events may change at the last minute; you can find the latest updates at:

    D’ni Language Classes

    Shokhootahn Rehn had two updates, one for the D’ni Language Classes and one for the Story Nights. Another student has started taking the classes!

    Visitors are asked to not post pellet points into the hood imager: one of his former students and a close friend, Yutiel Yoshi, who passed away in 2018, is listed there. He has refrained from posting pellets to maintain her name at the top, as a form of memorial.

    D’ni Language Classes schedule (click to expand)
    • Those who would like to attend the lessons should contact Rehn, preferably on Discord (r’Tayrtahn#1317), or via KImail (#80428). Be sure to include your KI number, so that Rehn can send you a reply!
    • The Guild of Instructors’ Hood will be open and public unless a class is in session. Classes are individual.
    • Daytime openings are on Monday to Friday, at 10:00, 11:00 or 12:00 KIT, depending on the student’s schedule.
    • Evening openings are on Monday to Thursday, at 20:00, 21:00 or 22:00 KIT, depending on the student’s schedule.
    • Daytime availability is subject to change with little or no notice. Last-minute changes to class times will be announced via Magic Bot (#27527) or Mimi Bot (#71459); to be notified, add both as buddies, then PM them “advert”.

    R’Tayrtahn’s Story Nights

    Story Night Europe and Original Story Night are currently retelling the first two human restorations of the Cavern. Eventually they will cover all of the books and games, as well as the three human attempts at the restoration of D’ni.

    R’Tayrtahn records videos of the sessions (via an avatar named “I’m a bot, do not message”), that he will eventually upload to his YouTube channel. Be careful if you PM r’Tay or the bot during the events, as messages will be visible in the videos 😉

    Videos now also come with auto translated captions in French, German, Indonesian, Italian, Polish, Portuguese and Spanish. Automatic translation often has trouble with words like “D’ni” or “linking books”, so your mileage may vary 😉

    Story Nights schedule (click to expand)
    • Story Nights are held in Tsahno’s Hood every Saturday, gathering at the fountain at around 23:00 KIT, with the story starting at about 23:30 KIT.
    • For Story Nights – Europe, the gatherings are on Saturday starting at 13:30 KIT, with the story starting at about 14:00 KIT.
    • On All Guilds Meeting days, the event will begin at 14:00 KIT or 30 minutes after the meeting, whichever is later.
    • The stories are told using voice chat, so you will need to have your speakers, headphones or KI devices on. If you would like a reminder, please send r’Tayrtahn (#58324) a KImail with your KI number included in the text, so that he can add you to his buddies list.

    That was it for this month. Please consider donating to keep the Cavern open!

    May ended with the CavFunding at 45% (CavCon 2.5) and the reserve at 644%.

    The next All Guilds Meeting is planned for Saturday, August 1st (Leesahn 24) at 13:00 KIT.

    Until then!

  • February 2026 All Guilds Meeting Summary

    February 2026 All Guilds Meeting Summary

    Here is the summary for the 190th All Guilds Meeting, moderated by PodHopper, along with the raw and cleansed chatlogs!

    Contents

    1. OpenUru
    2. Mysterium
    3. Events in the Cavern
    4. D’ni Language Classes
    5. R’Tayrtahn’s Story Nights

    OpenUru

    ☛ A new Age by Semjay is coming to Minkata Alpha, and hopefully will make it to MOULa by this year.

    ☛ Phase 1 of Descent is locked down fairly well and is just in the polishing stage now. Hopefully it too will be released by this year. The plan is to place a public Descent link in Chiso Preniv’s basement.

    ☛ Quite a few new non-linking books are coming to Chiso Preniv. Korov’ev has provided three lore documents, split into smaller chapter sized volumes. The Lara Documents will be added to a shelf provisionally named “Unverified Lineage”, as J.D. Barnes was never able to fully authenticate their validity. Any document that seems legit, but could not be plausibly verified, will be archived here in the future.

    The other two new volumes will be added in the now-called “Explorers’ Historical Retrospectives” (EHR) shelf: the first is A Journey without Ending, by Max, originally published on the old Guild of Messengers online magazine The Cavern Post. The second volume is The Restoration So Far, a series of retrospectives originally posted by Vidkid on the old Myst Online forums.

    ☛ Preafter, the Heritage Documents, and Activity in the Cavern, also in the EHR shelf, will be getting new covers that will hopefully make it easier to identify them.

    ☛ As chronicles like the Heritage Documents inevitably come with personal interpretations, Calum Traveler is also adding collections of primary sources, i.e. forum posts, starting with the Beneath forums. Once Tweek gets some time, he will also contribute backups of the old DRC forums.

    ☛ Standing signs, with artwork done by Tweek, will be put in place by various bookshelves for easier identification: the aforementioned “Unverified Lineage”, “Explorers Historical Retrospectives” and “Web Forum Archives”, along with “Linking Books”. When Serene and Tre’bivdil were moved over from the showcasing circle, some explorers had trouble finding them. The new standing signs should make it easier to find categories around the library.

    Mysterium

    ☛ The hotel booking link (not to be confused with a linking book) is now live.

    ☛ Submissions are still open for both shirt and pin designs. The deadline is closing soon, on February 27.

    ☛ The Creativity Prompt for February–March is “Sunrise“. Entries for the “Tradition” prompt for December–January were from Calum Traveler, Talashar, Belle and Redwoodrroad.

    Events in the Cavern

    ☛ IwonK will host a Wonky Talk (on her Twitch channel) on Friday 20 at 15:00 KIT in the Guild of Cookies’ Hood by the heek table. This month’s topic will be “Bunny Games“. Feel free to suggest interesting games she could talk (and draw) about. As always, there will be cookies!

    Besides streaming, IwonK is making some games of her own as a year-long gamedev challenge, using Bitsy; you can find them at her itch.io page.

    She is also working with Kefrith on an idea originating from the Mysterium Discord: a Mysterium-like online event. The work title is “Rivenium“, they are looking for ideas, events and presentations or panels. If you are interested, you can find IwonK or Kefrith on the Mysterium Discord, at the dedicated forum.

    ☛ Every Saturday, Ereshkigal is hosting an Ancient Stories event at 15:00 KIT in Chiso Preniv, reading folktales, translated ancient texts, historical fiction from all over the ancient world, as well as the occasional historical-inspired fan fiction.

    ☛ Babbel‘s classical music program will be on Monday 16 at 12:00 KIT, in the Hall of Kings in Ae’gura. The theme will be “Olympics, Love & Carnival“.

    ☛ Prad gave an update on the revived Cavern Choir project. Participants are asked to be able to: 1) carry a tune, 2) sing along a demo track, 3) record a good quality audio track (microphone, headphone, a computer with a soundcard and a recording program).

    They selected three songs: “Happy Birthday” (four voices, traditional), “Ave Verum Corpus” by W.A. Mozart (four voices, classical) and “Only You” by Voces8/Flying Pickets (four voices, popular a cappella). Participants are asked to send their recording by March 8, as the plan is to perform at Seeker’s Christmas Country Special.

    If you are interested, or need assistance with recording, please contact Babbel (aka Babbeltje40, aka Vrouwdinges) or Prad (KI #08406189).

    ☛ Augur’s Speculative Fiction Book Club will honor International Women’s Day with a selection of three novels written by women:

    Voting will be done in either the MOULa Events or the URU Community Movies and Games Discords. Voting for more than one book is fine, but please vote only on one server, not both.

    ☛ Brooketh presented the Competitive Myst Online Group, hosting an Ahyoheek game every Saturday at 21:00 KIT in the Competitive Myst Online Hood. All players are welcome,  regardless of skill level. If you don’t know how to play, they will teach you. Or you can just hang out and observe. Voice chat is encouraged, but not required; both are used.

    ☞ On the Open Cave shard, Ayohiker holds an analogous event every Monday at 14:00 KIT in the Ayohikers’ hood. There are also two new games in the City of Dimensions: Tic-Tac-TOC and Connect Four.

    ☛ The Age Expeditions are hosted by Korov’ev every Sunday at 11:00 KIT. There’s also an (uncommented) Twitch stream. In Deep Island, this month they will visit the entries from the second Rapid Age Development Contest, all Ahra Pahts shells; after that, they will explore Whilyam‘s Ages. In the Open Cave, they will visit Ages added to MOULa in 2022: Elonin, Fahets Highgarden and Eder Naybree.

    ☞ For a more complete list of upcoming events, check our calendar. Times and events may change at the last minute; you can find the latest updates at:

    D’ni Language Classes

    Shokhootahn Rehn had two updates, one for the D’ni Language Classes and one for the Story Nights. Another student has started taking the classes.

    Visitors are asked to not post pellet points into the hood imager: one of his former students and a close friend, Yutiel Yoshi, who passed away in 2018, is listed there. He has refrained from posting pellets to maintain her name at the top, as a form of memorial.

    D’ni Language Classes schedule (click to expand)
    • Those who would like to attend the lessons should contact Rehn, preferably on Discord (r’Tayrtahn#1317), or via KImail (#80428). Be sure to include your KI number, so that Rehn can send you a reply!
    • The Guild of Instructors’ Hood will be open and public unless a class is in session. Classes are individual.
    • Daytime openings are on Monday to Friday, at 10:00, 11:00 or 12:00 KIT, depending on the student’s schedule.
    • Evening openings are on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, at 20:00, 21:00 or 22:00 KIT, depending on the student’s schedule.
    • Daytime availability is subject to change with little or no notice. Last-minute changes to class times will be announced via Magic Bot (#27527) or Mimi Bot (#71459); to be notified, add both as buddies, then PM them “advert”.

    R’Tayrtahn’s Story Nights

    Story Night Europe and Original Story Night are currently telling the stories from Myst: The Book of D’ni. There will be no story on Saturday 14, due to family obligations. Eventually they cover all of the books and games, as well as the three human attempts at the restoration of D’ni.

    R’Tayrtahn records videos of the sessions (via an avatar named “I’m a bot, do not message”), that he will eventually upload to his YouTube channel. Be careful if you PM r’Tay or the bot during the events, as messages will be visible in the videos.

    Videos now also come with auto translated captions in French, German, Indonesian, Italian, Polish, Portuguese and Spanish. Automatic translation often has trouble with words like “D’ni” or “linking books”, so your mileage may vary.

    Story Nights schedule (click to expand)
    • Story Nights are held in Tsahno’s Hood every Saturday, gathering at the fountain at around 23:00 KIT, with the story starting at about 23:30 KIT.
    • For Story Nights – Europe, the gatherings are on Saturday starting at 13:30 KIT, with the story starting at about 14:00 KIT.
    • On All Guilds Meeting days, the event will begin at 14:30 KIT or 30 minutes after the meeting, whichever is later.
    • The stories are told using voice chat, so you will need to have your speakers, headphones or KI devices on. If you would like a reminder, please send r’Tayrtahn (#58324) a KImail with your KI number included in the text, so that he can add you to his buddies list.

    That was it for this month. Please consider donating to keep the Cavern open!

    December ended with the CavFunding at 82% (CavCon 2.8) and the reserve at 782%.

    The next All Guilds Meeting is planned for Saturday, March 7, 2026 (Leevotahr 23) at 13:00 KIT.

    Until then!

  • January 2026 All Guilds Meeting Summary

    January 2026 All Guilds Meeting Summary

    Here is the summary for the 189th All Guilds Meeting, moderated by PodHopper, along with the raw and cleansed chatlogs!

    Contents

    1. OpenUru
    2. Mysterium
    3. Events in the Cavern
    4. D’ni Language Classes
    5. R’Tayrtahn’s Story Nights

    OpenUru

    ☛ MOULa got an update on Christmas Eve, with bug fixes and a revamped Chiso Preniv, which had to be completely rebuilt since the original Blender file was lost. Sameehn is now showcased in the Book Ring, while Tre’bivdil has been moved to the side shelf (first to the right, looking at the window), next to Serene.

    ☛ The Preafter volumes have been added to the ‘Explorer Retrospective‘ shelf, joining the Heritage Documents and Activity in the Cavern. There are plans to add selected threads from the DRC and D’ni Explorer forums, along with relevant chatlogs from 2002 to today, to the shelf on the opposite side, in order to preserve original documents alongside the summaries and analyses in the Explorer Retrospective.

    ☛ The commentrary journal from Chiso Preniv was accidentally removed; in the next update it will be archived in one of the upper shelves, along with the original commentary from the Ae’gura Messengers Pub.

    ☛ The doorway in the Chiso Preniv basement will not be opened any time soon: the design plans are lost, and perhaps it’s better to keep Chiso focused on showcasing books and documents. Besides, rumors are that Clippy roams the hills outside the building, looking for victims!

    ☛ Phase 1 of Descent – currently being developed by Calum Traveler, Ametist, SereneTiki, Ehren, Semjay, Maurus and occasionally Tweek – is now ‘feature locked’ in terms of walkable content, from the Caldera down to the river channel. The first build is live on Minkata Alpha.

    Phase 2 is being planned, but it will have to wait until phase 1 is released. Many more month of work are needed before the expanded Descent will be ready for MOULa, but it’s making strides. Testers are invited to poke around in groups, as some bugs will only show up when multiple people are present (e.g. music cues firing off in the entire Age despite being meant to be local).

    ☛ Eder Naybree telescopes are waiting for a hotfix that will be applied as soon as possible. There were plans for a meteor impact event, but it’s not working as intended, so for the time being it’s scrapped. Meteor showers, on the other hand, should happen any day once the hotfix is live.

    Mysterium

    ☛ The date for the 2026 edition of the Myst convention has been set to July 24–26, in Portland, OR. The hotel will be the DoubleTree Hotel by Lloyd Center: rates are $139/night, including free parking, free hot breakfast buffet (up to two people/room). The hotel has a pool and free Wifi.

    ☛ The Creativity Prompt for December–January is “Tradition“. Entries for the “Orange” prompt for October–November were from Calum Traveler, Anna and Talashar.

    Events in the Cavern

    ☛ IwonK will host a Wonky Talk (on her Twitch channel) on Friday 16 at 15:00 KIT in the Guild of Cookies’ Hood by the heek table. This month’s topic will be “German Games“. Feel free to suggest interesting games she could talk (and draw) about. As always, there will be cookies!

    Besides streaming, IwonK is making some games of her own as a year-long gamedev challenge, using Bitsy; you can find them at her itch.io page.

    She is also working with Kefrith on an idea originating from the Mysterium Discord: a Mysterium-like online event. The work title is “Rivenium“, they are looking for ideas, events and presentations or panels. If you are interested, you can find IwonK or Kefrith on the Mysterium Discord, at the dedicated forum.

    ☛ Every Saturday, Ereshkigal is hosting an Ancient Stories event at 15:00 KIT in Chiso Preniv, reading folktales, translated ancient texts, historical fiction from all over the ancient world, as well as the occasional historical-inspired fan fiction.

    ☛ Babbel will host two events this month: on Monday 5 at 12:00 KIT she will host her own birthday party in Kirel, with European song festival music; the Cavern Choir will also make an appearance. The pre-show will start 20 minutes in advance.

    Her regular classical music program will be on Monday 19 (Martin Luther King Jr. Day) at 12:00 KIT, in the Hall of Kings in Ae’gura. The theme will be “In Higher Spirits“.

    ☛ Augur’s Speculative Fiction Book Club will start 2026 with a familiar book, The Book of Ti’ana by Rand Miller and David Wingrove! Their next meeting will be in Nezetahn(1)’s Hood’s Eder Delin, on January 24 at 12:30 KIT. Everyone is welcome to discuss their opinions on the book, using either voice or text chat.

    ☛ Brooketh presented the Competitive Myst Online Group, hosting an Ahyoheek game every Saturday at 21:00 KIT in the Competitive Myst Online Hood. All players are welcome,  regardless of skill level. If you don’t know how to play, they will teach you. Or you can just hang out and observe. Voice chat is encouraged, but not required; both are used.

    ☞ On the Open Cave shard, Ayohiker holds an analogous event every Monday at 14:00 KIT in the Ayohikers’ hood. There are also two new games: Tic-Tac-TOC and Connect Four, in the City of Dimensions.

    ☛ The Age Expeditions, hosted by Korov’ev every Sunday at 11:00 KIT, kicked off the year in Deep Island with a door run, and visiting Beachhouse Update by SereneTiki and Turtle Isle by DenDwaler.

    In the Open Cave, on the 11th they will visit the first Ages that made it on MOULa: Chiso Preniv, the Ae’gura Messengers Pub and Veelay Tsahvahn. These are not the first Ages to appear on TOC, though: Tre’bivdil, Fehnir’s House and Vothol Gallery have been available on MOUL shards for many years before. They will visit these soon.

    ☛ AlanDJ re-presented Radio Free D’ni, as it has been a while since the last presentation at the AGM. They broadcast music every Sunday at 13:00 KIT, with a 30 minutes preshow and aftershow. Each show has a theme: a particular artist, a genre, or a story. Every other Sunday they do a ‘remastered‘ show, one that was first broadcast five or so years ago, with some updates.

    On Sunday 4th the theme will be Jazz Fusion keyboard player Chick Corea. Next will be the annual look at musicians who left us in 2025. On the 18th the theme will be the French Progressive Rock in the Seventies.

    Alan also thanked everyone who listened to the reading of Susan Cooper’s The Dark Is Rising he did on Midwinter’s Day, it peaked at 22 listeners. For next year, he’s taking suggestions; so far he’s considering John Masefield’s The Box of Delights, although he already read it a few years ago. In the meantime, he’s planning to do another reading for the Summerfest; suggestions are welcome for this one too.

    ☞ For a more complete list of upcoming events, check our calendar. Times and events may change at the last minute; you can find the latest updates at:

    D’ni Language Classes

    Shokhootahn Rehn had two updates, one for the D’ni Language Classes and one for the Story Nights.

    Visitors are asked to not post pellet points into the hood imager: one of his former students and a close friend, Yutiel Yoshi, who passed away in 2018, is listed there. He has refrained from posting pellets to maintain her name at the top, as a form of memorial.

    D’ni Language Classes schedule (click to expand)
    • Those who would like to attend the lessons should contact Rehn, preferably on Discord (r’Tayrtahn#1317), or via KImail (#80428). Be sure to include your KI number, so that Rehn can send you a reply!
    • The Guild of Instructors’ Hood will be open and public unless a class is in session. Classes are individual.
    • Daytime openings are on Monday to Friday, at 10:00, 11:00 or 12:00 KIT, depending on the student’s schedule.
    • Evening openings are on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, at 20:00, 21:00 or 22:00 KIT, depending on the student’s schedule.
    • Daytime availability is subject to change with little or no notice. Last-minute changes to class times will be announced via Magic Bot (#27527) or Mimi Bot (#71459); to be notified, add both as buddies, then PM them “advert”.

    R’Tayrtahn’s Story Nights

    Story Night Europe and Original Story Night will soon start the story from Myst: The Book of D’ni. There will be no story on Saturday 17, due to family obligations. Eventually they cover all of the books and games, as well as the three human attempts at the restoration of D’ni.

    R’Tayrtahn records videos of the sessions (via an avatar named “I’m a bot, do not message”), that he will eventually upload to his YouTube channel. Be careful if you PM r’Tay or the bot during the events, as messages will be visible in the videos.

    Videos now also come with auto translated captions in French, German, Indonesian, Italian, Polish, Portuguese and Spanish. Automatic translation often has trouble with words like “D’ni” or “linking books”, so your mileage may vary.

    Story Nights schedule (click to expand)
    • Story Nights are held in Tsahno’s Hood every Saturday, gathering at the fountain at around 23:00 KIT, with the story starting at about 23:30 KIT.
    • For Story Nights – Europe, the gatherings are on Saturday starting at 13:30 KIT, with the story starting at about 14:00 KIT.
    • On All Guilds Meeting days, the event will begin at 14:30 KIT or 30 minutes after the meeting, whichever is later.
    • The stories are told using voice chat, so you will need to have your speakers, headphones or KI devices on. If you would like a reminder, please send r’Tayrtahn (#58324) a KImail with your KI number included in the text, so that he can add you to his buddies list.

    That was it for this month. Please consider donating to keep the Cavern open!

    The next All Guilds Meeting is planned for Saturday, February 7, 2026 (Leevotahr 1st) at 13:00 KIT.

    Until then!

  • MOULa update OpenUru#218d1 (client #217)

    MOULa update OpenUru#218d1 (client #217)

    On December 24 MOULa got another update, with updates to Chiso Preniv, Eder Naybree, Explorers’ Emporium, Kalamee and Sameehn! A full changelog is available at the bottom of this post.

    A note on bugs (click to expand)

    When an update hits MOULa it is almost inevitable that unexpected bugs will show up. For all the testing that can be done, Minkata never sees as many concurrent players as the official server, and not all issues can be catched.

    When the servers have just been restarted, most of the early linking slowness and problems are from the database buffers refilling – and by an overload of concurrent logins 😉

    No additions from Cyan are to be expected for the foreseeable future, apart from server updates, so all improvements and additions will come from fan developers, who dedicate their limited free time to at least try to let MOULa be the best it could potentially be.

    So the best way to deal with bugs is to have patience and report them, mentioning where you were and what you were doing, be it on Cyan’s Discord or OpenUru’s Discord.

    If you fancy contributing your work and/or helping with bug fixing, those places are also excellent starting points to be part of the Fourth Restoration 🙂

    OpenUru Build #218d1 (client #217) – Q3, 2025
    • [Rebuild] Chiso Preniv V2 {2}
    • [Update] Eder Naybree age {2}
    • [Update] Explorers Emporium age {3}
    • [Update] Kalamee age {3}
    • [Update] Sameehn age {1}
    • [Workaround] Nexus Python Update hide instanced EE and Sameehn {2}

    Attributions:

    1: ametist
    2: harley
    3: semjay

  • October 2025 All Guilds Meeting Summary

    October 2025 All Guilds Meeting Summary

    Here is the summary for the 186th All Guilds Meeting, moderated by Claidi Song, along with the raw and cleansed chatlogs!

    Claidi announced that for various reasons she will need to step down from moderation after December. If you are interested in moderating the meetings after December, please get in contact via the Cyan Chat or MOULa Events Discord servers.

    Contents

    1. OpenUru
    2. Mysterium
    3. Events in the Cavern
    4. D’ni Language Classes
    5. R’Tayrtahn’s Story Nights
    6. Miscellanea

    OpenUru

    ☛ If you plan to participate to Hacktoberfest, the H’uru group on GitHub is offering a few issues tagged with “Hacktoberfest”, meant as good first projects for contributors (besides Plasma, there are also a few issues for Korman, PlasmaShop, Dirtsand and libHSPlasma). You can also contribute non-code, such as documentation or tutorials, and submit the link to Hacktoberfest rather than a pull request.

    ☛ Progress in ongoing on the East Wing expansion for the Ae’gura Messengers Pub; it is planned to become a proper conference room for Mysterium once finished.

    ☛ The first elevator from the top of the Descent Shaft to the Eder Tomahn is now fully functional. After the second elevator will be done, the main problem will be the floor elevator at the bottom of the Shaft.

    After that, past textural cleanups and other wirings, Descent will be pushed to Minkata Alpha for a new round of testing. Things will be broken past the elevators, but it will be a chance for suggesting visual changes.

    ☛ Pod 12 and the Reischu Apartment need a few more tweaks before they can be pushed to Minkata Prime.

    ☛ The Stage and the Meteor Shower event in Eder Naybree will finally be pushed forwards. Bot operators are asked to disable the “ExtcolBookVis” variable, since it enables links to yet unreleased Ages.

    ☛ Chiso Preniv, Kalamee and Explorers’ Emporium also have updates almost ready to be pushed to Minkata. A lot of fixes and additions for the upcoming quarter update were possible thanks to collaborations between creators, and we hope more will come.

    ☛ Typically the pipeline goes from Minkata Alpha (beta testing), to Minkata Prime (bug fixing), to MOUL Staging (final check on Cyan’s server software) and finally MOUL live. Note that MOUL Staging is a limited-access, temporary shard that affects the CavFunding; those with an account are asked to limit their access to specific testing purposes.

    ☛ The OpenUru and the Guild of Writers websites and repos were recently subject to AI scraper bot attacks. Hoikas and Rarified have done their best to block unauthorized accesses, but legitimate IP addresses may have been blocked inadvertently. If you’re a contributor and suddenly can’t log in, try contacting Rarified (OU) or Hoikas (GoW) through the usual forum/Discord channels.

    Mysterium

    ☛ The Creativity Prompt for October is “Orange”. Entries for the “Round” prompt for September were from Jet and Talashar.

    Events in the Cavern

    ☛ On Monday 6, Skyisblu shared the recipe of her chocolate zucchini cake, inspired by suggestions from August’s post-stream discussions.
    The Cooking Sessions are on the first Monday of the month at 12:00 KIT, via Twitch, in the Guild of Caterers’ Hood. You can find past recipes and recordings at Skyisblu’s blog and YouTube channel.

    ☛ IwonK will host a Wonky Talk (on her Twitch channel) on Friday 17 at 15:00 KIT in the Guild of Cookies’ Hood by the heek table. This month’s topic will be “Swiss Games”. Feel free to suggest interesting games she could talk (and draw) about. As always, there will be cookies!

    Besides streaming, IwonK is making some games of her own as a year-long gamedev challenge, using Bitsy; you can find them at her itch.io page.

    She is also working with Kefrith on an idea originating from the Mysterium Discord: a Mysterium-like online event. The work title is “Rivenium“, they are looking for ideas, events and presentations or panels. If you are interested, you can find IwonK or Kefrith on the Mysterium Discord, at the dedicated forum.

    ☛ Every Saturday, Ereshkigal is hosting an Ancient Stories event at 15:00 KIT in Chiso Preniv, reading folktales, translated ancient texts, historical fiction from all over the ancient world, as well as the occasional historical-inspired fan fiction.

    ☛ Babbel will host her next classical music program in the Hall of Kings in Ae’gura, on Monday 20 at 12:00 KIT. The theme for this month will be “Let the organ everywhere…“.

    ☛ Augur’s Speculative Fiction Book Club will discuss their current book, Ready Player One by Ernest Cline, in Nezetahn(1)’s Hood’s Eder Delin. Due to traveling, the discussion is postponed to November 15 at 12:30 KIT. Everyone is welcome to discuss their opinions on the book, using either voice or text chat.

    ☛ Brooketh briefly presented the Competitive Myst Online Group, hosting an Ahyoheek game every Saturday at 21:00 KIT in the Competitive Myst Online Hood. All players are welcome,  regardless of skill level. If you don’t know how to play, they will teach you. Or you can just hang out and observe. Voice chat is encouraged, but not required; both are used.

    On the Open Cave shard, Ayohiker holds an analogous event every Monday at 14:00 KIT in the Ayohikers’ hood.

    ☛ The Cavern Tours are on hold until late 2026.

    ☛ The October Town Hall will be skipped.

    ☛ Calum Traveler does live Age building on Twitch on Mondays and Fridays, when there are no other events on schedule.

    ☞ For a more complete list of upcoming events, check our calendar. Times and events may change at the last minute; you can find the latest updates at:

    D’ni Language Classes

    Shokhootahn Rehn had two updates, one for the D’ni Language Classes and one for the Story Nights. Visitors are asked to not post pellet points into the hood imager: one of his former students and a close friend, Yutiel Yoshi, who passed away in 2018, is listed there. He has refrained from posting pellets to maintain her name at the top, as a form of memorial.

    D’ni Language Classes schedule (click to expand)
    • Those who would like to attend the lessons should contact Rehn, preferably on Discord (r’Tayrtahn#1317), or via KImail (#80428). Be sure to include your KI number, so that Rehn can send you a reply!
    • The Guild of Instructors’ Hood will be open and public unless a class is in session. Classes are individual.
    • Daytime openings are on Monday to Friday, at 10:00, 11:00 or 12:00 KIT, depending on the student’s schedule.
    • Evening openings are on Monday to Friday, at 20:00, 21:00 or 22:00 KIT, depending on the student’s schedule.
    • Daytime availability is subject to change with little or no notice. Last-minute changes to class times will be announced via Magic Bot (#27527) or Mimi Bot (#71459); to be notified, add both as buddies, then PM them “advert”.

    R’Tayrtahn’s Story Nights

    Story Night Europe and Original Story Night will continue this month with the story of young Atrus as told in the novel, Myst: The Book of Atrus. Eventually they will cover all of the books and games, as well as the three human attempts at the restoration of D’ni.

    R’Tayrtahn records videos of the sessions (via an avatar named “I’m a bot, do not message”), that he will eventually upload to his YouTube channel. Be careful if you PM r’Tay or the bot during the events, as messages will be visible in the videos.

    Videos now also come with auto translated captions in French, German, Indonesian, Italian, Polish, Portuguese and Spanish. Automatic translation often has trouble with words like “D’ni” or “linking books”, so your mileage may vary.

    Story Nights schedule (click to expand)
    • Story Nights are held in Tsahno’s Hood every Saturday, gathering at the fountain at around 23:00 KIT, with the story starting at about 23:30 KIT.
    • For Story Nights – Europe, the gatherings are on Saturday starting at 13:30 KIT, with the story starting at about 14:00 KIT.
    • On All Guilds Meeting days, the event will begin at 14:30 KIT or 30 minutes after the meeting, whichever is later.
    • The stories are told using voice chat, so you will need to have your speakers, headphones or KI devices on. If you would like a reminder, please send r’Tayrtahn (#58324) a KImail with your KI number included in the text, so that he can add you to his buddies list.

    Miscellanea

    ☛ This month, the Age Expeditions in Deep Island will visit Jo’nae Hood by Jonnee, including a restored version by SereneTiki, then they will tackle the puzzles of Takla Ma’kan, by the Huru.info group (not associated with the H’uru project). In the Open Cave, they will visit the last two pods of the Pod Age, then they will take the Fourth Journey in Minkata.

    That was it for this month. Please consider donating to keep the Cavern open!

    September ended with the CavFunding at 97% (CavCon 3) and the reserve at 636%.

    The next All Guilds Meeting is planned for Saturday, November 1st (Leevofo 10) at 13:00 KIT. Note that daylight saving in the U.S.A. ends later than most other countries, so that will be 20:00 CET.

    Until then!

  • {:en}September 2025 All Guilds Meeting Summary{:}{:ru}Сводка по Встрече Всех Гильдий — Сентябрь 2025{:}

    {:en}September 2025 All Guilds Meeting Summary{:}{:ru}Сводка по Встрече Всех Гильдий — Сентябрь 2025{:}

    {:en}Here is the summary for the 185th All Guilds Meeting, moderated by Claidi Song, along with the raw and cleansed chatlogs!

    Claidi announced that for various reasons she will need to step down from moderation after December. If you are interested in moderating the meetings after December, please get in contact via the Cyan Chat or MOULa Events Discord servers.

    Contents

    1. OpenUru
    2. Mysterium
    3. Events in the Cavern
    4. D’ni Language Classes
    5. R’Tayrtahn’s Story Nights
    6. Miscellanea

    OpenUru

    ☛ Calum Traveler announced that Ami‘s crew work of surveying everything in Descent from 2024 again has been progressing nicely. Elevator work will be taken on by Ametist. Once the elevators are all working, they are hoping to have Tweek go through and handle any lighting that need fixing or recalibration. Assuming everything goes according to plan, hopefully the first leg of Descent will be open sometime in 2026.

    ☛ A few assorted fixes and updates are planned for a release in the last quarter of this year, including a maintenance pass of Kalamee.

    Mysterium

    ☛ Calum Traveler shared some highlights from the survey:

    • The staff apologizes for canceling the Unconference, but factors related to the Georgia Aquarium excursion led to the decision. They do plan to include it, or a similar event, in future years.
    • Panels or presentations may not always be available every year, but they aim to balance activity and presentation content.
    • They plan to showcase local attractions or unique and interactive activities again in upcoming years; a Myst-inspired outdoor excursion will hopefully be included next year.

    ☛ All the streamed presentations have been uploaded to YouTube.

    ☛ For 2026, the Con Chairs will be M13 and Rayne. Next year, the convention will be held in Portland, OR, indicatively in July or August.

    ☛ The Creativity Prompt for September is “Round”. Entries for the “Bubbles” prompt for August were from Kh’reestrefah, IwonK, Kefrith, Talashar, and Nina.

    Events in the Cavern

    ☛ IwonK will host a Wonky Talk (on her Twitch channel) on Friday 19 at 15:00 KIT in the Guild of Cookies’ Hood by the heek table. This month’s topic will be “Space Games”. Feel free to suggest interesting games she could talk (and draw) about. As always, there will be cookies!

    Besides streaming, IwonK is making some games of her own as a year-long gamedev challenge, using Bitsy; you can find them at her itch.io page.

    She is also working with Kefrith on an idea originating from the Mysterium Discord: a Mysterium-like online event. The work title is “Rivenium“, they are looking for ideas, events and presentations or panels. If you are interested, you can find IwonK or Kefrith on the Mysterium Discord, at the dedicated forum.

    ☛ Every Saturday, Ereshkigal is hosting an Ancient Stories event at 15:00 KIT in Chiso Preniv, reading folktales, translated ancient texts, historical fiction from all over the ancient world, as well as the occasional historical-inspired fan fiction.

    ☛ Babbel will host her next classical music program in the Hall of Kings in Ae’gura, on Monday 15 at 12:00 KIT. The theme for this month will be “Latin American Music, Part 2“.

    ☛ Augur’s Speculative Fiction Book Club will discuss their current book, Ready Player One by Ernest Cline, in Nezetahn(1)’s Hood’s Eder Delin. Due to traveling, the discussion is postponed to November 15 at 12:30 KIT. Everyone is welcome to discuss their opinions on the book, using either voice or text chat.

    ☛ Isa and Cid, along with a few others, recently started the “MOULa Community Music, Movies, & Games” Discord server, a place where anyone can stream a movie they want to share. Anyone is welcome to host and plan single or recurring events. In addition to movies and shows, they will have other kinds of stream like music, video games, or live feed of hobbies like painting or building Lego. They are also hosting Augur’s Book Club’s meetings.

    ☛ Brooketh briefly presented the Competitive Myst Online Group, hosting an Ahyoheek game every Saturday at 21:00 KIT in the Competitive Myst Online Hood. All players are welcome,  regardless of skill level. If you don’t know how to play, they will teach you. Or you can just hang out and observe. Voice chat is encouraged, but not required; both are used.

    ☛ Due to traveling, Skyisblu’s Cooking Session for September will be skipped. In October, she will showcase a chocolate cake recipe.

    ☞ For a more complete list of upcoming events, check our calendar. Times and events may change at the last minute; you can find the latest updates at:

    D’ni Language Classes

    Shokhootahn Rehn had two updates, one for the D’ni Language Classes and one for the Story Nights. Visitors are asked to not post pellet points into the hood imager: one of his former students and a close friend, Yutiel Yoshi, who passed away in 2018, is listed there. He has refrained from posting pellets to maintain her name at the top, as a form of memorial.

    D’ni Language Classes schedule (click to expand)
    • Those who would like to attend the lessons should contact Rehn, preferably on Discord (r’Tayrtahn#1317), or via KImail (#80428). Be sure to include your KI number, so that Rehn can send you a reply!
    • The Guild of Instructors’ Hood will be open and public unless a class is in session. Classes are individual.
    • Daytime openings are on Monday to Friday, at 10:00, 11:00 or 12:00 KIT, depending on the student’s schedule.
    • Evening openings are on Monday to Thursday, at 20:00, 21:00 or 22:00 KIT, depending on the student’s schedule.
    • Daytime availability is subject to change with little or no notice. Last-minute changes to class times will be announced via Magic Bot (#27527) or Mimi Bot (#71459); to be notified, add both as buddies, then PM them “advert”.

    R’Tayrtahn’s Story Nights

    Story Night Europe and Original Story Night will continue this month with the story of young Atrus as told in the novel, Myst: The Book of Atrus. Eventually they will cover all of the books and games, as well as the three human attempts at the restoration of D’ni. Due to family obligations, there will be no story on Saturday 27.

    R’Tayrtahn records videos of the sessions (via an avatar named “I’m a bot, do not message”), that he will eventually upload to his YouTube channel. Be careful if you PM r’Tay or the bot during the events, as messages will be visible in the videos.

    Videos now also come with auto translated captions in French, German, Indonesian, Italian, Polish, Portuguese and Spanish. Automatic translation often has trouble with words like “D’ni” or “linking books”, so your mileage may vary.

    Story Nights schedule (click to expand)
    • Story Nights are held in Tsahno’s Hood every Saturday, gathering at the fountain at around 23:00 KIT, with the story starting at about 23:30 KIT.
    • For Story Nights – Europe, the gatherings are on Saturday starting at 13:30 KIT, with the story starting at about 14:00 KIT.
    • On All Guilds Meeting days, the event will begin at 14:00 KIT or 30 minutes after the meeting, whichever is later.
    • The stories are told using voice chat, so you will need to have your speakers, headphones or KI devices on. If you would like a reminder, please send r’Tayrtahn (#58324) a KImail with your KI number included in the text, so that he can add you to his buddies list.

    Miscellanea

    ☛ Cid announced the release of Neyyah, by Defy Reality Entertainment (Aaron Gwynaire), a game styled after Riven, with pre-rendered static nodes. While officially only released for Windows (for now), it is reported to work well under MacOS with CrossOver, and under Linux with Proton.

    ☛ This month, the Age Expeditions in Deep Island will visit Janga by Itep Edor, then Jo’nae and Jo’nae Hood by Jonnee, including a restored version by SereneTiki. In the Open Cave, having completed the First Journey, there will be a Fissure Party! Since they already completed the Second Journey (Tsogahl and Delin), they will then tackle the Third, i.e. the Pod Ages.

    ☛ The Cavern Today podcast just turned 20! They have plans to commemorate the big anniversary; in the meantime, you can listen their debut episode here.

    That was it for this month. Please consider donating to keep the Cavern open!

    July ended with the CavFunding at 110% (CavCon 4.1) and the reserve at 629%.

    The next All Guilds Meeting is planned for Saturday, October 4 (Leevot 17, 9681) at 13:00 KIT.

    Until then!{:}{:ru}Вот сводка по 185-й Встрече Всех Гильдий, модератор — Claidi Song, вместе с исходными и очищенными чатлогами!

    Claidi объявила, что по разным причинам ей придется уйти с поста модератора после декабря. Если вы хотите модераторить встречи после декабря, пожалуйста, свяжитесь через серверы Discord Cyan Chat или MOULa Events.

    Содержание

    1. OpenUru
    2. Mysterium
    3. События в Пещере
    4. Занятия по языку D’ni
    5. Story Nights R’Tayrtahn
    6. Разное

    OpenUru

    ☛ Calum Traveler сообщил, что работа команды Ami по обследованию всего в Descent с 2024 года снова продвигается хорошо. Работу с лифтом возьмет на себя Ametist. После того как все лифты заработают, планируется, что Tweek проверит и исправит освещение, если потребуется. Если все пойдет по плану, первая часть Descent откроется примерно в 2026 году.

    ☛ Несколько исправлений и обновлений планируются к выпуску в последнем квартале этого года, включая технический проход Kalamee.

    Mysterium

    ☛ Calum Traveler поделился некоторыми главными моментами обзора:

    • Организаторы извиняются за отмену Unconference, но решение было связано с поездкой в Georgia Aquarium. Планируется включить это мероприятие или аналогичное в будущем.
    • Панели или презентации могут не проводиться каждый год, но стараются поддерживать баланс между активностями и презентациями.
    • Планируется снова демонстрировать местные достопримечательности и уникальные интерактивные мероприятия; на следующий год, возможно, включат outdoor-экскурсию в стиле Myst.

    ☛ Все стримовые презентации загружены на YouTube.

    ☛ На 2026 год председателями конвенции будут M13 и Rayne. В следующем году конвенция пройдет в Portland, OR, ориентировочно в июле или августе.

    ☛ Творческий вызов (Creativity Prompt) на сентябрь — “Round“. Участники по “Bubbles” в августе: Kh’reestrefah, IwonK, Kefrith, Talashar и Nina.

    События в Пещере

    ☛ IwonK проведет Wonky Talk (на Twitch-канале) в пятницу, 19-го в 15:00 KIT в Guild of Cookies‘ Hood у стола heek. Тема месяца — “Space Games“. Можно предлагать интересные игры для обсуждения и рисунков. Как всегда, будут печеньки!

    Помимо стриминга, IwonK создаёт свои собственные игры в рамках годового gamedev-вызова с использованием Bitsy; можно посмотреть на ее странице itch.io.

    Она также работает с Kefrith над идеей, возникшей в Discord Mysterium: онлайн-мероприятие в стиле Mysterium. Рабочее название — “Rivenium“. Они ищут идеи, события, презентации и панели. Если интересно, можно найти IwonK или Kefrith на Discord Mysterium, на специальном форуме.

    ☛ Каждую субботу Ereshkigal проводит Ancient Stories в 15:00 KIT в Chiso Preniv, читает фольклор, переводы древних текстов, историческую фантастику со всего древнего мира и иногда фанфики на историческую тему.

    ☛ Babbel проведет следующую классическую музыкальную программу в Hall of Kings в Ae’gura, в понедельник, 15-го в 12:00 KIT. Тема месяца — “Латиноамериканская музыка, часть 2“.

    ☛ Augur‘s Speculative Fiction Book Club обсудит текущую книгу Ready Player One Эрнеста Клайна в Nezetahn(1)’s Hood‘s Eder Delin. Из-за поездок обсуждение перенесено на 15 ноября в 12:30 KIT. Все желающие могут обсуждать книгу голосом или в чате.

    ☛ Isa и Cid, вместе с другими, недавно создали “MOULa Community Music, Movies, & Games“ Discord-сервер, где каждый может транслировать фильм для других. Любой может проводить одноразовые или регулярные мероприятия. Помимо фильмов, планируются стримы музыки, игр, живые трансляции хобби вроде рисования или LEGO. Также они проводят встречи Augur’s Book Club.

    ☛ Brooketh кратко представила Competitive Myst Online Group, проводящую Ahyoheek каждую субботу в 21:00 KIT в Competitive Myst Online Hood. Все игроки приветствуются, независимо от уровня. Если не знаете, как играть, научат. Можно просто наблюдать. Голосовой чат приветствуется, но не обязателен.

    ☛ Из-за поездок Skyisblu пропустит сентябрьскую сессию по кулинарии. В октябре она покажет рецепт шоколадного торта.

    ☞ Для полного списка событий см. календарь. Время и события могут меняться в последний момент. Последние обновления доступны на:

    Занятия по языку D’ni

    Shokhootahn Rehn дал два обновления: одно для D’ni Language Classes и одно для Story Nights. Посетителей просят не размещать pellet points в hood imager: там указана его бывшая ученица и близкая подруга, Yutiel Yoshi, умершая в 2018 году. Rehn воздерживается от размещения pellet points, чтобы её имя оставалось вверху, в знак памяти.

    Расписание D’ni Language Classes (нажмите, чтобы развернуть)
    • Желающие посещать занятия должны связаться с Rehn, предпочтительно через Discord (r‘Tayrtahn#1317) или через KImail (#80428). Обязательно укажите свой KI номер, чтобы Rehn смог ответить!
    • Guild of Instructors‘ Hood будет открыт и публичен, если занятие не ведется. Занятия индивидуальные.
    • Дневные занятия: понедельник-пятница, в 10:00, 11:00 или 12:00 KIT, в зависимости от расписания студента.
    • Вечерние занятия: понедельник-четверг, в 20:00, 21:00 или 22:00 KIT, в зависимости от расписания студента.
    • Доступность в дневное время может меняться без предупреждения. Изменения в последнюю минуту объявляются через Magic Bot (#27527) или Mimi Bot (#71459); чтобы получать уведомления, добавьте обоих в друзья и отправьте им “advert”.

    Story Nights R’Tayrtahn

    Story Night Europe и Original Story Night продолжаются в этом месяце с историей молодого Атруса из романа Myst: The Book of Atrus. Впоследствии будут охвачены все книги и игры, а также три попытки человечества восстановить D’ni. Из-за семейных обязательств субботы, 27-го, истории не будет.

    R’Tayrtahn записывает видео с сессий (через аватар “I’m a bot, do not message”) и позже загрузит на свой YouTube-канал. Будьте осторожны, если отправляете ему KImail во время событий — сообщения будут видны на видео.

    Видео теперь снабжены авто-переводом с субтитрами на французский, немецкий, индонезийский, итальянский, польский, португальский и испанский. Автоперевод часто затрудняется с такими словами, как “D’ni” или “linking books”.

    Расписание Story Nights (нажмите, чтобы развернуть)
    • Story Nights проходят в Tsahno‘s Hood каждую субботу, сбор у фонтана около 23:00 KIT, начало истории около 23:30 KIT.
    • Для Story Nights – Europe сборы в субботу в 13:30 KIT, начало истории около 14:00 KIT.
    • В дни All Guilds Meeting событие начинается в 14:00 KIT или через 30 минут после встречи, в зависимости от того, что позже.
    • Истории рассказываются через голосовой чат, поэтому необходимо иметь колонки, наушники или KI-устройства. Для напоминания отправьте r’Tayrtahn (#58324) KImail с указанием вашего KI-номера, чтобы он смог добавить вас в свой спиок друзей.

    Разное

    ☛ Cid объявил о выпуске Neyyah от Defy Reality Entertainment (Aaron Gwynaire), игры в стиле Riven с предрендеренными статическими узлами. Пока официально только для Windows, но, как сообщается, работает под MacOS через CrossOver и под Linux через Proton.

    ☛ В этом месяце Age Expeditions на Deep Island посетят Janga от Itep Edor, затем Jo‘nae и Jo‘nae Hood от Jonnee, включая восстановленную версию SereneTiki. В Open Cave, после завершения Первого Пути, будет Fissure Party! После Второго Пути (Tsogahl и Delin) они приступят к Третьему, т.е. Pod Ages.

    ☛ Подкаст The Cavern Today отметил 20-летие! Планируются праздничные мероприятия; пока можно послушать первый эпизод.

    На этом всё за этот месяц. Пожалуйста, рассмотрите возможность пожертвования, чтобы Cavern оставалась открытой!

    Июль закончился с CavFunding на 110% (CavCon 4.1) и резервом на 629%.

    Следующая All Guilds Meeting запланирована на субботу, 4 октября (Leevot 17, 9681) в 13:00 KIT.

    До встречи!{:}

  • MOULa update OpenUru#218b (client #217)

    MOULa update OpenUru#218b (client #217)

    On May 6 MOULa got another update, with a few fixes, improvements, and the new Age of Sameehn! A full changelog is available at the bottom of this post.

    The update also includes a new Relto page. The book to Sameehn is available in the basement of the Explorers’ Emporium.

    A note on bugs (click to expand)

    When an update hits MOULa it is almost inevitable that unexpected bugs will show up. For all the testing that can be done, Minkata never sees as many concurrent players as the official server, and not all issues can be catched.

    When the servers have just been restarted, most of the early linking slowness and problems are from the database buffers refilling – and by an overload of concurrent logins 😉

    No additions from Cyan are to be expected for the foreseeable future, apart from server updates, so all improvements and additions will come from fan developers, who dedicate their limited free time to at least try to let MOULa be the best it could potentially be.

    So the best way to deal with bugs is to have patience and report them, mentioning where you were and what you were doing, be it on Cyan’s Discord or OpenUru’s Discord.

    If you fancy contributing your work and/or helping with bug fixing, those places are also excellent starting points to be part of the Fourth Restoration 🙂

    OpenUru Build #218b (client #217) – Q1, 2025
    • [new] New age Sameehn {1}
    • [new] New Relto Page {7}
    • [fix] Fix to Chiso Preniv’s door sound {5}
    • [fix] Fix to Cleft Riven scope camera {3}
    • [fix] Fix to creature timing in Negilahn and Payiferen {4}
    • [fix] Fix to Nick’s journal note in city {9}
    • [fix] Fix to Relto firemarble appearance {4}
    • [update] Adjustments to Credits & Buffer values for Cleft Radio Music {5}
    • [update] Explorers’ Emporium updates {6}
    • [update] Highgarden age updates {8}
    • [update] Veelay Journal additions {2}

    Attributions:

    1: ametist
    2: dpogue, Harley
    3: Harley
    4: Hazado
    5: Maurus
    6: Semjay
    7: TheScar(.fr)
    8: Tweek
    9: Zaroth

  • May 2025 All Guilds Meeting Summary

    May 2025 All Guilds Meeting Summary

    Here is the summary for the 181st All Guilds Meeting, moderated by Claidi Song, along with the raw and cleansed chatlogs!

    Contents

    1. OpenUru
    2. Mysterium
    3. Events in the Cavern
    4. D’ni Language Classes
    5. R’Tayrtahn’s Story Nights
    6. Miscellanea

    OpenUru

    ☛ On Tuesday 6, at around 9:00 KIT, a new content update will be released! It will include the Age of Sameehn, available on release … but not in Chiso, or the Nexus!

    Mysterium

    ☛ Registration for Mysterium 2025 is now open: early standard registration is $25, while premium registration (admission plus a shirt) is $40. Additional swag is also available with your registration through July 1st, including Direbo bubble coasters and a Golden Tablet lanyard charm, both by Kelly “Rayne” Coston.

    ☛ After July 1st, swag will no longer be available to pre-order and standard registration will increase to $30.

    ☛ You can find more info on Mysterium on BluSky, Facebook, Discord, and their website.

    ☛ The Creativity Prompt for May is “Chicken“, the deadline is May 31. Entries for the “Thawing” prompt for March–April were from Redwoodrroad, Calum Traveler, Belle, Talashar … and a bonus one from Cyan!

    Events in the Cavern

    ☛ On Monday 5, Skyisblu will make a sugar cookie, a quick, fully customizable recipe with only three ingredients; it makes a great addition to a dessert platter or afternoon tea tray for Mother’s Day – which is coming up soon.
    The Cooking Sessions are on the first Monday of the month at 12:00 KIT, via Twitch, in the Guild of Caterers’ Hood. You can find past recipes and recordings at Skyisblu’s blog and YouTube channel.

    ☛ PodHopper will host a Celtic Night event (with celtic and mystic music) on Friday 9 at 13:00 KIT in the Eder Delin of the Guild of Healers hood.

    ☛ IwonK will host a Wonky Talk (on her Twitch channel) on Friday 16 at 15:00 KIT in the Guild of Cookies’ Hood by the heek table. This month’s topic will be “Male protagonists in Games“. Feel free to suggest interesting games she could talk (and draw) about. As always, there will be cookies!
    Besides streaming, IwonK is making some games of her own as a year-long gamedev challenge, using Bitsy; you can find them at her itch.io page.

    ☛ Babbel will host her next classical music program in the Hall of Kings in Ae’gura, on Monday 19 at 12:00 KIT. The theme this month is “Vive la France!”.

    ☛ The revived Cavern Choir at the time of writing has 6 male singers and 4 female singers; they need more female singers, so if you are interested please contact Babbeltje40 (aka Vrouwdinges)  or Prad (#08406189).
    They still have some undecided candidates among their singers for the first song. There are plans for a concert consisting of three songs in August at the MOULa Summer Party.

    ☛ Augur’s Speculative Fiction Book Club will discuss their current book, This Is How You Lose the Time War by Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone, in Nezetahn(1)’s Hood’s Eder Delin, on May 31 at 12:30 KIT. Everyone is welcome to discuss their opinions on the book, using either voice or text chat.

    ☛ Every Tuesday, Ereshkigal is hosting an Ancient Stories event at 11:30 KIT in Mir-o-Bot’s Eder Gira (PM “link” to Mir-o-Bot #32319 or MinBot #9292763 to get there), reading folktales, translated ancient texts, historical fiction from all over the ancient world, as well as the occasional historical-inspired fan fiction.

    ☞ For a more complete list of upcoming events, check our calendar. Times and events may change at the last minute; you can find the latest updates at:

    D’ni Language Classes

    Shokhootahn Rehn had two updates, one for the D’ni Language Classes and one for the Story Nights.

    Visitors are asked to not post pellet points into the hood imager: one of his former students and a close friend, Yutiel Yoshi, who passed away in 2018, is listed there. He has refrained from posting pellets to maintain her name at the top, as a form of memorial.

    D’ni Language Classes schedule (click to expand)
    • Those who would like to attend the lessons should contact Rehn, preferably on Discord (r’Tayrtahn#1317), or via KImail (#80428). Be sure to include your KI number, so that Rehn can send you a reply!
    • The Guild of Instructors’ Hood will be open and public unless a class is in session. Classes are individual.
    • Daytime openings are on Monday to Friday, at 10:00, 11:00 or 12:00 KIT, depending on the student’s schedule.
    • Evening openings are on Monday to Friday, at 20:00, 21:00 or 22:00 KIT, depending on the student’s schedule.
    • Daytime availability is subject to change with little or no notice. Last-minute changes to class times will be announced via Magic Bot (#27527) or Mimi Bot (#71459); to be notified, add both as buddies, then PM them “advert”.

    R’Tayrtahn’s Story Nights

    Story Night Europe and Original Story Night will continue this month with the story of the Fall, which will last for the next 6 weeks. Eventually they will cover all of the books and games, as well as the three human attempts at the restoration of D’ni.

    R’Tayrtahn records videos of the sessions (via an avatar named “I’m a bot, do not message”), that he will eventually upload to his YouTube channel. Be careful if you PM r’Tay or the bot during the events, as messages will be visible in the videos 😉

    Videos now also come with auto translated captions in French, German, Indonesian, Italian, Polish, Portuguese and Spanish. Automatic translation often has trouble with words like “D’ni” or “linking books”, so your mileage may vary 😉

    Story Nights schedule (click to expand)
    • Story Nights are held in Tsahno’s Hood every Saturday, gathering at the fountain at around 23:00 KIT, with the story starting at about 23:30 KIT.
    • For Story Nights – Europe, the gatherings are on Saturday starting at 13:30 KIT, with the story starting at about 14:00 KIT.
    • On All Guilds Meeting days, the event will begin at 14:00 KIT or 30 minutes after the meeting, whichever is later.
    • The stories are told using voice chat, so you will need to have your speakers, headphones or KI devices on. If you would like a reminder, please send r’Tayrtahn (#58324) a KImail with your KI number included in the text, so that he can add you to his buddies list.

    Miscellanea

    ☛ This month, the Fan Age Expeditions in Deep Island will complete the Secret of the Rainbow Journey, by exploring Edereden by J.J. Jaguar. Then, they will visit Kohdalahn and Tyldalahn by Itep Edor, Corvus and others. The month will close either in Alabaster’s Depths by Dulcamara (if possible), or in the Maintainers’ Gateway by Melvin.

    And that was it for this month. Please consider donating to keep the Cavern open!

    March ended with the CavFunding at 69% (CavCon 2.7) and the reserve at 682%.

    The next All Guilds Meeting is planned for Saturday, June 7 (Leebro 9, 9681) at 13:00 KIT.

    Until then!

  • News Roundup #31

    ☛ Anthony Kleine posted an interesting two-part article about fixing the loading speed between nodes in Myst IV. There is no support yet for Revelation in ScummVM, but if it will be added, this is a tweak that could definitely be considered.

    ☛ In episode 121 of the Video Game History Hour podcast, Cyan co-founder Rand Miller took VGHF library director Phil Salvador on an exclusive tour of the Cyan Vault.

  • MOULa update OpenUru#217

    MOULa update OpenUru#217

    On November 12 MOULa got another update, with various fixes, improvements, and a new Age, soon to be unveiled! A full changelog is available at the bottom of this post. As usual, an audio summary of the updates was added to the Kirel auditorium podium.

    Books with D’ni fairytales have been added to Elonin; new shirts (Mysterium 2024, Riven, Radio Free D’ni, and one for the new Age) have been made available. The Ayoheek scoreboards in the neighborhoods, and the female hands options colors, have been fixed.

    A note on bugs (click to expand)

    When an update hits MOULa it is almost inevitable that unexpected bugs will show up. For all the testing that can be done, Minkata never sees as many concurrent players as the official server, and not all issues can be catched.

    When the servers have just been restarted, most of the early linking slowness and problems are from the database buffers refilling – and by an overload of concurrent logins 😉

    No additions from Cyan are to be expected for the foreseeable future, apart from server updates, so all improvements and additions will come from fan developers, who dedicate their limited free time to at least try to let MOULa be the best it could potentially be.

    So the best way to deal with bugs is to have patience and report them, mentioning where you were and what you were doing, be it on Cyan’s Discord or OpenUru’s Discord.

    If you fancy contributing your work and/or helping with bug fixing, those places are also excellent starting points to be part of the Fourth Restoration 🙂

    OpenUru Build #217 – Q3, 2024
    • [new] D’ni Fairytale books added to Elonin. {2}
    • [new] Explorers’ Emporium Age added. {12}
    • [new] Kirel message for 2024 Quarter 3 added. {6}
    • [new] Linking Book cover for Serene Age added. {7}
    • [new] New Riven, Radio Free D’ni, and ExpEmp shirts added. {8}
    • [new] New Wardrobe Item added. {4}
    • [update] Chiso Preniv Age additions & improvements. {5}
    • [update] Cleft visuals, Linking Panel consistency, Music Update (With new attribution in Credits). {11}
    • [update] Eder Naybree Beach additions. {9}
    • [update] Elonin improvements (steaming hot). {1}
    • [update] Fixed Ayoheek Scoreboards in Hoods. {10}
    • [update] Highgarden Content and Lighting updates. {14}
    • [update] Kirel refresh, door activations, & Eddie! {5}
    • [update] New Messenger’s Pub visual improvements. {5}
    • [update] New Mysterium 2024 Shirts. {5}
    • [update] Relto Page Combo: Storm + Veelay Visual Update. {11}
    • [update] Veelay Tsahvahn additions. {5}
    • [update] Wardrobe: Fix for the Female Hands Options colors. {13}
    • [client] (internal) Fix internal debugging commands {3}
    • [known issue] Someone has spray-painted one of the New Messenger’s Pub Cones black. We’re looking for some paint remover.

    Attributions:

    1: ametist, Ehren
    2: ametist, Ereshkigal, Semjay
    3: dgelessus
    4: dgelessus, Ehren, Riccardo Salerano, Salvo Ludus, Sirius, TheScar(.fr)
    5: Doobes
    6: Doobes, DapperAndy, skyisblu, Tyion, Zaroth
    7: Doobes, Tweek
    8: dpogue, AlanD & Malaclypse, Semjay
    9: Harley, Maurus, Hazado
    10: Hazado, dgelessus
    11: Maurus
    12: Semjay, Doobes
    13: TheScar(.fr)
    14: Tweek

  • November 2024 All Guilds Meeting Summary

    November 2024 All Guilds Meeting Summary

    Here is the summary for the 175th All Guilds Meeting, moderated by Claidi Song, along with the raw and cleansed chatlogs!

    Contents

    1. Mysterium
    2. OpenUru
    3. The Cavern Today
    4. Events in the Cavern
    5. D’ni Language Classes
    6. R’Tayrtahn’s Story Nights
    7. Miscellanea

    Mysterium

    ☛ The Creativity Prompt for November–December is “Hearth”, the deadline is December 31st. Entries for the “Falling” prompt for September–October were from Calum Traveler, Bastiko, Talashar, Rahshahth.

    OpenUru

    Calum Traveler mentioned that the latest update for MOULa is on the Staging server, and may be released in one or two weeks!

    The Cavern Today

    Maurus, on behalf of The Cavern Today, announced their latest episode: “Return to Riven“. They had of course a lot to talk about the Riven remake, but also about Mysterium, Cyan’s future, and some original music. It is also episode 3 of their D’ni restoration history series, “Deep Dive With Esto Centura”.

    The Cavern Today is available to stream on Apple Podcast, Spotify and other streaming services, and of course on TCT’s website.

    Events in the Cavern

    ☛ On Monday 4, Skyisblu prepared baked chicken meatballs in tomato sauce, smothered in ooey-gooey melted cheese, since fall has come in with a bang this year in Quebec. The Cooking Sessions are on the first Monday of the month at 12:00 KIT, via Twitch, in the Guild of Caterers’ Hood. You can find past recipes and recordings at Skyisblu’s blog and YouTube channel.

    ☛ IwonK will host a Wonky Talk (on her Twitch channel) on Friday 15 at 15:00 KIT in the Guild of Cookies’ Hood by the heek table. This month’s topic will be “Horror games“. Feel free to suggest interesting games she could talk (and draw) about. As always, there will be cookies!

    IwonK is also making some games of her own as a year-long gamedev challenge; you can find them at her itch.io page. Moreover, she recently got accepted at a local university, studying Game Design!

    ☛ Every Tuesday, Ereshkigal is hosting an Ancient Stories event at 11:30 KIT in Fahets Highgarden, reading (via stream) folktales, translated ancient texts, historical fiction from all over the ancient world, as well as the occasional historical-inspired fan fiction, and also a collection of D’ni fairytales Ereshkigal wrote as a kickoff event.

    ☛ Babbel will host her next classical music program in the Hall of Kings in Ae’gura, on Monday 18 at 12:00 KIT. The theme this month is “The Unfinished Works“.

    ☛ For a more complete list of upcoming events, check our calendar. Times and events may change at the last minute; you can find the latest updates at:

    D’ni Language Classes

    Shokhootahn Rehn had two updates, one for the D’ni Language Classes and one for the Story Nights.

    Visitors are asked to not post pellet points into the hood imager: one of his former students and a close friend, Yutiel Yoshi, who passed away in 2018, is listed there. He has refrained from posting pellets to maintain her name at the top, as a form of memorial.

    More about the D’ni Language Classes
    • Those who would like to attend the lessons should contact Rehn, preferably on Discord (r’Tayrtahn#1317), or via KImail (KI# 80428). Be sure to include your KI number, so that Rehn can send you a reply!
    • The Guild of Instructors’ Hood will be open and public unless a class is in session. Classes are individual.
    • Daytime openings are on Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday, at 10:00, 11:00 or 12:00 KIT, depending on the student’s schedule.
    • Evening openings are on Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday, at 20:00, 21:00 or 22:00 KIT, depending on the student’s schedule.
    • Daytime availability is subject to change with little or no notice. Last-minute changes to class times will be announced via Magic Bot (KI #27527) or Mimi Bot (KI #71459); to be notified, add both as buddies, then PM them “advert”.

    R’Tayrtahn’s Story Nights

    Story Night Europe and Original Story Night cover the stories of all of the Myst books and games, as well as the three human attempts at the restoration of D’ni.

    R’Tayrtahn records videos of the sessions (via an avatar named “I’m a bot, do not message”), that he will eventually upload to his YouTube channel. Be careful if you PM r’Tay or the bot during the events, as messages will be visible in the videos 😉 The channel is current through February 20, 2021.

    Videos now also come with auto translated captions in French, German, Indonesian, Italian, Polish, Portuguese and Spanish. Automatic translation often has trouble with words like “D’ni” or “linking books”, so your mileage may vary 😉

    More about the Story Nights
    • Story Nights are held in Tsahno’s Hood every Saturday, gathering at the fountain at around 23:00 KIT, with the story starting at about 23:30 KIT.
    • For Story Nights – Europe, the gatherings are on Saturday starting at 13:30 KIT, with the story starting at about 14:00 KIT.
    • On All Guilds Meeting days, the event will begin at 14:00 KIT or 30 minutes after the meeting, whichever is later.
    • The stories are told using voice chat, so you will need to have your speakers, headphones or KI devices on. If you would like a reminder, please send r’Tayrtahn (KI# 58324) a KImail with your KI number included in the text, so that he can add you to his buddies list.

    Miscellanea

    ☛ At the end of October, Cyan announced a big update to the VR remake of Myst! The main highlight is the upgrade from Unreal Engine 4 to Unreal Engine 5, which solved a number of stability issues on various platforms.

    ☛ Episode 16 of The Lost Art, by MystiTech Productions, is coming on January 4, 2025 at 14:30 KIT. The premiere live chat will as usual start half an hour before.

    ☛ In November, the Fan Age Expeditions in Deep Island will explore Elsewhere by Denost, the third chapter in his series about Gary Bradwell after Somewhere and Iceworld. This is a large Age with a complex series of puzzles, so it will take the whole month to complete it.

    And that was it for this month. Please consider donating to keep the Cavern open!

    The next All Guilds Meeting is planned for Saturday, December 7 (Leevobro 10) at 13:00 KIT.

    Until then!

  • MOULa update OpenUru#212

    On November 8 MOULa got another update, with various fixes, improvements and a new Age! A full changelog is available at the bottom of this post. As usual, an audio summary of the updates was added to the Kirel auditorium podium.

    A new area within D’ni, by TGMChrist & Tweek, will soon be unveiled. The doors of the Library and the Museum in Ae’gura now work properly, opening and closing as people get through them. Various updates were made to Chiso Preniv, Eder Bahvahnter, Eder Naybree, Elonin, Kalamee, and Tiam.

    A note on bugs (click to expand)

    When an update hits MOULa it is almost inevitable that unexpected bugs will show up. For all the testing that can be done, Minkata never sees as many concurrent players as the official server, and not all issues can be catched.

    When the servers have just been restarted, most of the early linking slowness and problems are from the database buffers refilling – and by an overload of concurrent logins 😉

    No additions from Cyan are to be expected for the foreseeable future, apart from server updates, so all improvements and additions will come from fan developers, who dedicate their limited free time to at least try to let MOULa be the best it could potentially be.

    So the best way to deal with bugs is to have patience and report them, mentioning where you were and what you were doing, be it on Cyan’s Discord, OpenUru’s Discord or OpenUru forums.

    If you fancy contributing your work and/or helping with bug fixing, those places are also excellent starting points to be part of the Fourth Restoration 🙂

    OpenUru Build #212b – Q3, 2023
    • [new] Ae’gura Library and Museum doors now work {8}
    • [new] New D’ni area by TGMChrist & Tweek {14}
    • [new] New audio track for introductory video {11}
    • [new] New Kirel audio recording for Q3 {13}
    • [update] Consistency Pass of Book Textures {9}
    • [update] Improvements to pellet imager {8}
    • [update] Improvements to Relto internals {8}
    • [update] Improvements to sliding door mechanics {8}
    • [update] Texture Optimization in (old) Messenger’s Pub & Phil’s Relto {10}
    • [update] Updates to Chiso Preniv {5}
    • [update] Updates to Eder Bahvahnter {6}
    • [update] Updates to Eder Naybree {7}
    • [update] Updates to Elonin {3}
    • [update] Updates to Kalamee {12}
    • [update] Updates to Tiam {3}
    • [fix] Don’t trust local machine time for synchronized gameplay {1}
    • [fix] Fix “crash on exit” caused by player hearing link sound {4}
    • [fix] Fix Descent Bahro Stone link-in animation {8}
    • [fix] Fix Gahreesen Wall Nexus camera operation {8}
    • [fix] Fix getting stuck in Heek during player exit {2}
    • [fix] Fix Hood/Kirel skybox streaking {9}
    • [fix] Fix issues with Relto Page clickables {8}

    Attributions:

    1: Adam {Hoikas}
    2: Adam {Hoikas}, Hazado
    3: ametist
    4: dgelessus, Adam {Hoikas}
    5: Doobes
    6: Dulcamara, ametist
    7: Harley
    8: Hazado
    9: Maurus
    10: Maurus, Adam {Hoikas}
    11: Rand, Maurus, Hazado
    12: Semjay
    13: skyisblu, Zaroth, Hazado
    14: TGMChrist, Tweek

  • November 2023 All Guilds Meeting Summary

    November 2023 All Guilds Meeting Summary

    Here is the summary for the 163rd All Guilds Meeting, moderated by Claidi Song, along with the raw and cleansed chatlogs!

    Contents

    1. Mysterium
    2. Events in the Cavern
    3. OpenUru
    4. D’ni Language Classes
    5. R’Tayrtahn’s Story Nights
    6. Miscellanea

    Mysterium

    ☛ In Addition to co-chairing this year, Annacat is once again managing the Writing & Artwork Table submissions. The Committee has decided to add a limit of five pages for any printouts to save trees and wallets. If your piece is longer you may wish to direct people to a website or other location where they can read the full text.

    ☛ The creativity prompt for November is “Found Family”; the deadline is November 30. Entries for the “Noir” prompt for October were from Angelmyst, Redwoodrroad, Calum Traveler, Talashar, Diranda, Tomatoes.

    Events in the Cavern

    ☛ For November’s Cooking Sessions with Sky, on Monday 6 at 12:00 KIT in the Guild of Caterers’ Hood, Skyisblu will try her hand at homemade pierogi, Polish dumplings filled with a mix of mashed potatoes and cheese, boiled and fried, sometimes topped with sour cream.

    Every month is something new and different, a lot of times inspired by what is coming from Skyisblu’s garden, or what is in season in her corner of the world. She also tries to answer any questions regarding the recipe she is cooking, other dishes or cuisines, and takes suggestions for future sessions.

    You can find past recipes and recordings at Skyisblu’s blog and YouTube channel.

    ☛ IwonK will host a Wonky Talk (on her Twitch channel) on Friday 17 at 15:00 KIT in the Guild of Cookies’ Hood by the heek table. This month’s topic will be horror games. Feel free to suggest interesting games she could talk (and draw) about. As always, there will be cookies!

    IwonK also made some games of her own as a year-long gamedev challenge; you can find them at her itch.io page.

    ☛ Babbel will host her classical music program in the Hall of Kings in Ae’gura on Monday 20 at 12:00 KIT.

    OpenUru

    ☛ Rarified gave a brief comment about the update schedule for MOULa. The Q2/Q3 2023 update has passed testing! On Monday 6 an announcement should be posted in the Cyan Discord server (probably #moula-announcements), with more info about the date of the update. Many items are included in this update: most fan Ages have received some tweaks, and many technical glitches, including very old ones, have been fixed. One new area will eventually be open for exploration (more info below).

    Rarified has now started to tackle a task that has been put off for years: the merger of the existing MOULa client with the modern H’uru client that the Guild of Writers team has been working on for a decade. They will start with an entirely new Minkata shard, which probably will not go live before 3–4 weeks from now.

    The new shard will likely only have a duplicate of the H’uru client, where contributors can begin to explore how their materials interact with the new client. Behind the scenes, Rarified has a list of changes he thinks are needed for more casual users to access MOULa with the same ease.

    They will also start working on a single Uru installation that can be used to access most (MOUL-based) shards, without a separate installation for each. That will of course depend on shard operators agreeing that the client can and will be used, but the capability will be there to select a shard at the time you launch Uru. At start it will likely be MOULa and the Minkata shards. Deep Island is very unlikely to be included, being based on the offline game, and neither will be The Open Cave, which is currently unmaintained and requires a specific set of older game files to work.

    Editor’s note: there have been a few attempts at a “multishard” client in the past, most notably Untìl Uru had a unified launcher for the various independent shards. More recently but less successfully, the Atlantis shard made an attempt at unifying the MOUL-based shard login.

    ☛ Christopher Therburg announced that the Fall of D’ni Memorial Island (Bahn’tefoonet in D’ni) is finally ready. There will be an opening ceremony in Chiso Preniv, soon after the release of the update. He, and possibly Tweek, will give a tour of the island; after that, a minute of silence will be observed to commemorate the D’ni who died at the hand of A’gaeris.

    Christopher has further plans to make some small changes to the island and the memorial itself so that it will be preserved and being in a good shape for a long time. He will soon add telescopes near the docks at a later date, for closer views of certain D’ni islands and Ae’gura itself.

    How to be a tester (click to expand)

    To be a tester, you will need to open an account on the Minkata prime shard; it is highly recommended to read the Tester’s Guide to understand what is expected. To test the cutting edge additions, you can sign up for the Minkata alpha shard.

    To report bugs, you can post on the OpenUru Discord server (channels #hood or #dev); on Discord you can ask to be added to the Testers role to be notified of testing requests, which sometimes need quick response in terms of hours, not days.

    D’ni Language Classes

    R’Tayrtahn gave two updates, one for the D’ni Language Classes and one for the Story Nights. The Guild of Instructors has lost one of their own: Guild Master shokhootahn shen, aka shenendoah or Kathleen, passed away late last month.

    Visitors are asked to not post pellet points into the hood imager: one of his former students and a close friend, Yutiel Yoshi, who passed away in 2018, is listed there. He has refrained from posting pellets to maintain her name at the top, as a form of memorial.

    More about the D’ni Language Classes (click to expand)
    • Those who would like to attend the lessons should contact Rehn via PM or KImail (KI# 80428), or on Discord (r’Tayrtahn#1317).
    • The Guild of Instructors’ Hood will be open and public unless a class is in session.
    • There are daytime openings Monday to Friday, at 12:00, 13:00 or 14:00 KIT, though availability is subject to change with little or no notice;
    • evening openings are on Monday to Friday, at 20:00, 21:00 or 22:00 KIT, depending on the student’s schedule.
    • Daytime availability is subject to change with little or no notice. Last-minute changes to class times will be announced via Magic Bot (KI #27527) or Mimi Bot (KI #71459); to be notified, add both as buddies, then PM them “advert”.

    R’Tayrtahn’s Story Nights

    Story Night Europe and Original Story Night are telling the story from Myst III: Exile. After that, they will begin the story from Myst IV: Revelation. Eventually they will cover all of the books and games, as well as the three human attempts at the restoration of D’ni.

    R’Tayrtahn records videos of the sessions (via an avatar named “I’m a bot, do not message”), that he will eventually upload to his YouTube channel. Be careful if you PM r’Tay or the bot during the events, as messages will be visible in the videos 😉

    More about the Story Nights (click to expand)
    • Story Nights are held in Tsahno’s Hood every Saturday, gathering at the fountain at around 23:00 KIT, with the story starting at about 23:30 KIT.
    • For Story Nights – Europe, the gatherings are on Saturday starting at 13:30 KIT, with the story starting at about 14:00 KIT.
    • On All Guilds Meeting days, the event will begin at 14:00 KIT or 30 minutes after the meeting, whichever is later.
    • The stories are told using voice chat, so you will need to have your speakers, headphones or KI devices on. If you would like a reminder, please send r’Tayrtahn (KI# 58324) a KImail with your KI number included in the text, so that he can add you to his buddies list.

    Miscellanea

    ☛ In November, the Fan Ages Expeditions in Deep Island will conclude the exploration of Takla Ma’kan by the German group H’Uru. Next, they will explore Paah’kweh and Sonavio by BobLishman, and visit the entries from the first Rapid Age Development contest. To round up the month, they will explore a few Ages made in 2008: Aerie, TINA Testing Area, Kahntinoy, Fena Barel.

    And that was it for this month. Please consider donating to keep the Cavern open!

    October ended with the CavFunding at 177% (CavCon 4.8) and the reserve at 652%, with 5% extra expenses. Population was at 49,489 (⇑259), with 1047 unique visits.

    The next All Guilds Meeting is planned for Saturday, December 2 (Leevobro 5) at 13:00 KIT.

    Until then!

  • October 2023 All Guilds Meeting Summary

    October 2023 All Guilds Meeting Summary

    Here is the summary for the 162nd All Guilds Meeting, moderated by Claidi Song, along with the raw and cleansed chatlogs!

    Contents

    1. Mysterium
    2. Events in the Cavern
    3. Magic Ages
    4. OpenUru
    5. D’ni Language Classes
    6. R’Tayrtahn’s Story Nights
    7. Miscellanea

    Mysterium

    ☛ Submissions for pins are now open, until March 31, Pins are not required to follow the Mysterium 2024 theme of Serenia, and/or the host city of Montreal. Shirt submissions are also open, until February 25.

    ☛ A new COVID vaccine has been made available for the latest variants of the virus. The Committee recommends everyone to get it as soon as possible. Also, there have been reports of pharmacies no longer updating or providing vaccine cards; if you are looking for an updated proof of vaccine, it is advisable to specifically request a card, or look into electronic vaccine records if available.

    ☛ The creativity prompt for October is “Noir”; the deadline is October 31. Entries for the “Back to School” prompt for September were from Calum Traveler, Talashar,  Redwoodrroad, Salvo Ludus.

    Events in the Cavern

    ☛ October 31 is the 26th anniversary of the release of Riven: the Sequel to Myst! Cyan is still at work on the VR remake, some glimpses of which were shown and discussed at this year’s Mysterium.

    ☛ Skyisblu hosts “Cooking Sessions with Sky” (on her Twitch channel) every month on the first Monday at 12:00 KIT in the Guild of Caterers’ Hood; recently she made okonomiyaki. The recipes are explained in both English and French.

    Every month is something new and different, a lot of times inspired by what is coming from Skyisblu’s garden, or what is in season in her corner of the world. She also tries to answer any questions regarding the recipe she is cooking, other dishes or cuisines, and takes suggestions for future sessions.

    You can find past recipes and recordings at Skyisblu’s blog and YouTube channel.

    ☛ IwonK will host a Wonky Talk (on her Twitch channel) on Friday 13 at 15:00 KIT in the Guild of Cookies’ Hood by the heek table. This month’s topic will be robots in video games. Feel free to suggest interesting games she could talk (and draw) about. As always, there will be cookies!

    ☛ Karel will host a Music Session in the Ae’gura Messengers Pub on Friday, October 13 at 13:00 KIT; the theme will be “Game Music over the Years“.

    ☛ Diranda, on behalf of the Guild of Authors and Artists, invited everyone to National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) 2023. They will hold workshops, write-ins, writing sprints and other NaNo-related gatherings in the Cavern as well as on their Discord server.

    Event dates will be posted soon; they will try to accomodate schedules as best as possible, so if you are interested, you should get in contact to help plan the events. They plan to have a concurrent event for artists as well as other creative types, including Age writers, to join in the fun. Suggestions for concurrent activities are definitely welcome.

    If you would like an invite to the Guild’s Discord, or for more info and questions about NaNoWriMo events, you should contact Diranda. For more about National Novel Writing Month, you can visit the official website.

    Magic Ages

    Mister Magic is back in the Cavern! He has now restored all of his Magic Ages, including the fireworks, and the numerous Magic Games are playable again. Mister Magic is currently working on making the Fabulous Magic Treasure (FMT) available to players again.

    To get help with the magic commands in the game, send “help” in PM to one of the bots with and they will send you a KI-mail with all the commands:

    • Magic Bot #27527,
    • Mimi Bot #71459,
    • Magic Treasure #26224,
    • Magic-Treasure #24891,
    • Mimi Treasure #21190.

    You can ask questions regarding the Magic Ages and everything that goes with them on the dedicated channel on the MOULa Events Discord, or on the dedicated thread on the Mystpedia forums.

    To celebrate the return of the Magic Bots (and as a thank you to Mir-o-Bot for remaining loyal despite all the difficulties), there will be a party, on Saturday, October 14 at 11:30 KIT, in Mir-o-Bot’s Kalamee (to get there, PM “to kalamee” to Mir-o-Bot, #32319).

    Eternal Seeker will provide the music, and the Nulp Dance Group will open the evening with a short but cool performance. In order to see all the effects, it is important not to use an internal client. Please come to the party with the vanilla MOULa client. After the performance, the dance floor will be open.

    Dances

    There will be no ‘guided dance’, but you can dance with a partner of your choice, with the help of Magic-Bot. There are different dances for this:

    • dancewith [name] [x]
      • abbreviated: dcw [name] [x]
    • slowdancewith [name] [x]
      • abbreviated: sldw [name] [x]

    where [name] is the avatar name of your desired dance partner, and [x] is the number of repetitions (max 3). All the seven dances that were available with the ‘guided dances’ are also available:

    • minadance [x] [name]

    Odd numbers are slightly faster dances, even numbers are slightly slower. Be polite and ask your desired dance partner to dance beforehand 😉

    Note that after calling the command, you will automatically be teleported to your dance partner and take a step backwards to assume the correct position. Make sure that your dance partner is not looking into an abyss, otherwise you would fall!

    If you need a KI note with a recap of the commands, you can ask Minasunda to send you one when you are in the Cavern.

    OpenUru

    ☛ Calum Traveler mentioned an upcoming fix to a long standing issue: in 2007 the DRC locked open the doors to the Library and Museum in Ae’gura, due to technical issues with the automatic sensors that were causing the doors to close in peoples faces, or stay shut when they should have opened.

    After almost 17 years, thanks to the hard work of Hazado, the functioning of these doors will be restored to proper functionality, opening and closing for a person coming close to their sensor regions, but staying open if multiple people are close by and not closing again until all people have transited. If someone links out while inside the sensor region, the doors will not close again until another person has gone through.

    ☛ Rarified gave a brief comment about the update schedule for MOULa. If all goes well, they should be able to send Cyan the new material later this month, with a possible release date for mid-November.

    ☛ TikiBear announced the restoration of the Age of Mirtahm, by Ametist and himself. There is no set date yet for when the Age will be made available.

    Mirtahm was found by Rebus and his friends, and is apparently deserted, after a cataclysmic flood that leaves much under water. There are structures remaining above the water that they have been restoring.

    From what they have found, the D’ni rescued and evacuated the original inhabitants. They then stayed for some time, with a small crew, to excavate a mineral. Now, after some cleanup, the Age is peaceful, if moody. There will be plenty of swimming and diving, though there will be fauna to contend with.

    ☛ Semjay is still working on refurbishing the Explorers’ Emporium (currently available on Deep Island); she is hoping to have it ready for testing by Christmas.

    How to be a tester (click to expand)

    To be a tester, you will need to open an account on the Minkata prime shard; it is highly recommended to read the Tester’s Guide to understand what is expected. To test the cutting edge additions, you can sign up for the Minkata alpha shard.

    To report bugs, you can post on the OpenUru Discord server (channels #hood or #dev); on Discord you can ask to be added to the Testers role to be notified of testing requests, which sometimes need quick response in terms of hours, not days.

    D’ni Language Classes

    R’Tayrtahn gave two updates, one for the D’ni Language Classes and one for the Story Nights. Another student has finished the 101 lessons and is working on their final exam!

    Visitors are asked to not post pellet points into the hood imager: one of his former students and a close friend, Yutiel Yoshi, who passed away in 2018, is listed there. He has refrained from posting pellets to maintain her name at the top, as a form of memorial.

    More about the D’ni Language Classes (click to expand)
    • Those who would like to attend the lessons should contact Rehn via PM or KImail (KI# 80428), or on Discord (r’Tayrtahn#1317).
    • The Guild of Instructors’ Hood will be open and public unless a class is in session.
    • There are daytime openings Monday to Friday, at 12:00, 13:00 or 14:00 KIT, though availability is subject to change with little or no notice;
    • evening openings are on Tuesday to Friday, at 20:00, 21:00 or 22:00 KIT, depending on the student’s schedule.
    • Daytime availability is subject to change with little or no notice. Last-minute changes to class times will be announced via Magic Bot (KI #27527) or Mimi Bot (KI #71459); to be notified, add both as buddies, then PM them “advert”.

    R’Tayrtahn’s Story Nights

    Story Night Europe and Original Story Night are telling the story of Myst: The Book of D’ni, as told in the novel. After that, they will begin the story from Myst III: Exile. Eventually they will cover all of the books and games, as well as the three human attempts at the restoration of D’ni.

    R’Tayrtahn records videos of the sessions (via an avatar named “I’m a bot, do not message”), that he will eventually upload to his YouTube channel. Be careful if you PM r’Tay or the bot during the events, as messages will be visible in the videos 😉

    More about the Story Nights (click to expand)
    • Story Nights are held in Tsahno’s Hood every Saturday, gathering at the fountain at around 23:00 KIT, with the story starting at about 23:30 KIT.
    • For Story Nights – Europe, the gatherings are on Saturday starting at 13:30 KIT, with the story starting at about 14:00 KIT.
    • On All Guilds Meeting days, the event will begin at 14:00 KIT or 30 minutes after the meeting, whichever is later.
    • The stories are told using voice chat, so you will need to have your speakers, headphones or KI devices on. If you would like a reminder, please send r’Tayrtahn (KI# 58324) a KImail with your KI number included in the text, so that he can add you to his buddies list.

    Miscellanea

    ☛ In October, the Fan Ages Expeditions in Deep Island will explore Jo’nae and Jo’nae Hood by Jonnee (from the book room in Janga, if possible), Takla Ma’kan by the German group H’Uru (not to be confused with the Writers’ developers group), and Paah’kweh by BobLishman.

    And that was it for this month. Please consider donating to keep the Cavern open!

    The next All Guilds Meeting is planned for Saturday, November 4 (Leevofo 12) at 13:00 KIT (20:00 CET).

    Until then!

  • September 2023 All Guilds Meeting Summary

    September 2023 All Guilds Meeting Summary

    Here is the summary for the 161st All Guilds Meeting, moderated by Claidi Song, along with the raw and cleansed chatlogs!

    Contents

    1. Mysterium
    2. Events in the Cavern
    3. OpenUru
    4. Fall of D’ni Memorial Island
    5. D’ni Language Classes
    6. R’Tayrtahn’s Story Nights
    7. Miscellanea

    Mysterium

    ☛ Next year’s Mysterium will be held in Canada, in Montreal, QC, so you may want to look up any immigration requirements. There are some pointers at the Location page on the convention’s website.

    If you do not have a passport it would be a good idea to look into it soon, since it can take a few months for the application to be processed.

    Most importantly, rely on official sources for immigration information. The convention offers those links for convenience, but do not rely on advice from Discord or any other unofficial source.

    ☛ The theme for 2024 will be Serenia, since it will be the 20th anniversary of Myst IV: Revelation.

    Submissions for T-shirt designs are open, and will be accepted until February 25. Details are available on the design page; in general, the committee will look favorably upon designs that incorporate both the year’s theme and the host city.

    ☛ The creativity prompt for September is “Back to School”; the deadline is September 30. Entries for the “Blazing” prompt for June were from Calum Traveler, KellyC, Triss, Talashar, IwonK, Salvo Ludus, Laughingpineapple, and Floydman.

    Events in the Cavern

    ☛ September is a month of many anniversaries:

    • Sunday 10 is the 19th anniversary of the release of Myst IV: Revelation, and the 16th of the Gametap episode “Deception”;
    • Monday 18 is the 9th of the Great Crash, when everyone had to reset their KI;
    • Tuesday 19 is the 18th anniversary of Myst V: End of Ages, and is also Talk Like a Pirate day;
    • Sunday 24 is the day the historical Guild of Writers was founded, and more importantly the 30th anniversary of (the original) Myst; and
    • Thursday 28 marks the historical Arrival of the Great King.

    ☛ IwonK will host a Wonky Talk (on her Twitch channel) on Friday 15 at 15:00 KIT in the Guild of Cookies’ Hood by the heek table. This month’s topic will be non-human characters in games. Feel free to suggest interesting games she could talk (and draw) about. As always, there will be cookies!

    OpenUru

    Rarified gave a brief comment about schedules and the pipeline into MOULa. They have started to choose what will go into the next update. That means that serious development will stop for a month, and a testing schedule will be announced for the Minkata shards, on the OpenUru Discord server (channel #test).

    If all goes well, they should be able to send Cyan the new material for the end of September, with a possible release date for mid-October. There are updates to several ages, and at least one new Age.

    How to be a tester (click to expand)

    To be a tester, you will need to open an account on the Minkata prime shard; it is highly recommended to read the Tester’s Guide to understand what is expected. To test the cutting edge additions, you can sign up for the Minkata alpha shard.

    To report bugs, you can post on the OpenUru Discord server (channels #hood or #dev); on Discord you can ask to be added to the Testers role to be notified of testing requests, which sometimes need quick response in terms of hours, not days.

    Fall of D’ni Memorial Island

    Christopher Therburg said a few words about his Fall of D’ni Memorial Island project, or Bahn’tefoonet (lit. “island-memorial”) in D’ni. The restoration and conversion is finally complete, and the island should be ready to open with the next update.

    Christopher also gave a few bits about the history of the island, which is thought to have been a small D’ni park before the Fall. The memorial is connected to water pipes for filling up the basin; these pipes used to serve a fountain that was found so badly damaged that it was impossible to restore. The island itself was covered in debris when first surveyed. The restoration progress will be detailed in a journal available for reading.

    There will be an opening ceremony in Chiso Preniv, and a minute of silence once on the island.

    Christopher also briefly talked about the new Age he found a few months ago, somewhere in a house in the Cavern. The name of the Age is Ahnogahlpo (“water-cave”), and it seems to be a garden Age set in an ocean or huge lake, with some islands with holes and caves. The sands of the islands beaches glow strangely at night.

    The age is still in the earliest stages of restoration and not yet fully mapped, so it is still a llong way from being safe for public access.

    D’ni Language Classes

    R’Tayrtahn gave two updates, one for the D’ni Language Classes and one for the Story Nights.

    Visitors are asked to not post pellet points into the hood imager: one of his former students and a close friend, Yutiel Yoshi, who passed away in 2018, is listed there. He has refrained from posting pellets to maintain her name at the top, as a form of memorial.

    More about the D’ni Language Classes (click to expand)
    • Those who would like to attend the lessons should contact Rehn via PM or KImail (KI# 80428), or on Discord (r’Tayrtahn#1317).
    • The Guild of Instructors’ Hood will be open and public unless a class is in session. There are daytime openings Monday to Friday, at 12:00, 13:00 or 14:00 KIT, though availability is subject to change with little or no notice;
    • evening openings are on Tuesday to Friday, at 20:00, 21:00 or 22:00 KIT, depending on the student’s schedule.
    • Daytime availability is subject to change with little or no notice. Last-minute changes to class times will be announced via Magic Bot (KI #27527) or Mimi Bot (KI #71459); to be notified, add both as buddies, then PM them “advert”.

    R’Tayrtahn’s Story Nights

    Story Night Europe and Original Story Night are telling the story of Myst: The Book of D’ni, as told in the novel. After that they will begin the story from Myst III: Exile. Eventually they will cover all of the books and games, as well as the three human attempts at the restoration of D’ni.

    R’Tayrtahn records videos of the sessions (via an avatar named “I’m a bot, do not message”), that he will eventually upload to his YouTube channel. Be careful if you PM r’Tay or the bot during the events, as messages will be visible in the videos 😉

    More about the Story Nights (click to expand)
    • Story Nights are held in Tsahno’s Hood every Saturday, gathering at the fountain at around 23:00 KIT, with the story starting at about 23:30 KIT.
    • For Story Nights – Europe, the gatherings are on Saturday starting at 13:30 KIT, with the story starting at about 14:00 KIT.
    • On All Guilds Meeting days, the event will begin at 14:00 KIT or 30 minutes after the meeting, whichever is later.
    • The stories are told using voice chat, so you will need to have your speakers, headphones or KI devices on. If you would like a reminder, please send r’Tayrtahn (KI# 58324) a KImail with your KI number included in the text, so that he can add you to his buddies list.
    • Last-minute changes to Story Night times are posted on the left-hand imager in the hood.

    Miscellanea

    ☛ In September, the Fan Ages Expeditions in Deep Island will begin their third cycle! They will start again from the very beginning of fan age building, with creations from 2005.

    And that was it for this month. Please consider donating to keep the Cavern open!

    August ended with the CavFunding at 83% (CavCon 2.8) and the reserve at 587%, with no extra expenses.

    The next All Guilds Meeting is planned for Saturday, October 7 (Leevot 19) at 13:00 KIT.

    Until then!

  • News Roundup #28

    ☛ As mentioned in the MOULa update post, the Relto start was given a new video, which was premiered on YouTube on the day of the update; you can watch it in English, French and German.

    Eder Bahvahnter will open on April 17 at 12:00 KIT; you can get there via Elonin, or by sending “to Bahvahnter” in PM to Mir-o-Bot (KI# 32319).

    Kalamee will open on May 1 at 13:00 KIT, in Chiso Preniv; Nosila will provide the music.

    ☛ A new update for the Myst Documentary was posted. There has been great progress on several fronts. The film’s treatment is now complete. A new trailer was completed, to be shown to potential partners to gather the additional funds required to finish the documentary; the trailer will be showcased at Mysterium 2023. Two new excerpts are also available in the article. The Vault of Stories so far has gathered more than 90 volumes with 535 pages.

    ☛ Doobes’ work on the Descent path and the possible integration of more Myst V ages was the focus of an article on Massively Overpowered.

    ☛ The Cavern Communications Network has released the 5th episode of its podcast The Water Cooler Show: an interview with Ametist.

    ☛ A few ages have been ported to VRChat, with Cyan’s approval: Bevin, Eder Tsogal, Kadish Gallery, Ahnonay Cathedral, and more. More info is available at the Virtual Reality Guild Discord server and VRC group.

  • MOULa update OpenUru#211

    MOULa update OpenUru#211

    On April 12 MOULa got another update, with various fixes, improvements and new Ages! A full changelog is available at the bottom of this post.

    You can now add a Chiso book to your Relto. The Relto start got a new intro video. A few more clothing items have been added (you will have to look for them!). The DRC stage has been re-added to the Ae’gura plaza.

    Various fixes have been made to Phil’s Relto books, the Kirel podium audio, the Ahnonay vogondola entry and exit animations, the Wall Game climb region, the rainy Yeesha page holographic, and updates to Serene and Tiam.

    Eder Bahvahnter will be officially opened in a ceremony on Monday 17 at 12:00 KIT, in the public Elonin (you can also get there by sending “to Bahvahnter” in PM to Mir-o-Bot, KI# 32319).

    A note on bugs (click to expand)

    When an update hits MOULa it is almost inevitable that unexpected bugs will show up. For all the testing that can be done, Minkata never sees as many concurrent players as the official server, and not all issues can be catched.

    When the servers have just been restarted, most of the early linking slowness and problems are from the database buffers refilling – and by an overload of concurrent logins 😉

    No additions from Cyan are to be expected for the foreseeable future, apart from server updates, so all improvements and additions will come from fan developers, who dedicate their limited free time to at least try to let MOULa be the best it could potentially be.

    So the best way to deal with bugs is to have patience and report them, mentioning where you were and what you were doing, be it on Cyan’s Discord, OpenUru’s Discord or OpenUru forums.

    If you fancy contributing your work and/or helping with bug fixing, those places are also excellent starting points to be part of the Fourth Restoration 🙂

    OpenUru Build #211d – Quarter 1, 2023
    • [new] Add Age reset into linking books {17}
    • [new] Add Chiso Book to Relto Bookshelf {9}
    • [new] Add Kalamee link panel to Nexus {10}
    • [new] Add Selector to Video GUI {9}
    • [new] Additional Clothing Items {14}
    • [new] Fan Relto Intro replacement for Yeesha intro in Relto start {8}
    • [new] Eder Bahvahnter Age {1}
    • [new] Kalamee Age {16}
    • [new] Restore DRC Stage functionality {2}
    • [update] Add Cannen Filter to Veelay Music {15}
    • [update] Add Updates to Phil’s Relto Book Textures {15}
    • [update] Add Updates to Kirel podium audio for 2023q1 {3}
    • [update] Adjust Ahnonay Vogondola entry/exit animations {9}
    • [update] BlueSpiral improvements and cross-play support {18}
    • [update] Bug fix for Wall Game climb region {9}
    • [update] Chiso Preniv Age {5}
    • [update] Cleft Zandi radio fix {15}
    • [update] Eder Naybree Age {7}
    • [update] Elonin Age {1}
    • [update] Fix Ahnonay waterfall loop {9}
    • [update] Fix Bahro Cave texture issues {12}
    • [update] Fix Incorrect Textures In (Old) Messenger’s Pub {15}
    • [update] Fix rainy Yeesha page holographic {9}
    • [update] Fix shading on the hydrant Cleft book in Relto {6}
    • [update] Force Third person camera when falling out of any Bahro Cave {11}
    • [update] Great Tree Pub {4}
    • [update] Multiplayer cleft windmill fixes {13}
    • [update] New Messengers Pub {4}
    • [update] Reduce flicker of textures when arriving in relto {9}
    • [update] Serene Age {4}
    • [update] Start rain in Phil Relto immediately {9}
    • [update] Tiam Age {1}
    • [update] Wall Game Code fixes {9}
    • [update] [internal] Allow additional Bahro stone style linking GUI {9}
    • [update] [internal] Fix activitiy responder behavior {18}
    • [update] [internal] Refactor SwimDockExit and WallClimb* animations {9}

    Attributions:

    1: ametist
    2: Briggs, Hazado
    3: DapperAndy, Tyion, Zaroth, skyisblu, Taliana, aurora
    4: Doobes
    5: Doobes, Maurus
    6: dpogue
    7: Harley
    8: Harley, Hazado, Maurus, skyisblu, Taliana
    9: Hazado
    10: Hazado, Deledrius
    11: Hazado, Ehren
    12: Hazado, Harley
    13: Hoikas
    14: Hoikas, Maurus, Miles, Korovev, LarryD, Harley, Hazado
    15: Maurus
    16: Semjay
    17: Tweek, Hazado
    18: Zaroth

    (header image by Maurus)

  • April 2023 All Guilds Meeting Summary

    April 2023 All Guilds Meeting Summary

    Here is the summary for the 156th All Guilds Meeting, along with the raw and cleansed chatlogs!

    Contents

    1. Mysterium
    2. Events in the Cavern
    3. OpenUru
    4. Ages of Doobes
    5. D’ni Language Classes
    6. R’Tayrtahn’s Story Nights
    7. Miscellanea

    Mysterium

    Early bird registration and shirt orders are now closed; regular registration (slightly more expensive) will be open until June 16, and other swag items may still be purchased until June 3.

    The prompt for February is “You Fool!”; the deadline is April 30. Entries for the “Idle Hands” prompt for March were Kefrith, Redwoodrroad, Calum Traveler, Talashar, and Laughingpineapple.

    ☛ For the latest info and more details, check the official website of the Mysterium Convention.

    Events in the Cavern

    ☛IwonK will host a Wonky Talk (on her Twitch channel) on Friday 14 at 15:00 KIT in the Guild of Cookies’ Hood by the heek table. This month’s topic is male protagonists in video games. Feel free to suggest interesting games she could talk (and draw) about. As always, there will be cookies!

    ☛ April 21 is Leefo 1st in the D’ni calendar, the first day of D’ni year 9679. Hahr rahm gah shoraht!

    OpenUru

    ☛ The Q1 update is on its final leg of testing before release, sometime next week. Briggs and Hazado have worked hard to restore the old DRC stage by the Tokotah plaza tent: its intended use will be for things like the story Town Halls or for speaking or music events.

    There will be two versions for it: one is the full DRC build with microphone, which will be reserved for Cyan if they will ever wants to use it; it will have a fully blocked off collision wall. The other, public version will be a generic stage with reduced collisions, letting people get onto the stage and not getting in the way of tent climbing activities 😉

    ☛ Eder Bahvahnter, by Ametist, will be available immediately after the update; the book will be found in Elonin, and it will be a public instance available from all versions of that neighborhood.

    ☛ Another surprise Age will also be included in the update. Details are kept under secret; Doobes stated to be very impressed with it.

    How to be a tester (click to expand)

    To be a tester, you will need to open an account on the Minkata prime shard; it is highly recommended to read the Tester’s Guide to understand what is expected. To test the cutting edge additions, you can sign up for the Minkata alpha shard.

    To report bugs, you can post on the OpenUru Discord server (channels #hood or #dev); on Discord you can ask to be added to the Testers role to be notified of testing requests, which sometimes need quick response in terms of hours, not days.

    Ages of Doobes

    Doobes announced that phase one of the Descent expansion is likely to be completed in the very near future! If all goes well, he will be able to submit it for the Q2 update testing, and if no major bugs show up, this first phase will be ready in time for Mysterium.

    Phase one consists mostly of the tract from the surface to the bottom of the Great Shaft you may be familiar with from Myst V or the Dirt demo. The biggest difference is that spiral path of the Shaft has been fully repaired, and you will be able to walk up and down the entirety of it (about two hours of continuous running). The elevators will still be there, and you could also try to just jump down if you dare!

    There is a lot of stuff in this build that has never been tested for multiplay, so that is going to be a key item to test when the time comes. Doobes has also worked on a more realistic lighting of the location, while still keeping the mood of the scene.

    Ultimately the goal is to open the full path from the surface to D’ni. Cyan has provided just enough with the Intangibles content for a phase two, but it still needs all the rough edges sanded down, so Doobes opted for a release in stages to keep up interest. Beyond phase two no concept art is available, so unless Cyan will have specific features they want included, the design of the path up to the Cavern will be open to suggestions.

    To keep updated on Doobes’ work, check his blog and his Facebook page.

    D’ni Language Classes

    R’Tayrtahn gave two updates, one for the D’ni Language Classes and one for the Story Nights.

    Visitors are asked to not post pellet points into the hood imager: one of his former students and a close friend, Yutiel Yoshi, who passed away in 2018, is listed there. He has refrained from posting pellets to maintain her name at the top, as a form of memorial.

    More about the D’ni Language Classes (click to expand)
    • Those who would like to attend the lessons should contact Rehn via PM or KImail (KI# 58324), or on Discord (r’Tayrtahn#1317).
    • The Guild of Instructors’ Hood will be open and public unless a class is in session. There are daytime openings Monday to Friday, at 12:00, 13:00 or 14:00 KIT, though availability is subject to change with little or no notice;
    • evening openings are on Monday, Wednesday and Thursday, at 20:00, 21:00 or 22:00 KIT, depending on the student’s schedule.
    • Daytime availability is subject to change with little or no notice. Last-minute changes to class times are posted on the left-hand imager in the hood.

    R’Tayrtahn’s Story Nights

    Story Night Europe and Original Story Night are telling the story of Atrus as told in the book Myst: The Book of Atrus. After that they will begin the story from the game of Myst. Eventually they will cover all of the books and games. as well as the three human attempts at the restoration of D’ni.

    There will be no Story Night on April 8, due to it being Easter weekend and because r’Tay will be traveling.

    R’Tayrtahn records videos of the sessions (via an avatar named “I’m a bot, do not message”), that he will eventually upload to his YouTube channel. Be careful if you PM r’Tay or the bot during the events, as messages will be visible in the videos 😉

    More about the Story Nights (click to expand)
    • Story Nights are held in Tsahno’s Hood every Saturday, gathering at the fountain at around 23:00 KIT, with the story starting at about 23:30 KIT.
    • For Story Nights – Europe, the gatherings are on Saturday starting at 13:30 KIT, with the story starting at about 14:00 KIT.
    • On All Guilds Meeting days, the event will begin at 14:00 KIT or 15 minutes after the meeting, whichever is later.
    • The stories are told using voice chat, so you will need to have your speakers, headphones or KI devices on. If you would like a reminder, please send r’Tayrtahn (KI# 58324) a KImail with your KI number included in the text, so that he can add you to his buddies list.
    • Last-minute changes to Story Night times are posted on the left-hand imager in the hood.

    Miscellanea

    In April, the Fan Ages Expeditions will complete the expedition to Elsewhere by Denost. It is a huge Age, with a lot of swimming, running and many puzzles, so they have not finished it yet! After that, they will begin the exploration of Alabaster by Dulcamara.

    And that was it for this month. Please consider donating to keep the Cavern open!

    March ended with the CavFunding at 85% (CavCon 2.9) and the reserve at 691%, with 20% extra expenses. Population was at 47,581 (⇑252), with 1174 unique visits.

    The next All Guilds Meeting is planned for Saturday, May 6 (Leefo 13, 9679) at 13:00 KIT.

    Until then!

  • January 2023 All Guilds Meeting Summary

    January 2023 All Guilds Meeting Summary

    Here is the summary for the 153rd All Guilds Meeting, along with the raw and cleansed chatlogs!

    Contents

    1. Mysterium
    2. OpenUru
    3. Storytellers
    4. Events in the Cavern
    5. D’ni Language Classes
    6. R’Tayrtahn’s Story Nights
    7. Miscellanea

    Mysterium

    Submission deadlines for the 2023 convention are getting closer:

    • shirt designs closed on January 7;
    • pin designs are open until February 12;
    • events are open until April 29 (note that if you require special seating arrangements or equipment, you will need to inform the Committee in the submission).

    A few policy changes were also announced, regarding privacy and a few other points.

    The prompt for January is “Beginnings”; the deadline is January 31. Entries for the “Endings” prompt for December were Calum Traveler, Redwoodrroad, Talashar and Laughingpineapple.

    OpenUru

    Issues have been reported with some shirts going invisible at odd distances or reappearing at further ones; the fan devs plan to fix these in the coming quarter.

    The Q1-23 update testing is underway on Minkata Alpha. Testers are asked to to be discrete about a certain project they can find there until it will be ready to be released, and only report issues on the OpenUru Discord. Eder Naybree may have its beach expansion locked down in this quarter too.

    How to be a tester (click to expand)

    To be a tester, you will need to open an account on the Minkata prime shard; it is highly recommended to read the Tester’s Guide to understand what is expected. To test the cutting edge additions, you can sign up for the Minkata alpha shard.
    To report bugs, you can post on the OpenUru Discord server (channels #hood or #dev); on Discord you can ask to be added to the Testers role to be notified of testing requests, which sometimes need quick response in terms of hours, not days.

    Storytellers

    Calum thanked the participants to the event in Eder Naybree for making it successful. The storytellers will try to telegraph some events a bit more obviously going forwards, but they still want to keep the free-form on-the-moment events. Transcripts are available on the IC discussion forum.

    Events in the Cavern

    IwonK’s first stream for the year will be about racing games. To attend, tune in to her Twitch channel on January 13 at 15:00 KIT. There will be cookies, as always!

    D’ni Language Classes

    R’Tayrtahn gave two updates, one for the D’ni Language Classes and one for the Story Nights.

    Visitors are asked to not post pellet points into the hood imager: one of his former students and a close friend, Yutiel Yoshi, who passed away in 2018, is listed there. He has refrained from posting pellets to maintain her name at the top, as a form of memorial.

    More about the D’ni Language Classes (click to expand)
    • Those who would like to attend the lessons should contact Rehn via PM or KImail (KI# 58324), or on Discord (r’Tayrtahn#1317).
    • The Guild of Instructors’ Hood will be open and public unless a class is in session. There are daytime openings on weekdays at 12:00, 13:00 or 14:00 KIT, though availability is subject to change with little or no notice;
    • evening openings are on Monday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday at 20:00, 21:00 or 22:00 KIT, depending on the student’s schedule.
    • Daytime availability is subject to change with little or no notice. Last-minute changes to class times are posted on the left-hand imager in the hood.

    R’Tayrtahn’s Story Nights

    Story Night Europe and Original Story Night are telling the story of the Fall as told in the book Myst: The Book of Ti’ana. After that they will begin the story from Myst: The Book of Atrus, followed by the story from the game of Myst. Eventually they will cover all of the books and games. as well as the three human attempts at the restoration of D’ni.

    R’Tayrtahn records videos of the sessions (via an avatar named “I’m a bot, do not message”), that he will eventually upload to his YouTube channel. Be careful if you PM r’Tay or the bot during the events, as messages will be visible in the videos 😉

    More about the Story Nights (click to expand)
    • Story Nights are held in Tsahno’s Hood every Saturday, gathering at the fountain at around 23:00 KIT, with the story starting at about 23:30 KIT.
    • For Story Nights – Europe, the gatherings are on Saturday starting at 13:30 KIT, with the story starting at about 14:00 KIT.
    • On All Guilds Meeting days, the event will begin at 14:00 KIT or 15 minutes after the meeting, whichever is later.
    • The stories are told using voice chat, so you will need to have your speakers, headphones or KI devices on. If you would like a reminder, please send r’Tayrtahn (KI# 58324) a KImail with your KI number included in the text, so that he can add you to his buddies list.
    • Last-minute changes to Story Night times are posted on the left-hand imager in the hood.

    Miscellanea

    In January, the Fan Ages Expeditions will conclude the exploration of Elodea Schatzkammern by Dulcamara. Then they will examine two new TikiBear restorations, along with Greenwood Cottage, originally by Kierra and salvaged by Melvin. Next they will explore the mysteries of The Maintainers Gateway by Melvin, and conclude the month in Shorah Pahts, the beginning of the ‘Secret of the Rainbow’ journey by Jhon J. Jaguar.

    And that was it for this month. Please consider donating to keep the Cavern open!

    December ended with the CavFunding at 143% (CavCon 4.4) and the reserve at 579%, with no extra expenses. Population was at 46,703 (⇑290), with 1250 unique visits.

    The next All Guilds Meeting is planned for Saturday, February 4 (Leevosahn 27) at 13:00 KIT.

    Until then!

  • MOULa update OpenUru#209

    On December 8 MOULa got another update, with various fixes and improvements for the newly opened Ages! A full changelog is available at the bottom of this post.

    The behavior of the Ahnonay Cathedral doors was changed: now they will stay open until everyone links out. A future update may extend a similar behavior to other doors, possibly re-enabling the doors in the Museum and the Library in Ae’gura.

    The resolution of Atrus’ note in the Cleft has been increased, improving its readability.

    Seasonal decorations were added to the fountain in Eder Naybree.

    A note on bugs (click to expand)

    When an update hits MOULa it is almost inevitable that unexpected bugs will show up. For all the testing that can be done, Minkata never sees as many concurrent players as the official server, and not all issues can be catched.

    When the servers have just been restarted, most of the early linking slowness and problems are from the database buffers refilling – and by an overload of concurrent logins 😉

    No additions from Cyan are to be expected for the foreseeable future, apart from server updates, so all improvements and additions will come from fan developers, who dedicate their limited free time to at least try to let MOULa be the best it could potentially be.

    So the best way to deal with bugs is to have patience and report them, mentioning where you were and what you were doing, be it on Cyan’s Discord, OpenUru’s Discord or OpenUru forums.

    If you fancy contributing your work and/or helping with bug fixing, those places are also excellent starting points to be part of the Fourth Restoration 🙂

    OpenUru Build #209 Build Update

    Content changes:

    • [new] Puzzle state tracking (“sliding”) capability {7}
    • [new] Kirel message for 2022 Quarter 4 added. {4}
    • [update] Chiso Preniv Age remodelling. Caution! Secret door may operate erratically due to its own whims. Repairs are underway. {3}
    • [update] Eder Naybree improvements. Seasonal decorations, lighting, journals. {5}
    • [update] Elonin Age improvements. {2}
    • [update] Tiam Age improvements. Button puzzle usability improvements. {2}
    • [update] Cleft Atrus note readability improvements. {6}
    • [update] Ahnonay Cathedral Door fixes. {3}

    Client changes:

    • [client] (internal) Improved age state (SDL) capabilities {1}

    Attributions:

    1: Adam, Zaroth
    2: ametist
    3: Doobes
    4: Doobes, DapperAndy, skyisblu, Tyion, Zaroth
    5: Harley
    6: Zaroth
    7: Zaroth, Adam

    (source)

  • November 2022 All Guilds Meeting Summary

    November 2022 All Guilds Meeting Summary

    Here is the summary for the 151st All Guilds Meeting, along with the raw and cleansed chatlogs!

    Contents

    1. Mysterium
    2. Riven
    3. Town Hall
    4. OpenUru
    5. Events in the Cavern
    6. D’ni Language Classes
    7. R’Tayrtahn’s Story Nights
    8. Miscellanea

    Mysterium

    Mysterium 2023 will be held in Spokane, WA from June 30 to July 2. Earlier than usual, because Spokane will be busy with events in late July–early August, and hotels are booked solid for July and August. No details on the specific hotel are available yet, but prices will likely be higher than usual too.

    2023 marks the Myst franchise’s 30th anniversary, so the theme of next year’s Mysterium will be: “The Evolution of Myst”. The world and the franchise have evolved over the years, and the convention will showcase this evolution.

    Submissions also started opening. First is the T-shirt artwork: every year the community is invited to create the artwork, and a lot of cool directions could be taken with 2023’s theme. The deadline is January 7, 2023. As always, the creators of the winning designs will each receive a free T-shirt. And, similarly to the past couple of years, the shirt design will be added to the wardrobe in MOULa.

    Next are event submissions: projects you want to show off, deep dives into D’ni culture, awesome group activities, and more are all welcome. The deadline is April 29, 2023.

    The community Discord server has recently gone through some minor housekeeping. Most importantly, they have revised and clarified the rules: most of it was codifying what was already enforced, but please check out the #rules and #announcements channels when you have a chance. The server is also now verified, which means it got a custom (and easier to remember) invite link.

    The Mysterium prompt for November is “Fall” (not necessarily Autumn); the deadline is November 30. Winners of the “Spooky” prompt for October were Redwoodrroad, Calum Traveler, IwonK, Talashar and Delcolux.

    Riven

    On October 31 Cyan released a teaser video showcasing the Riven logo, confirming they are indeed working on a modern remake of Myst’s sequel. No release date has yet been revealed. For more details, check our dedicated post.

    Town Hall

    The Rei’schu expedition was held over the Discord. There are transcripts available on the story forums. In the next MOULa update, the first draft of these transcripts will be added to Eder Naybree, until their permanent resting place is ready.

    OpenUru

    The team of artists, programmers, and janitors were quite weary after last summer’s update, so they took things easy this time and combined the time of the third and fourth quarters. There are new Ages, new places to poke at, and fixes (including a possible fix to cull the lag in Eder Naybree on older machines).

    Contributions for the next release have been frozen, and testing has started on the Minkata shard. The more people testing the better, so please join if you can (details at the bottom of this section). Testing will continue until late November; if all is well, they will deliver the update to Cyan, to be tested on Staging for about two weeks, then deployed early–mid December.

    For the Descent shaft, a very preliminary set of areas are already being tested on the Minkata alpha test shard, but development has mostly been put on the back burner until more effort can be dedicated to it, probably some time in 2023.

    Rarified is committed to bringing the backlog of improvements to the game client from the Guild of Writers’ H’uru codebase (including the transition from PhysX 2 to PhysX 4) to MOULa. An early ‘draft’ of the new client on yet another Minkata shard may be released the first quarter of next year, to start the migration process.

    Backward compatibility came up. While the GoW codebase only supports current versions of Windows, Rarified is going to try to continue building MOULa clients to be as backward compatibile as possible; but there will be a time when Win 7 and older will not be able to run it.

    Editor’s note: it should be noted that Windows backward compatibility and a native client on macOS and Linux are conflicting objectives, and developing for the latter involves changes that may overall improve the client’s performance and security. Also, while users of older versions of Windows have been penalized only in recent years, macOS and especially Linux users always had to go through hoops to be in the Cavern.

    How to be a tester (click to expand)

    To be a tester, you will need to open an account on the Minkata prime shard; it is highly recommended to read the Tester’s Guide to understand what is expected. To test the cutting edge additions, you can sign up for the Minkata alpha shard.
    To report bugs, you can post on the OpenUru Discord server (channels #hood or #dev); on Discord you can ask to be added to the Testers role to be notified of testing requests, which sometimes need quick response in terms of hours, not days.

    Events in the Cavern

    ☛ Tehlrov K’hris announced an Unwritten campaign, “Read Between the Lights”, hosted by Zekh, with three players/characters:

    • Pritika Chatterjee, a well read teacher with an eye for solving mysteries, played by Ereshkigal;
    • Mikito “Mike” Takahashi, a curious nomadic encyclopedia with a heart, played by Tehlrov Kh’ris; and
    • Carmen Durand, an eclectic art school dropout, played by Belle.

    The first session will be held on November 19 at 12:00 KIT and will last about three hours. The campaign is expected to last 4–5 sessions, and will be streamed live on Tehlrov Kh’ris’ Twitch channel.

    The in-Cavern location will be a secret, but if you find them, please refrain from text or voice chat as they will need both to play the game.

    ☛ IwonK announced her Wonky Talk on Friday, November 18 at 15:00 KIT in the Guild of Cookies’ Hood, by the ahyoheek table. This month’s topic is spooky and horror games. If you have ideas for interesting games she could talk about (and draw), feel free to contact her.

    D’ni Language Classes

    R’Tayrtahn gave two updates, one for the D’ni Language Classes and one for the Story Nights.

    Visitors are asked to not post pellet points into the hood imager: one of his former students and a close friend, Yutiel Yoshi, who passed away in 2018, is listed there. He has refrained from posting pellets to maintain her name at the top, as a form of memorial.

    More about the D’ni Language Classes (click to expand)
    • Those who would like to attend the lessons should contact Rehn via PM or KImail (KI# 58324), or on Discord (r’Tayrtahn#1317).
    • The Guild of Instructors’ Hood will be open and public unless a class is in session. Daytime openings are currently on Monday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday at 12:00, 13:00 or 14:00 KIT;
    • evening openings are on weekdays at 20:00, 21:00 or 22:00 KIT, depending on the student’s schedule.
    • Daytime availability is subject to change with little or no notice. Last-minute changes to class times are posted on the left-hand imager in the hood.

    R’Tayrtahn’s Story Nights

    Story Night Europe and Original Story Night are telling the story of the Fall as told in the book Myst: The Book of Ti’ana. This is a multi-part story that will last for about three more months.

    R’Tayrtahn is in the process of uploading the backlog of videos from previous sessions to his YouTube channel. Be careful if you PM r’Tay during the events, as messages will be visible in the videos 😉

    More about the Story Nights (click to expand)
    • Story Nights are held in Tsahno’s Hood every Saturday, gathering at the fountain at around 23:00 KIT, with the story starting at about 23:30 KIT.
    • For Story Nights – Europe, the gatherings are on Saturday starting at 13:30 KIT, with the story starting at about 14:00 KIT.
    • On All Guilds Meeting days, the event will begin at 14:00 KIT or 15 minutes after the meeting, whichever is later.
    • The stories are told using voice chat, so you will need to have your speakers, headphones or KI devices on. If you would like a reminder, please send r’Tayrtahn (KI# 58324) a KImail with your KI number included in the text, so that he can add you to his buddies list.
    • Last-minute changes to Story Night times are posted on the left-hand imager in the hood.

    Miscellanea

    In November, the Fan Ages Expeditions will look for Gary’s whereabouts in Iceworld by Denost, part of a larger Age that also includes Somewhere and Elsewhere, inhabited by the Jhibis and the Guardian. Then, they will begin the exploration of Elodea by Dulcamara.

    And that was it for this month. Please consider donating to keep the Cavern open!

    October ended with the CavFunding at 99% (CavCon 3) and the reserve at 519%, with no extra expenses. Population was at 46,130 (⇑374), with 1344 unique visits.

    The next All Guilds Meeting is planned for Saturday, December 3 (Leevobro 6) at 13:00 KIT.

    Until then!

  • September 2022 All Guilds Meeting Summary

    September 2022 All Guilds Meeting Summary

    Here is the summary for the 149th All Guilds Meeting, along with the raw and cleansed chatlogs!

    Contents

      1. Events in the Cavern
      2. Cavern Tours
      3. Mysterium
      4. MOULa updates
      5. Town Hall
      6. Fan Ages updates
      7. Miscellanea

    Events in the Cavern

    Skyisblu presented her cooking sessions, held each month in the Guild of Caterers’ Hood and streamed on her Twitch channel in both English and French; a chance to get together, learn a new recipe and talk food. Recordings of the streams and the accompanying recipes are available on her weblog.

    IwonK will draw and talk about the topic of educational video games on her Twitch channel on Friday 16 at 15:00 KIT. In Cavern, the gathering will be in the Guild of Cookies’ Hood, around the Ahyoheek table.

    Cavern Tours

    The next Cavern Tour will be held on Saturday 24 at 11:00 KIT, starting from the Cavern Tour’s Hood, with Larry LeDeay and r’Tayrtahn as the guides, and Susa’n and Zeke as the hosts. This time they will will continue the tour of Descent and Great Shaft by showing the DIRT Descent demo and some Myst V content.

    The Tours use Twitch for the presentation, so you will need to keep a browser or the app open in the background. Videos will be available for two weeks after the tour. The stream will be simulcasted on Facebook and Youtube.

    The tours occasionally visit hard to reach places. Mir-o-Bot (KI# 32319) is often employed for special effects and long-distance travel (and to avoid stairs). If you arrive late, you can PM Susa’n (KI# 9122427) to join the in-progress tour – but do try to arrive in time!

    Mysterium

    Participants, whether online or in-person, to the Myst convention are invited to give feedback via a survey available on the website.

    Events that were streamed via Twitch have been uploaded to YouTube. For a summary of the panels, check our dedicated post.

    The Mysterium prompt for September is “Sleep, Rest”; the deadline is September 30. Winners of the “Travel” prompt for August were Redwoodrroad, IwonK, Sasha Strange, Talashar and Laughingpineapple.

    MOULa updates

    A big update was released on August 3. The fan developers are looking into other potential chat customization features down the line, e.g. giving event organizers a special, toggleable chat color header for events such as the AGM or a Door Run contest.

    A stopgap solution to the issue of overcrowded hood was implemented: the membership lists of the most overcrowded have been truncated. Everyone in those hoods are still members, but will not show up in the KI list. However, when those members visit their neighborhood, they will get re-added back into the list.

    Lists will periodically be checked and if necessary truncated, but the permanent solution is that these members join a new neighborhood.

    Town Hall

    The ‘Storytellers’ group held their monthly Town Hall event for players who are interested in keeping tabs on the ongoing IC story.

    They are gathering volunteers to “hold negotiations with the people of Rei’schu”, either via Discord or in Cavern, essentially like an Unwritten session. The second option is to handle this event more or less off screen and crafting a sort of after-action report based on those events.

    On Cyan Chat, there is now a dedicated channel for story related talks: #moula-story-chat.

    Fan Ages updates

    On Friday 9 the garden Age of Eder Naybree, the ‘Prologue’ to the ‘Rei’schu arc’, will be released in Chiso Preniv. There will be no ceremony and no time has been announced, so be sure to check Chiso often that day!

    Early in September, a new Relto page was enabled in Tiam. Take a good look around to find it 😉

    Miscellanea

    • In September, the Fan Ages Expeditions will explore the features of the City of Dimensions, originally released on The Open Cave shards but ported to Deep Island in 2020.
      They will then take the journey in R’Oshanhnin Korvahkhn, by Calena, Wamduskasapa and Tachzusamm, one of the few fan Ages of old to grant a Relto page.
      Then they will start the search for Gary in Somewhere by Denost, part of a larger Age (which also includes Iceworld and Elsewhere) inhabited by the Jhibis and the Guardian.
      At the end of the month, or more likely in October, they will then visit three educational Ages by Corvus and Ametist: Hallway, Matte and ReGahlpo.

    And that was it for this month. Please consider donating to keep the Cavern open!

    August ended with the CavFunding at 96% (CavCon 3) and the reserve at 523%, with 15% extra expenses. Population was at 45,494 (⇑297), with 1348 unique visits.

    The next All Guilds Meeting is planned for Saturday, October 1st (Leevot 14) at 13:00 KIT.

    The role of Moderator is currently vacant, with Calum Traveler filling in for the time being; if anyone would like to take the role, it is your chance to step up 😉

    Until then!

  • News Roundup #24

    If you were getting the “SetActivePlayer” error when logging in with an avatar or it took an extremely long time, you should now be able to log in. This is a temporary fix, once you logged in it is strongly advised to join a different neighborhood.

    Chogon’s detailed explanation (click here to expand)

    What was causing the problem was new avatars were being put in the same neighborhood instead of distributing them into neighborhoods with a maximum of 20 members. We fixed that problem a while back but the overcrowded neighborhoods (some with over 1,100 members!) still existed! Which caused the SetActivePlayer error for those players because the client would try to find and download those 1,100+ members of their neighborhood and the database would start choking and say “this ain’t happening”.
    Then I had a crazy idea and a tool was created by Adam{Hoikas}. This morning we truncated all the membership lists of the overcrowded neighborhoods, 41 neighborhoods in all. Everyone in those neighborhoods are still members of that hood, they just won’t show up in the KI neighborhood player list. However, if that member visits their neighborhood, they will get re-added back into the membership list. So, this is just a stop gap fix to get people back into MOULa. I will periodically check for growing neighborhood membership lists and truncate them. But it would be better if these members joined a new neighborhood.

    The Mysterium decorations are now visible in the New Messengers Pub, a piece of the convention in the Cavern. Be sure to visit and get all the new shirts!

    The invitation to the Vault of Stories of the Myst Documentary Kickstarter, where backers can share their Myst Story (as a reward for Planetarium pledges or higher), was sent today. Check for an email from Fangamer to get your code and head into the Vault.

  • August 2022 All Guilds Meeting Summary

    August 2022 All Guilds Meeting Summary

    Here is the summary for the 148th All Guilds Meeting, along with the raw and cleansed chatlogs!

    Contents

      1. Mysterium
      2. MOULa updates
      3. Town Hall
      4. Summer Festival
      5. Chiso Preniv updates
      6. Cavern Tours
      7. D’ni Language Classes
      8. R’Tayrtahn’s Story Nights
      9. Miscellanea

    Mysterium

    The Cyan Q&A session will not be taking live questions; you can submit your questions until August 7 (today) via the online form.

    If you are attending in person and forgot to submit an artwork or writing submission, you will have to bring it with you, as submissions are now closed.

    The schedule has been finalized, and includes a few Cavern related panels. On Friday night the video for the Mysterium Concert held on Friday 6 will be released on YouTube.

    There will be two MOUL Developer panels, for coding and Age building, half hour each. Among the guests there will be MacCodeMonkey, DPogue, Rarified, Hoikas, Tweek, Doobes, Ametist, and Calum Traveler.

    Most events will be streamed via Twitch, and uploaded to YouTube later; exceptions are noted on the schedule. The Meow Wolf excursion will not be streamed.

    The last round of special guests have been announced:

    • Eric Anderson has been with Cyan for several years, contributing to Uru, Myst V and Obduction;
    • Rand Miller co-founded Cyan and brought Myst, Obduction and all the other Cyan titles that are the very reason for the convention’s existence;
    • Joshua Reinstein is an editor and researcher for The Myst Documentary;
    • Guy Sprung is an accomplished thespian, but Myst fans will know him as Achenar from Myst IV: Revelation.

    The Mysterium prompt for August is “Travel”; the deadline is August 31. Winners of the “Voltaic Age” prompt for July were Talashar, Calum Traveler and Redwoodrroad.

    MOULa updates

    A big update was released on Wednesday 3. Included in this update were a few long requested KI changes: the command /textcolor [color] or /textcolor [colorvaluedata], well known to those familiar with shards like Deep Island, allows to change the chat text color; the change is local to the user.

    When using a custom text color, messages from PM, Buddies, or Neighbors will have prefixes to identify them: instead of  an ambiguous “From [person] in [Age]” it will now have [BUDDIES], [PRIVATE] or [NEIGHBORS] as a prefix. This feature carries into chatlogs regardless of custom color formatting.

    Another important change is related to the way Marker Games can be edited. This is primarily to prevent two related issues: MG’s titles cannot be edited if you are not the owner or not in editing mode; this is to prevent a bug where occasionally an edited title of a MG could cause it to duplicate within KI folders.

    Secondly, if you have a MG and wish to delete it, it will only delete the access node on your KI (as it was intended to be); this allows to delete the MG even if it is stuck in the “Loading Now” state. Hopefully this will also prevent new MGs to get stuck in that state.

    A door to the basement of Chiso Preniv is now available, but you will need to find the hidden button (although the door will likely be already open 🙂 ). A Nexus Terminal has been installed somewhere in Elonin.

    On Wednesday the Watcher’s Pub puzzle room door was open. This was a bug: ways to officially re-open that area [if ever 😛 – Ed.] are still being discussed, and the door will remain sealed until then.

    As for the new Ages, Eder Naybree is scheduled for September 9, while Fahets Highgarden will be released sometime after that depending on Tweek’s personal schedule. Announcements will be made closer to the release date.

    A solo mode has been added to the Gahreesen Wall, so that those who want to train by themselves will no longer have to run from side to side to set up a game.

    Some server issues have cropped up since the update and are being looked into. Some of the major clogs may be tied to the issue of overcrowded neighborhoods. A temporary solution that should help alleviate some of the strain is in the works, but it is strongly advised to move your avatar to a less crowded hood as soon as you can.

    Town Hall

    The “Storytellers” group held their second Town Hall event, designed for players who are interested in keeping tabs on the ongoing RP story to be able to catch up on missed events, as well as be able to provide some input on the future.

    They plan to hold the next ones on either either the last Wednesday of the month (after Fil Live) or during the last weekend of the month.

    Rulesets for the storytellers and a code of conduct for the town halls have been posted on Calum Traveler’s blog, until a more formal website is set up.

    Summer Festival

    Minasunda summarized the MOULa Summer Festival held on the week just prior the AGM. Up to 53 people attended the show, and it went very well, with no unforeseen obstacles.

    Thanks go to Mirphak for providing the link to Elonin, and to the special guests who took part in the concert: Piboc, aka Olivier Maurey; Lyllus, aka Lillo Moon Minniti; Fil, aka Phil Rounds.

    The full-length concert will be released as a YouTube Premiere on August 12 at 16:00 KIT. Excerpts from the concert will also be released as a YouTube Premiere on Saturday 13 at 14:45 KIT, with a bonus intro introducing the Nulp Dance Group.

    During the premieres you will be able to chat with the Nulps, and if you will be in the Cavern the gathering will be in the New Messengers Pub, festively decorated for Myterium.

    Chiso Preniv updates

    Doobes gave an outline of his contributions for the latest MOULa update. The work area on the lower floor of Chiso Preniv is now officially opened to the public, giving a peek into the daily life of those working to restore various parts of the Cavern and the Ages they have found so far, and some newly-Written Ages.

    This includes various projects from familiar faces in the Cavern like Dulcamara, Rebus, Kelsei, Tweek, and more. They want this restoration to be as transparent as they can. With luck, you may even find them down there working on or discussing things!

    They will also soon be archiving the older Kirel audios in that location as well. You will be able to replay them from the test pedestal in there.

    On another topic, for those who cannot attend Mysterium, the Cavern gathering location will be the New Messengers Pub. There will be swag to grab, including lots of shirts, and they will remain available for most of the rest of August. Thanks go to Hazado and KellyC for helping organize the event.

    To keep updated on Doobes’ work, check his blog and his Facebook page.

    How to be a tester (click to expand)

    To be a tester, you will need to open an account on the Minkata prime shard; it is highly recommended to read the Tester’s Guide to understand what is expected. To test the cutting edge additions, you can sign up for the Minkata alpha shard.
    To report bugs, you can post on the OpenUru Discord server (channels #hood or #dev); on Discord you can ask to be added to the Testers role to be notified of testing requests, which sometimes need quick response in terms of hours, not days.

    Cavern Tours

    The Cavern Tour will be held on Saturday 27 at 11:00 KIT, starting from the Cavern Tour’s Hood, with Larry LeDeay and r’Tayrtahn as the guides, and Susa’n and Zeke as the hosts.

    The Tours will use a Twitch channel for the presentation, so you will need to keep a browser or the app open in the background. Videos will be available for two weeks after the tour. The stream will be simulcasted on Facebook and Youtube.

    The tours occasionally visit hard to reach places. Mir-o-Bot (KI# 32319) is often employed for special effects and long-distance travel (and to avoid stairs). If you arrive late, you can PM Susa’n (KI# 9122427) to join the in-progress tour – but do try to arrive in time!

    D’ni Language Classes

    R’Tayrtahn gave two updates, one for the D’ni Language Classes and one for the Story Nights. Currently, there are two students taking the classes and are at various stages of completion.

    More about the D’ni Language Classes (click to expand)
    • Those who would like to attend the lessons should contact Rehn via PM or KImail (KI# 58324).
    • The Guild of Instructors’ Hood will be open and public unless a class is in session. Daytime openings are currently on Monday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday at 12:00, 13:00 or 14:00 KIT; evening openings
    • on Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday at 20:00, 21:00 or 22:00 KIT, depending on the student’s schedule.
    • Daytime availability is subject to change with little or no notice. Last-minute changes to class times are posted on the left-hand imager in the hood.
    • Shokhootahn Rehn (aka r’Tayrtahn) can be found on Discord as r'Tayrtahn#1317.

    R’Tayrtahn’s Story Nights

    Story Night Europe and Original Story Night are in synch, and are telling the stories of the kings of D’ni, which will go on for the next 7 weeks.

    R’Tayrtahn is in the process of uploading the backlog of videos from previous sessions to his YouTube channel. Be careful if you PM r’Tay during the evennts, as messages will be visible in the videos 😉

    More about the Story Nights (click to expand)
    • Story Nights are held in Tsahno’s Hood every Saturday, gathering at the fountain at around 23:00 KIT, with the story starting at about 23:30 KIT.
    • For Story Nights – Europe, the gatherings are on Saturday starting at 13:30 KIT, with the story starting at about 14:00 KIT. On All Guilds Meeting days, the event will begin at 14:00 KIT or 15 minutes after the AGM, whichever is later.
    • The stories are told using voice chat, so you will need to have your speakers, headphones or KI devices on. If you would like a reminder, please send r’Tayrtahn (KI# 58324) a KImail with your KI number included in the text, so that he can add you to his buddies list.
    • Last-minute changes to Story Night times are posted on the left-hand imager in the hood.

    Miscellanea

    • The Cavern Today Podcast is back, available on Spotify, Apple Podcasts and other streaming services. Their first episode for this year features an interview to Patrick Dulebohn.
    • In August, the Fan Ages Expeditions will continue the esploration of Adrael, trying to find out whatever happened to D’ni Research Association member Irena Stromberg, who has gone missing after a vision of a ‘ghost’ with glowing eyes.
      They will then visit some the Uru locations of the Devokan Trust, one of the most elaborate fan-written storylines, spanning various platforms in the Metaverse (the real Metaverse).
      Then they will play some music in Turtle Isle by DenDwaler, and finish the month with two puzzles: Lohdehvis by Takku Petreya and Rahsoo B’ahrotan by Calena.

    And that was it for this month. Please consider donating to keep the Cavern open!

    July ended with the CavFunding at 80% (CavCon 2.9) and the reserve at 527%, with 20% extra expenses. Population was at 45,197 (⇑230), with 1069 unique visits.

    The next All Guilds Meeting is planned for Saturday, September 3 (Leetar 21) at 13:00 KIT.

    The role of Moderator is currently vacant, with Calum Traveler filling in for the time being; if anyone would like to take the role, it is your chance to step up 😉

    Until then!

  • MOULa update OpenUru#207

    On August 3 MOULa got another big update, with lots of interesting additions! Here are a few highlights; a the full changelog is available at the bottom of this post.

    New Ages

    As revealed at the last few AGMs, a couple of new fan Ages are included in the update, but they will be unveiled in the near future. In the meantime, a few improvements have been added to Chiso Preniv (a new floor is now open, look for number 18), New Messengers Pub, K’veer, Elonin (a global instance has been added), Tiam, Watcher’s Pub. The Gahreesen Wall had a few improvements too.

    Mysterium

    In preparation for Mysterium, the New Messengers Pub has been decked out with decorations and swag to pick up. Be sure to pass by starting on Saturday 13!

    Interface

    Two new commands have been added: /textcolor, to customize the chat text display, and /cough, a new emote. New audio messages and subtitles have been added to the podium in Kirel. New fonts have been added for future use in journals. The name of the sender is now visible in KI messages in the Incoming folder.

    Fixes

    A few, long-standing bugshave been fixed: non-loading marker games can now be deleted, and improper editing is now prevented. The disappearing Dusty ball in Minkata should now be visible. Various fixes for animations and sounds have been added.

    A note on bugs

    When an update, especially one as large as this one, hits MOULa it is almost inevitable that unexpected bugs will show up. For all the testing that can be done, Minkata never sees as many concurrent players as the official server, and not all issues can be catched.

    When the servers have just been restarted, most of the early linking slowness and problems are from the database buffers refilling – and by an overload of concurrent logins 😉

    No additions from Cyan are to be expected for the foreseeable future, apart from server updates, so all improvements and additions will come from fan developers, who dedicate their limited free time to at least try to let MOULa be the best it could potentially be.

    So the best way to deal with bugs is to have patience and report them, mentioning where you were and what you were doing, be it on Cyan’s Discord, OpenUru’s Discord or OpenUru forums.

    If you fancy contributing your work and/or helping with bug fixing, those places are also excellent starting points to be part of the Fourth Restoration 🙂

    OpenUru Build #207 Build Update (click to expand)

    Content changes:
    – [n] New ages, revealed in near future. Even a secret door!{9}
    – [n] Add /cough emote{13}
    – [n] Add /textcolor command to customize text display{13}
    – [n] Add Mysterium and Guild of Instructors clothing{10}
    – [n] Bending a few rules, a “Global” instance of Elonin for group activities. You need to find the link!{5}
    – [n] New audio messages and subtitles for Kirel{14}
    – [n] New fonts to be used in the future for journals{13}
    – [n] The New Messengers Pub has been decked out for Mysterium{8}
    – [u] New “clue” function to imagers{12}
    – [u] Add senders of Incoming KI mail to KI Recents folder{13}
    – [f] Fix a behavior regression in Relto Start path regarding Pellet Cave Code{10}
    – [f] Fix clothing ordering in closet{10}
    – [f] Fix K’veer to prevent it from registering as a City link{10}
    – [f] Fix pod portals so they don’t stick around{10}
    – [f] Fix relto door animations{10}
    – [f] Fix relto page sound{10}
    – [f] Fix relto rain on roof sound{11}
    – [u] Prevent improper Marker Game editing, permit deleting non-loading Marker Games{13}
    – [u] Improvements to Chiso Preniv, New Messengers Pub, K’veer Ages{6}
    – [u] Improvements to Elonin, Tiam Ages{4}
    – [u] Improvements to Gahreesen wall game{10}
    – [u] Improvements to Great Tree (Watcher’s) Pub, new Nexus book{6}
    – [u] Remove “Visitor” from game selection screen{10}
    – [u] Subtitle corrections{13}
    – [u] Updates to Phil’s Relto Bookshelf{7}

    Client changes:
    – [u] Under the hood improvements for KI{13}
    – [f] Fix disappearing Dusty in Minkata{1}
    – [f] Fix infrequently encountered startup error when age files updated{3}

    Key:
    [n] new
    [f] fixed
    [u] updated
    Attributions:
    1: Adam{Hoikas}, Hazado
    2: Adam{Hoikas}, Hazado, Zaroth
    3: Adam{Hoikas}, Zaroth
    4: ametist
    5: ametist, Doobes
    6: Doobes
    7: Doobes, Ehren
    8: Doobes, Harley, Hazado
    9: Doobes, Tweek, Harley
    10: Hazado
    11: Hazado, Doobes, Maurus
    12: Hazado, Zaroth
    13: Zaroth
    14: Zaroth, DapperAndy, Tyion, skyisblu, Taliana
    (source)

  • News Roundup #21

    Cyan news

    ☛ An update to MOULa was released on July 12, bringing the avatar dance animations from Uru: CC. You can now pick the awkward dance style of your choice 😀 The new animation is activated using /retrodance .

    ☛ The music for Firmament will be composed by Maclaine Diemer, who previously worked on ArenaNet’s Guild Wars 2, Harmonix’s Rock Band franchises, Riot Games’ League of Legends, Amazon Game Studios’ first major original title Crucible, and most recently Salt and Sacrifice from Devour Studios.

    Mysterium news

    ☛ As announced during the AGM, a Mysterium Concert will be held live on August 5 at 13:00 KIT, in NDG Elonin, during the Summer Festival 2022. The concert, conceived by Minasunda, will be a tour across the Myst games and the Cavern and its community.

    For in-person Mysterium attendees, a special highlights video of the concert will be premiered on August 13 and shared on Facebook and Discord. For online attendees, a link to the full concert will be provided on August 14, for those unable to attend the concert live.

    The concert will feature three special guests who will play live: Olivier Maurey aka Piboc, Lillo Moon Minniti aka Lyllus, and Phil Rounds aka Fil. You can find more info about the artists on Calum Traveler’s blog.

    ☛ A new round of special guests has been announced:

    • John Austin, co-founder of Pontoco and project lead on The Last Clockwinder (a Cyan Venture);
    • Don Carson, Senior Art Director at Mighty Coconut and former Disney Imagineer;
    • Henning Koczy, Level Designer for Walkabout Mini Golf (a VR game planning to release a new course based on Myst island) at Mighty Coconut;
    • Lucas Martell, Head of Mighty Coconut and creator of Walkabout Mini Golf;
    • Anita Tung, Art Director for The Last Clockwinder.

    ☛ There will also be a Cyan Q&A Panel; if you wish to ask any questions, please submit them via this form by August 7. It will be a general Q&A, so feel free to ask about Firmament, Venture projects, Starry Expanse, etc.

    ☛ The Myst Documentary crew will share an update and sneak peeks of the film progress, as well as show off the Myst Story Community Vault. There will also be a Q&A session.

    ☛ Proof of vaccination will be asked at the time badges will be issued, you will not need to show proof again for the rest of the weekend. The up-to-date COVID policies are available here, the Committee will avoid changing them unless necessary.

    Other news

    ☛ The third episode of the WaterCooler Show, by the Cavern Communications Network, will be an interview to Aaron Gwynaire, developer of the upcoming Myst-style point-and-click adventure game Neyyah.

  • July 2022 All Guilds Meeting Summary

    July 2022 All Guilds Meeting Summary

    Here is the summary for the 147th All Guilds Meeting, along with the raw and cleansed chatlogs!

    Contents

    1. Mysterium
    2. Town Hall
    3. Summer Festival
    4. Chiso Preniv updates
    5. Cavern Tours
    6. Miscellanea

    Mysterium

    The first guests for this year have been announced, and several more will be announced very soon:

    • Katie “Kha’tie” Postma, a long-time fixture within the Myst and Mysterium community, now the Social Media Manager for the Myst Documentary;
    • Philip Shane, award winning documentary filmmaker, currently working on the Myst Documentary;
    • Ryan “Greydragon” Warzecha, recently promoted to Associate Designer on Firmament, formerly Head of Developer Relations for Cyan Ventures, and Cyan’s resident tiki bar authority.

    For those attending the Meow Wolf event, a reminder was posted to review their light and noise sensitivity warnings.

    The Mysterium prompt for July is “Voltaic Age”; the deadline is July 31. Winners of the “Resilience” prompt for June were Grayson, Harley and Laughingpineapple. Winners of the “Villains” prompt for May were Grayson, Belle, Talashar and Laughingpineapple.

    Town Hall

    The “Storytellers” group recently held the first of several planned monthly Town Hall events, designed for players who are interested in keeping tabs on the ongoing RP story to be able to catch up on missed events, as well as be able to provide some input on the future. An unedited chatlog can be found on Traveler’s Cavern Log; minutes of these logs are being planned to be posted to a journal in Chiso Preniv, although not before Q3.

    Explorers there voted on three items: first, Eder Naybree was chosen to be released first, with Highgarden second. A second vote was held on the restoration priorities for the Overflow Station area, and the third was on diplomatic relations with an inhabited Age.

    On the storytelling front, some concerns were raised about some ambiguity of rule interactions. A formal post is being drafted for a generic ruleset to address these concerns; most of the rules will be similar to the AGM rules.

    Summer Festival

    PodHopper presented the outline of the MOULa Summer Festival, which will be held on August 1–5, before the next AGM. The number of events made a five-day festival possible, with a variety of events like contests, music, a video event and a marker game.

    For more information, or if you have an idea for an event that you would like to be included, feel free to contact PodHopper on Discord (PodHopper#8133) or in MOULa (#7116825). The events are also listed in our calendar.

      • Monday 1st
        • 12:00–13:30: Cooking Session with Sky (video event)
        • 13:30–15:00: Eternal Evergreens (music event)
      • Tuesday 2
        • 13:00–14:30: Cone Race (contest)
        • 14:30–15:30: Beach Party by the Fountain (music event)
      • Wednesday 3
        • 14:00–16:00: Wall game (contest)
      • Thursday 4
        • 12:00–13:00: A brief history of D’ni (marker game)
        • 15:00–16:30: Door Run (contest)
      • Friday 5
        • 13:00–14:30: Mysterium Concert (music event)

    Minasunda gave a few more details on some of the events. At the “Eternal Evergreens” event – which will take place in the stained glass windows room in Mir-o-Bot’s Elonin (PM “to NDG Elonin” to the bot to get there, KI# 32319) – Eternal Seeker will sing a few songs. A ‘guided dance’ is planned, where avatars will temporarily be taken over for a dance routine. If you do not want to be integrated in the dance, let Mina know so she can put you on the exclusion list for the duration of the event.

    The second event, also taking place in Mir-o-Bot’s Elonin, is a very special, 80 min concert for this year’s Mysterium. Uncle Rebus’ large Persian carpet offers plenty of space for the attendees, so there is no need to climb on the furniture 😉

    The concert is not just a music stream: the Nulp Dance Group will ‘play’ instruments live and will be supported by three backround singers. There will be pieces from Myst, Riven, Exile, Revelation, End of Ages and Uru, plus three artists well known in the Myst/Uru community will play live a few of their pieces: Olivier Maurey aka Piboc, Lillo Moon Minniti aka Lyllus, and Phil Rounds aka Fil.

    A video will be recorded, and excerpts will then be released as a YouTube Premiere during the convention (because of timing constraints, the video cannot be longer than 25 min). The release date will be posted on Facebook and Discord very soon.

    Chiso Preniv updates

    Doobes gave an update on what is coming for the next update to MOULa. The Chiso Preniv library will be greatly expanded, with journals and stories related to the ongoing RP fan stories. All the new content (save a few Ages planned for later release) will be available immediately after the update, but will be somewhat hidden: a hint is to look for the number 18 😉

    If you would like to add a little story-related something, or even just some creative writing related to Myst/Uru for a future update, let Doobes know. Note that you may be asked by testers to work out some ‘wrinkles’ and such.

    With Chiso’s updates out of the way, Doobes will focus solely on the Ae’gura Messengers Pub’s Mysterium decorations. Each of the corner alcoves and the conference room upstairs will be devoted to each Myst game in the series. The main hall and entryway will also have the tables ‘dressed up’ in cliché hotel conference room fashion, for extra authenticity and to give those that could not make it to the convention in-person the same feel as if they were there. There will also be some ‘swag’ to collect 🙂

    If all goes well, the decorations (along with many other goodies and fixes) will appear soon after the update and just in time for Mysterium weekend, August 12–14. The update is planned to be released for the end of July or beginning of August.

    A separate small update will be released in the coming week: an addition was needed for one of the presentations.

    To keep updated on Doobes’ work, check his blog and his Facebook page.

    How to be a tester (click to expand)

    To be a tester, you will need to open an account on the Minkata prime shard; it is highly recommended to read the Tester’s Guide to understand what is expected. To test the cutting edge additions, you can sign up for the Minkata alpha shard.
    To report bugs, you can post on the OpenUru Discord server (channels #hood or #dev); on Discord you can ask to be added to the Testers role to be notified of testing requests, which sometimes need quick response in terms of hours, not days.

    Cavern Tours

    The Cavern Tour are back, on the fourth Saturday of the month, gathering at 11:00 KIT in the Cavern Tour’s Hood.

    Larry LeDeay will reprise his role as the tour guide, r’Tayrtahn will appear as guest guide. Zeke, the original creator of the Cavern Tours, will also be back as host along Susa’n.

    The Tours will use a Twitch channel for the presentation, so you will need to keep a browser or the app open in the background. Videos will be available for two weeks after the tour. The stream will be simulcasted on Facebook and Youtube.

    The tours occasionally visit hard to reach places. Mir-o-Bot (KI# 32319) is often employed for special effects and long-distance travel (and to avoid stairs). If you arrive late, you can PM Susa’n (KI# 9122427) to join the in-progress tour – but do try to arrive in time!

    Miscellanea

    • The Cavern Communications Network has released an episode of its podcast The Water Cooler Show, and will release another one on July 8: the first is an interview to Patrick Dulebohn aka Doobes.
    • The second is an interview to the crew of MystiTech Productions, the group behind the machinima series The Lost Art; episode 14 was released on June 18 on MystiTech’s YouTube channel.

    And that was it for this month. Please consider donating to keep the Cavern open!

    June ended with the CavFunding at 114% (CavCon 4.1) and the reserve at 544%, with no extra expenses. Population was at 44,967 (⇑220), with 1090 unique visits.

    The next All Guilds Meeting is planned for Saturday, August 6 (Leesahn 28) at 13:00 KIT.

    The role of Moderator is currently vacant, with Calum Traveler filling in for the time being; if anyone would like to take the role, it is your chance to step up 😉

    Until then!

  • {:en}News Roundup #19{:}{:it}Carrellata di notizie #19{:}

    {:en}

    MOULa news

    The #205e update released on May 12 fixed a few bugs in Gahreesen:

    • crash on link to Maintainer Nexus;
    • barriers on Gahreesen wall sides allowing unearned win;
    • barrier on top of Gahreesen wall preventing climbing over top edge;
    • Gahreesen shadow textures in maintainer suit machine room improved.

    Mysterium news

    • A full COVID-19 vaccination will be required to attend Mysterium 2022; a FAQ is available here.
    • An optional excursion to the interactive art exhibit Meow Wolf: Convergence Station is planned for Friday, August 12 at 7:20 PM (local time). Tickets are available for $35 through the Registration page until June 30.
    • The winner for April’s Community Prompt “Atrus Family Road Trip” was Grayson aka redwoodrroad; his and others’ works are available on Mysterium’s Discord server.
    • Submissions for the activity book and for events are open until May 22.
    • After today, May 15, the price of the convention registration will increase to $30 and T-shirts will no longer be available for presale, although some may be available at the door.

    {:}{:it}

    Notizie da MOULa

    L’aggiornamento #205e rilasciato il 12 maggio corregge alcuni bug in Gahreesen:

    • crash quando ci si collega al Nexus dei Mantenitori;
    • le barriere ai lati del Muro di Gahreesen consentivano una vittoria immeritata;
    • una barriera in cima al Muro di Gahreesen impedisce di scavalcare il bordo superiore;
    • migliorate le texture delle ombre nella stanza della macchina per la tuta da Mantenitore.

    Notizie da Mysterium

    • Sarà necessaria una vaccinazione completa contro il COVID-19 per partecipare a Mysterium 2022; una FAQ è disponibile qui.
    • Un’escursione facoltativa alla mostra d’arte interattiva Meow Wolf: Convergence Station è prevista per venerdì 12 agosto alle 19:20 (ora locale). I biglietti sono disponibili per $35 dalla pagina di registrazione fino al 30 giugno.
    • Il vincitore del Community Prompt di aprile “Atrus Family Road Trip” è Grayson alias redwoodrroad; le opere sue e degli altri sono disponibili sul server Discord di Mysterium.
    • Le iscrizioni per il libro delle attività e per gli eventi sono aperte fino al 22 maggio.
    • Dopo oggi, 15 maggio, il prezzo della registrazione alla convention salirà a $30 e le magliette non saranno più disponibili per la prevendita, però potrebbero esserne disponibili ancora un po’ all’ingresso.

    {:}

  • May 2022 All Guilds Meeting Summary

    Here is the summary for the 145th All Guilds Meeting, along with the raw and cleansed chatlogs!

    Contents

    1. Events in the Cavern
    2. Fan Ages Touring Club
    3. OpenUru
    4. D’ni Language Classes
    5. R’Tayrtahn’s Story Nights
    6. Miscellanea

    Events in the Cavern

    A Wall Tournament was held in Cody Herd’s Hood on Friday, May 6; Minasunda made a video of the event. The Maintainer suit can now be acquired and saved in the Relto wardrobe by winning a competition with another explorer – playing both sides doesn’t count! If multiple contestants are climbing the Wall, only the first one will get the suit.

    For a guide on how to set up the Wall panel, you can find a journal in one of the meeting rooms in Gahreesen, or you can consult this quick guide at the Guild of Archivists wiki.

    Fan Ages Touring Club

    Korov’ev gave a quick update on the Fan Ages Expeditions he is hosting on the Deep Island shard, every Sunday at 11:00 KIT.

    In April, they started with a few Ages by Jamey, like Writers’ Niche; then they dedicated a few visits to the Geologica series, starting in Dragon’s Tooth, and ended the month following uncle Rebus’ steps in Botan and Moysenland.

    In May, they will start by trying to recover Quilla’s piano, starting in Elonin; the rest of the month will be dedicated to Ages mostly from 2009, including a few more Ahra Pahts Shells and some ages by Race.

    More about the Expeditions (click to expand)
    • The expeditions are streamed (without comments), and the videos will be available for two weeks after. Be careful if you PM Korov’ev, as messages will be visible in the videos 😉
    • After the tour, those who still have the energy are welcome to Korov’ev’s Gahreesehn for some Wall training (feel free to send a message to #194197 for an invite).
    • A gallery of fan ages with some details is available on the Writers’ wiki. Setting up a Deep Island client can be a bit tricky in some situations; a quick guide is available in our Troubleshooting section.

    OpenUru

    Rarified gave a quick outline of the MOULa update plans for the coming months. They just released the Q1 update and started working on the Q2 one.

    New Ages, or big changes to existing ones, are first tested on the Minkata alpha shard. Then, they are moved to the Minkata prime shard, where minor changes and changes to programming are also tested. Eventually the fixes and new content are moved to Cyan’s Staging server, and after a brief testing released on MOULa.

    Of particular note is the issue of adapting content from Myst V: a lot of confidential talks are happening between various groups to try and make it happen, but Cyan may not have all the rights required to make that content available on MOULa.

    How to be a tester (click to expand)

    To be a tester, you will need to open an account on the Minkata prime shard; it is highly recommended to read the Tester’s Guide to understand what is expected. To test the cutting edge additions, you can sign up for the Minkata alpha shard.
    To report bugs, you can post on the OpenUru Discord server (channels #hood or #dev); on Discord you can ask to be added to the Testers role to be notified of testing requests, which sometimes need quick response in terms of hours, not days.

    D’ni Language Classes

    R’Tayrtahn gave two updates, one for the D’ni Language Classes and one for the Story Nights.

    More about the D’ni Language Classes (click to expand)
    • Those who would like to attend the lessons should contact Rehn via PM or KImail (KI# 58324); be sure to include your KI number in the message!
    • The Guild of Instructors’ Hood will be open and public unless a class is in session. Daytime openings are currently on Monday–Friday at 12:00, 13:00 or 14:00 KIT; evening openings at 20:00, 21:00 or 22:00 KIT, depending on the student’s schedule.
    • Last-minute changes to class times are posted on the left-hand imager in the hood.
    • Shokhootahn Rehn (aka r’Tayrtahn) can be found on Discord as r'Tayrtahn#1317.

    R’Tayrtahn’s Story Nights

    Story Night Europe and Original Story Night are in synch, and are telling the stories of the kings of D’ni, which will go on for the next 17 weeks.

    R’Tayrtahn has restarted upload recordings of the Nights to his YouTube channel, and is in the process of uploading the backlog of videos from previous sessions. Be careful if you PM r’Tay, as messages will be visible in the videos 😉

    More about the Story Nights (click to expand)
    • Story Nights are held in Tsahno’s Hood every Saturday, gathering at the fountain at around 23:00 KIT, with the story starting at about 23:30 KIT.
    • For Story Nights – Europe, the gatherings are on Saturday starting at 13:30 KIT, with the story starting at about 14:00 KIT. On All Guilds Meeting days, the event will begin at 14:00 KIT or 15 minutes after the AGM, whichever is later.
    • The stories are told using voice chat, so you will need to have your speakers, headphones or KI devices on. If you would like a reminder, please send r’Tayrtahn (KI# 58324) a KImail with your KI number included in the text, so that he can add you to his buddies list.
    • Last-minute changes to Story Night times are posted on the left-hand imager in the hood.

    Miscellanea

    • Mysterium Events and Activity Book submissions are open until May 22; Writing & Artwork submissions are open until July 31.
    • The Mysterium prompt for May is “Villains”; the deadline is May 31 at 21:00 KIT.
    • The Fan Devs are working on a way to include senders to KI mails, making it easier to reply.
    • Area Man Lives, published by Cyan Ventures, is planned to be released on May 12.
    • Myst (2021) has won the Webby People’s Voice award in games for Technical Achievement. This is the second award after the Mac App Store Game of the Year.

    And that was it for this month. Please consider donating to keep the Cavern open!

    April ended with the CavFunding at 78% (CavCon 2.8) and the reserve at 507%, with 4% extra expenses. Population was at 44,497 (⇑295), with 1340 unique visits.

    The next All Guilds Meeting is planned for Saturday, June 4 (Leebro 7, 9678) at 13:00 KIT.

    The role of Moderator is currently vacant, with Calum Traveler filling in for the time being; if anyone would like to take the role, it is your chance to step up 😉

    Until then!

  • News Roundup #18

    Cavern events

    A Developers and Storytellers Meeting was held on April 24: it covered the highlights of the latest patch, and discussed the intentions for the fan-directed IC storyline. A cleansed and a raw chatlog are available.

    Guild of Writers

    Korman 0.13 was released on April 24: it represents 83 commits with approximately 850 lines of code changed since Korman 0.12a. Per the announcement of Korman 0.12, Blender 2.79b is no longer supported; Korman will now only function with “Blender for Korman”. More details in the release notes.

    Mysterium

    The hotel this year is the Holiday Inn Denver East in the Central Park neighborhood, east of downtown Denver, CO. The discounted rate, including free parking, will be $121/night, and will be available until July 20. More details on the location here.

    Quabitat for Squeemanity will allow to adopt a pet quab or squee and get a free, customizable habitat. More info will come soon.

    The Committee is planning a Family Feud style game show for this year’s convention. To do that, they need survey responses, the more they get the better it will be. You can find the survey here.

    The Committee is also still taking submissions for this year’s Activity Book; the deadline has been extended to May 22, the same as the event submissions.

    Cyan

    The winners of Cyan’s 2nd annual Cake Contest are Molonara, mst_haroro, CalleyJSciWri, and fobofobiac. They got gift certificates for the Cyan Store, along with stained-glass motif posters, print and coaster sets created by Kelly Coston.

    Area Man Lives, a game under development by Numinous Games and published by Cyan Ventures, is rapidly approaching a release date. A cast promo was released on April 12; you may even spot a familiar face or two 😉

    A new Cyan Venture was announced: The Last Clockwinder, a sci-fi VR puzzler for Meta Quest 2 and Steam from indie studio Pontoco.

    Abner Coimbre, senior engineer for Firmament, left the position to focus on the systems programming conference Handmade Seattle.

  • {:en}MOULa update OpenUru#205d{:}{:it}MOULa update OpenUru#205d{:}

    {:en}On April 20 MOULa got another big update, with lots of interesting additions! A full list is available at the bottom of this post.

    A new start choice

    New avatars are now given a choice on the starting experience: either in the Cleft (as first experienced in Uru: ABM), aimed at new explorers not familiar with the setting and/or the mechanics; or straight in Relto, aimed at returning players and those who want immediate access to public areas. The Cleft will still be available in the latter case.

    The Gahreesen Wall

    The Wall is a competitive game in the final area of Gahreesen. While it has been available for years on a few shards like The Open Cave and Deep Island, it never did on MOULa – until now! In this implementation, the Wall features audio cues, and spectators can follow the contestants on monitors in the conference rooms.

    For more info on the Wall and how to set up a match, there is a journal in one of the conference room, or you can check the dedicated Guild of Archivists’ wiki page.

    A new Age

    As revealed in a recent AGM, the new Age of Elonin, by Dulcamara and Ametist, will be unveiled on Friday, April 29 at 13:00 KIT in Chiso Preniv, where the new book will be made available.

    On a separate note, the Nexus terminal in the Ae’gura Guild of Messengers’ Pub is now active, and can be used to add it to your list of Cavern Locations.

    Subtitles

    All in-game dialogue is now subtitled (in the chat area). Subtitles will be on by default, but can be turned off in F4 > Audio Settings.

    A note on bugs

    When an update, especially one as large as this one, hits MOULa it is almost inevitable that unexpected bugs will show up; for all the testing that can be done, Minkata never sees as many concurrent players as the official server, and not all issues can be catched. No addition from Cyan is to be expected for the foreseeable future, apart from server updates, so all improvements and additions will come from fan developers, who dedicate their limited free time to at least try to let MOULa be the best it could potentially be.

    So the best way to deal with bugs is to have patience and report them, mentioning where you were and what you were doing, be it on Cyan’s Discord, OpenUru’s Discord or OpenUru forums.

    If you fancy contributing your work and/or helping with bug fixing, those places are also excellent starting points to be part of the Fourth Restoration 🙂

    OpenUru Build #205d Build Update (click to expand)

    Client changes:
    – [n] Subtitles {20,1}
    – [n] Wall game {12,1,20,9,13,5,10,3}
    – [f] Client crash linking to Eder Tsogahl {20,7}
    – [f] Fix cursor visiblity issues {20,1}
    – [f] Crashes with new buddy list commands {20,1}
    – [u] Default clothing change notifications {12}
    – [f] Prevent link race conditions {20,1}
    – [f] Memory reserves in client {16}
    – [u] Allow panic linking to be disabled {12,1}
    Content changes:
    – [n] Subtitles for speech audios {20}
    – [n] New emote KI commands (/ok, /rofl, /sad) {20}
    – [n] New area in Cavern (future reveal) {8,2}
    – [n] Gahreesen Wall {12,15,1,20,9,13,5,10,3}
    – [n] KI /addbuddy can now add players in neighbors channel {20}
    – [n] Kirel 2022 Q1 audio recordings {12,6,18,17,19,14,11}
    – [n] Guild of Messengers Pub is a global city instance {9,12,16,1}
    – [n] KI now only highlights name in mentions {20}
    – [n] New Avatars have a choice of game start {12}
    – [n] New KI commands (/age, /buddies, /neighbors) {20}
    – [n] Nexus panels can include fan ages {12}
    – [n] Someone moved the backpack from Er’cana {12}
    – [f] Autumn trees Page {12}
    – [f] Clothing at distance {12}
    – [f] Er’cana Tunnel Roof texture {4}
    – [f] GreatZero beam skipping city arch {12}
    – [f] KI Slot on City Nexus podiums {12}
    – [f] Myst Age rendering problems {12}
    – [f] Formatting of Descent, Phil journals {20}
    – [f] Improved KI /look {20}
    – [f] KI chat now will discard blank messages {20}
    – [f] Er’cana backpack corrections {12}
    – [f] Neighborhood Gahreesen Well second floor window {12}
    – [f] Serene Age decorations, footprints issues {9}
    – [u] Chiso Preniv {9}
    – [u] Tiam Age {2}
    – [u] Veelay journal {9}
    Key:
    [n] new
    [f] fixed
    [u] updated
    Attributions:
    {1} Adam {Hoikas}
    {2} Ametist
    {3} Briggs
    {4} CalumTraveler
    {5} ChristopherS
    {6} DapperAndy
    {7} Deledrius
    {8} Dulcamara
    {9} Doobes
    {10} Filtik
    {11} Fujhoo
    {12} Hazado
    {13} Mystler
    {14} neurovac
    {15} r’Tayrtahn
    {16} rarified
    {17} skyisblu
    {18} Taliana
    {19} Tyion
    {20} Zaroth
    (source)

    {:}{:it}Il 20 aprile MOULa ha ricevuto un altro grosso aggiornamento, con molte aggiunte interessanti! Un elenco completo è disponibile in fondo a questo post.

    Una nuova scelta per l’inizio

    Ai nuovi avatar viene ora data una scelta per l’esperienza iniziale: o nel Crepaccio (come sperimentato per la prima volta in Uru: ABM), rivolto ai nuovi esploratori che non hanno familiarità con l’ambientazione e/o le meccaniche di gioco; o direttamente in Relto, rivolto ai giocatori di ritorno e a chi desidera un accesso immediato alle aree pubbliche. Il Crepaccio sarà comunque disponibile anche nel secondo caso.

    Il Muro di Gahreesen

    Il Muro è un gioco competitivo nell’area finale di Gahreesen. Sebbene sia stato disponibile per anni su alcuni shard come The Open Cave e Deep Island, non lo è mai stato su MOULa – fino ad ora! In questa implementazione, il Muro include segnali audio e gli spettatori possono seguire i concorrenti su dei monitor nelle sale conferenze.

    Per maggiori informazioni sul Muro e su come impostare una partita, potete trovare un diario in una delle sale conferenze, oppure potete visitare la pagina wiki dedicata della Gilda degli Archivisti.

    Una nuova Era

    Come rivelato in una recente AGM, la nuova Era of Elonin, creata da Dulcamara e Ametist, sarà svelata venerdì 29 aprile alle 21:00 CEST a Chiso Preniv, dove sarà reso disponibile il nuovo libro.

    In una nota a parte, il terminale Nexus nel Pub dei Messaggeri di Ae’gura è ora attivo e può essere utilizzato per aggiungerlo al vostro elenco dei Luoghi della Caverna.

    Sottotitoli

    Tutti i dialoghi di gioco sono ora sottotitolati (nell’area di chat). I sottotitoli saranno attivi per impostazione predefinita, ma possono essere disattivati in F4 > Audio Settings.

    Una nota sui bug

    Quando un aggiornamento, specialmente uno grosso come questo, arriva su MOULa è quasi inevitabile che si manifestino bug imprevisti; nonostante tutti i test che possono essere eseguiti, Minkata non vede mai tanti giocatori simultanei quanto il server ufficiale e non tutti i problemi possono essere rilevati. Nessuna aggiunta da Cyan è da aspettarsi per il prossimo futuro, a parte aggiornamenti del server, quindi tutti i miglioramenti e aggiunte verranno dai fan sviluppatori, che dedicano il loro limitato tempo libero a cercare di rendere MOULa il meglio che possa essere.

    Quindi il modo migliore di gestire i bug è di avere pazienza e di segnalarli (in inglese), menzionando dove vi trovavate e cosa stavate facendo, sul server Discord di Cyan, di OpenUru o sul forum di OpenUru.

    Se poi desideraste contribuire con una vostra creazione e/o aiutare a correggere i bug, quei luoghi sono anche ottimi punti di partenza per far parte della Quarta Restaurazione 🙂

    OpenUru Build #205d Build Update (cliccare per espandere)

    Client changes:
    – [n] Subtitles {20,1}
    – [n] Wall game {12,1,20,9,13,5,10,3}
    – [f] Client crash linking to Eder Tsogahl {20,7}
    – [f] Fix cursor visiblity issues {20,1}
    – [f] Crashes with new buddy list commands {20,1}
    – [u] Default clothing change notifications {12}
    – [f] Prevent link race conditions {20,1}
    – [f] Memory reserves in client {16}
    – [u] Allow panic linking to be disabled {12,1}
    Content changes:
    – [n] Subtitles for speech audios {20}
    – [n] New emote KI commands (/ok, /rofl, /sad) {20}
    – [n] New area in Cavern (future reveal) {8,2}
    – [n] Gahreesen Wall {12,15,1,20,9,13,5,10,3}
    – [n] KI /addbuddy can now add players in neighbors channel {20}
    – [n] Kirel 2022 Q1 audio recordings {12,6,18,17,19,14,11}
    – [n] Guild of Messengers Pub is a global city instance {9,12,16,1}
    – [n] KI now only highlights name in mentions {20}
    – [n] New Avatars have a choice of game start {12}
    – [n] New KI commands (/age, /buddies, /neighbors) {20}
    – [n] Nexus panels can include fan ages {12}
    – [n] Someone moved the backpack from Er’cana {12}
    – [f] Autumn trees Page {12}
    – [f] Clothing at distance {12}
    – [f] Er’cana Tunnel Roof texture {4}
    – [f] GreatZero beam skipping city arch {12}
    – [f] KI Slot on City Nexus podiums {12}
    – [f] Myst Age rendering problems {12}
    – [f] Formatting of Descent, Phil journals {20}
    – [f] Improved KI /look {20}
    – [f] KI chat now will discard blank messages {20}
    – [f] Er’cana backpack corrections {12}
    – [f] Neighborhood Gahreesen Well second floor window {12}
    – [f] Serene Age decorations, footprints issues {9}
    – [u] Chiso Preniv {9}
    – [u] Tiam Age {2}
    – [u] Veelay journal {9}
    Key:
    [n] new
    [f] fixed
    [u] updated
    Attributions:
    {1} Adam {Hoikas}
    {2} Ametist
    {3} Briggs
    {4} CalumTraveler
    {5} ChristopherS
    {6} DapperAndy
    {7} Deledrius
    {8} Dulcamara
    {9} Doobes
    {10} Filtik
    {11} Fujhoo
    {12} Hazado
    {13} Mystler
    {14} neurovac
    {15} r’Tayrtahn
    {16} rarified
    {17} skyisblu
    {18} Taliana
    {19} Tyion
    {20} Zaroth
    (source)

    {:}

  • April 2022 All Guilds Meeting Summary

    Here is the summary for the 144th All Guilds Meeting, along with the raw and cleansed chatlogs!

    Contents

    1. Events in the Cavern
    2. A new era in D’ni
    3. Cavern Tours
    4. Fan Ages Touring Club
    5. D’ni Language Classes
    6. R’Tayrtahn’s Story Nights
    7. Bugged marker games
    8. Miscellanea

    Events in the Cavern

    Minasunda announced two events for April: the first is the D’ni New Year 9678 celebrations, on Thursday, April 21 at 13:00 KIT. Yoda cannot be available this year, so there will be no Light Show; instead, Seeker will host a Music Show in Mir-o-Bot’s Tiam (to get there PM “to mobtiam” to Mir-o-Bot, KI# 32319).

    The second event is the Mother Earth Day Nulp Dance Show on Friday, April 22 at 13:00 KIT, in Mir-o-Bot’s Er’cana (to get there PM “link” or “meet” to Mir-o-Bot). Seeker will provide the music.

    The show will take place at different locations in Er’cana; to follow the dancers PM “w” to Mir-o-Bot. The first change can be reached on foot (just follow Fog_man) but the following ones cannot be reached through normal means (please do not use ladders or the harvester, they will make you crash). There will be short breaks to give the audience time to regroup.

    A new era in D’ni

    Doobes announced the upcoming big MOULa update, which at the time of this writing was already moved onto Cyan’s staging server, where the final testing is done.

    Doobes has teased some of the features in his Facebook page, including: an option to select either Relto or the Cleft when starting a new avatar; subtitles for all the in-game spoken dialog (including some newly-recorded voiceovers); the reactivation of the Gahreesen Wall; a new Cavern location from Dulcamara and Ametist. A full list of fixes and updates will be posted when the update will go live.

    If you want to help out with testing (especially important this time), you can sign up for an account on Cyan’s staging server; note that this account is separate from your MOULa one, so don’t worry if something is lost, deleted, etc. The use of the staging server will require Cyan to utilize the CavCon reserve funds.

    After testing on the staging server, it is strongly advised to delete your audio.ini file (%USERPROFILE%\Documents\Uru Live\Init) before returning to MOULa.

    In the meantime, work on the next quarter’s update has already begun! We will keep you updated as new features and fixes are announced.

    To keep updated on Doobes’ work, check his blog and his Facebook page.

    Cavern Tours

    The Cavern Tour will be held on Saturday 9 at 11:00 KIT, starting from the Cavern Tour’s Hood. The host, Larry LeDeay, will use his Twitch channel for the presentation, so you will need to keep a browser or the app open in the background. Videos will be available for two weeks after the tour. The stream will be simulcasted on Facebook and Youtube.

    This month the Tour will continue the exploration of the Myst V Ages.

    The tours occasionally visit hard to reach places. Mir-o-Bot (KI# 32319) is often employed for special effects and long-distance travel (and to avoid stairs). If you arrive late, you can PM Susa’n (KI# 9122427) to join the in-progress tour – but do try to arrive in time!

    Fan Ages Touring Club

    Korov’ev gave a quick update on the Fan Ages Expeditions he is hosting on the Deep Island shard, every Sunday at 11:00 KIT.

    In March they visited the entries for the DAWN Contest, two of which also took part in the 3rd RAD; they then visited SereneTiki’s creations, including the ever-changing Sprite Gallery; next they tackled the non-trivial puzzle age Oolbahnneea. The month was rounded off with the collaborative project Rell-too.

    For April, the plan is to start with Jamey’s ages, like Tsoidahl Sheegahtee and Writers’ Niche; then they will start the grand tour of Geologica, starting in Dragon’s Tooth and witnessing the changes that occurred through geological eras. They will end the month following uncle Rebus’ steps in Botan and Moysenland.

    More about the Expeditions (click to expand)
    • The expeditions are streamed (without comments), and the videos will be available for two weeks after. Be careful if you PM Korov’ev, as messages will be visible in the videos 😉
    • After the tour, those who still have the energy are welcome to Korov’ev’s Gahreesehn for some Wall training (feel free to send a message to #194197 for an invite).
    • A gallery of fan ages with some details is available on the Writers’ wiki. Setting up a Deep Island client can be a bit tricky in some situations; a quick guide is available in our Troubleshooting section.

    D’ni Language Classes

    R’Tayrtahn gave two updates, one for the D’ni Language Classes and one for the Story Nights.

    More about the D’ni Language Classes (click to expand)
    • Those who would like to attend the lessons should contact Rehn via PM or KImail (KI# 58324); be sure to include your KI number in the message!
    • The Guild of Instructors’ Hood will be open and public unless a class is in session. Daytime openings are currently on Monday–Friday at 12:00, 13:00 or 14:00 KIT; evening openings at 20:00, 21:00 or 22:00 KIT, depending on the student’s schedule.
    • Last-minute changes to class times are posted on the left-hand imager in the hood.
    • Shokhootahn Rehn (aka r’Tayrtahn) can be found on Discord as r'Tayrtahn#1317.

    R’Tayrtahn’s Story Nights

    Story Night Europe and Original Story Night are in synch, and are telling the stories of the kings of D’ni, which will go on for the next 22 weeks.

    R’Tayrtahn has restarted upload recordings of the Nights to his YouTube channel, and is in the process of uploading the backlog of videos from previous sessions. Be careful if you PM r’Tay, as messages will be visible in the videos 😉

    More about the Story Nights (click to expand)
    • Story Nights are held in Tsahno’s Hood every Saturday, gathering at the fountain at around 23:00 KIT, with the story starting at about 23:30 KIT.
    • For Story Nights – Europe, the gatherings are on Saturday starting at 13:30 KIT, with the story starting at about 14:00 KIT. On All Guilds Meeting days, the event will begin at 14:00 KIT or 15 minutes after the AGM, whichever is later.
    • The stories are told using voice chat, so you will need to have your speakers, headphones or KI devices on. If you would like a reminder, please send r’Tayrtahn (KI# 58324) a KImail with your KI number included in the text, so that he can add you to his buddies list.
    • Last-minute changes to Story Night times are posted on the left-hand imager in the hood.

    Bugged marker games

    Calum Traveler mentioned the issue of marker games stuck in “LOADING”: unfortunately, it seems like they are struck with a bug where, when a player is deleting their access node (the marker game KImail) from their KI, a permanent delete is propagated to the server, erasing the MG pointer and breaking the access nodes for all other players.

    The devs are hard at work on trying to figure out a way to prevent this bug. One known trigger is the presence of duplicated entries of that MG: deleting the duplicate will break the MG. Renaming one of the entries also seems to be a trigger, as well as moving a MG to a folder then getting another copy.

    They are trying to integrate the old Marker Editor client functionality in the H’uru client, possibly even integrating it into the main client, but progress on that has been slow and it was given a lower priority.

    Miscellanea

    • The Mysterium prompt for March “Discord Stickers” has concluded; entries were “Saav Bonk” by Kefrith, “Riven Pokey” by SqueeFruit, “Airship” by KellyC, “Fallen Cone” and “Bahro Stare” by Laughingpineapple.
    • The new prompt for April is “Atrus Family Roadtrip”.
    • Firmament will release for PS4, PS5 and PS VR 2: backers who selected PS4 as their platform will receive a single key that grants them all three version. Unfortunately it will not be released for PS VR (the first one).
    • Firmament is planned to launch on PC, Mac and PS “later this year”.
    • Cyan’s April Fools’ joke was the very limited Riven Fire Marble Hand and Body Soap. Hurry, they may still have one left! 😀

    And that was it for this month. Please consider donating to keep the Cavern open!

    March ended with the CavFunding at 75% (CavCon 2.8) and the reserve at 530%, with 20% extra expenses. Population was at 44,202 (⇑229), with 1177 unique visits. Extra costs were from the Q1 update.

    The next All Guilds Meeting is planned for Saturday, May 7 (Leefo 14, 9678) at 13:00 KIT.

    The role of Moderator is currently vacant, with Calum Traveler filling in for the time being; if anyone would like to take the role, it is your chance to step up 😉

    Until then!

  • March 2022 All Guilds Meeting Summary

    Here is the summary for the 143rd All Guilds Meeting, along with the raw and cleansed chatlogs!

    Contents

    1. A new era in D’ni
    2. Cavern Tours
    3. Fan Ages Touring Club
    4. D’ni Language Classes
    5. R’Tayrtahn’s Story Nights
    6. International Women’s Day
    7. Miscellanea

    A new era in D’ni

    Kelsei A.T. announced the III Deep City Lecture, about the D’ni legal system, held right after the Meeting 15:00 KIT in the Guild of Archivists’ Hood, and streamed over Twitch and Discord.

    Next, she announced the long-awaited public opening of the Gahreesen Wall, expected for the end of the month! After that, the pipeline includes a neighborhood area called Elonin (by Dulcamara) and a garden Age called Eder Naybree (by CalumTraveler). More info will come soon™.

    Patrick Dulebohn and CalumTraveler are working on restoring the Nexus podium in the Guild of Messengers Pub, so that getting there will be a little easier. They also plan to move the Chiso Preniv book there out of the kitchen.

    The issue with Tiam not showing in the Nexus seems to have been sorted out, the book should appear as expected for invites in the near future. They hope they will be able to avoid similar problems in the future.

    There is a quality of life update to the KI planned in the near future. This update should help folks who have a harder time hearing certain spoken word sources, like the Kirel podium or dialog.

    Tweek then announced they are working on opening an area of Fahets to the public. The area is called Highgarden, a small island off the western coast of Fahets ‘prime’. They are ensuring it is safe after the destablization event on Fahets several years ago.

    To keep updated on Tweek’s work, check his Facebook page.

    Patrick Dulebohn hinted at another Garden Age coming fairly soon. He will need to consult with the DRC, especially Dr. Richard Watson, since he reportedly visited it in the past.

    Cavern Tours

    The Cavern Tour will be held on Saturday 12 at 11:00 KIT, starting from the Cavern Tour’s Hood. The host, Larry LeDeay, will use his Twitch channel for the presentation, so you will need to keep a browser or the app open in the background. Videos will be available for two weeks after the tour. The stream will be simulcasted on Facebook and Youtube.

    This month the Tour will continue the exploration of the Myst V Ages.

    The tours occasionally visit hard to reach places. Mir-o-Bot (KI# 32319) is often employed for special effects and long-distance travel (and to avoid stairs). If you arrive late, you can PM Susa’n (KI# 9122427) to join the in-progress tour – but do try to arrive in time!

    Fan Ages Touring Club

    Korov’ev gave a quick update on the Fan Ages Expeditions he is hosting on the Deep Island shard, every Sunday at 11:00 KIT.

    In January they visited the entries of the first Rapid Age Development contest: Abysos, a couple of Ahra Pahts shells, and Zephyr Cove; then a few assorted ages: Aerie, TINA Testing Area, Kahntinoy, Fena Barel (the last two involved in fan-run ‘episodes’ held in 2008). They finished the month in Tunnel Demo, Soundgarden and Wianeroy.

    In February they visited the entries for the II RAD Contest, a group of Ahra Pahts shells; then a few works by Andy Legate and by Whilyam; the month finished with the III RAD Contest entries, including Tre’bivdil.

    For March, the plan is to visit the entries for the DAWN Contest, two of which also took part in the 3rd RAD; then they will visit SereneTiki’s creations, including the ever-changing Sprite Gallery; then they will tackle a non-trivial fan-made puzzle age, Oolbahnneea. If they can finish that in one session, they will round the month off with the collaborative project Rell-too.

    More about the Expeditions (click to expand)
    • The expeditions are streamed (without comments), and the videos will be available for two weeks after. Be careful if you PM Korov’ev, as messages will be visible in the videos 😉
    • After the tour, those who still have the energy are welcome to Korov’ev’s Gahreesehn for some Wall training (feel free to send a message to #194197 for an invite).
    • A gallery of fan ages with some details is available on the Writers’ wiki. Setting up a Deep Island client can be a bit tricky in some situations; a quick guide is available in our Troubleshooting section.

    D’ni Language Classes

    R’Tayrtahn gave two updates, one for the D’ni Language Classes and one for the Story Nights.

    More about the D’ni Language Classes (click to expand)
    • Those who would like to attend the lessons should contact Rehn via PM or KImail (KI# 58324); be sure to include your KI number in the message!
    • The Guild of Instructors’ Hood will be open and public unless a class is in session, currently on Monday–Friday starting at 12:00, 13:00 or 14:00 KIT, and on Wednesday–Friday starting at 20:00, 21:00 or 22:00 KIT, depending on the student’s schedule.
    • Last-minute changes to class times are posted on the left-hand imager in the hood.

    R’Tayrtahn’s Story Nights

    Story Night Europe and Original Story Night are in synch, and are telling the stories of the kings of D’ni, which will go on for the next 26 weeks.

    R’Tayrtahn has restarted upload recordings of the Nights to his YouTube channel, and is in the process of uploading the backlog of videos from previous sessions. Be careful if you PM r’Tay, as messages will be visible in the videos 😉

    More about the Story Nights (click to expand)
    • Story Nights are held in Tsahno’s Hood every Saturday, gathering at the fountain at around 23:00 KIT, with the story starting at about 23:30 KIT.
    • For Story Nights – Europe, the gatherings are on Saturday starting at 13:30 KIT, with the story starting at about 14:00 KIT. On All Guilds Meeting days, the event will begin at 14:00 KIT or 15 minutes after the AGM, whichever is later.
    • The stories are told using voice chat, so you will need to have your speakers, headphones or KI devices on. If you would like a reminder, please send r’Tayrtahn (KI# 58324) a KImail with your KI number included in the text, so that he can add you to his buddies list.
    • Last-minute changes to Story Night times are posted on the left-hand imager in the hood.
    • Recording of the Stories are available on r’Tayrtahn’s YouTube channel; however some hardware issues are preventing r’Tayrtahn from uploading the latest episodes.

    International Women’s Day

    Aurelias announced a few Cavern events for the International Women’s Day:

    • Monday, March 7
      • 12:30 KIT: From Dusk to Dawn in Mir-o-Bot’s Eder Gira, hosted by Aurelias (stream) (to get there PM “to gira” to Mir-o-Bot, KI# 32319)
    • Tuesday, March 8
      • 11:30 KIT: Long Shall Women Thrive in Ae’gura, hosted by Nosila (stream)
      • 13:00 KIT: Ambient Women in PodHopper’s Hood, hosted by PodHopper (stream)
      • 15:00 KIT: Music by Female Artist in Ae’gura Plaza, hosted by AlanDJ (stream)
    • Wednesday, March 9
      • 14:00 KIT: Escuta as Minas! / Listen to Gals! in Sutherland Point in Ae’gura, hosted by Dah’mpa (stream)
    • Friday, March 11
      • 14:00 KIT: Yeesha – The Broken Bird in Kirel, hosted by owly (stream)
      • 15:00 KIT: Wonky Talk in the Guild of Cookies’ Hood, hosted by IwonK (stream)

    Miscellanea

    • The deadline for the Mysterium T-shirt contest has passed; they will announce the winners in the next few days in the blog.
    • The February prompt “Glass” has concluded; the new prompt is “Stickers for the Mysterium Discord server”.
    • Patrick Dulebohn plans to put something together in the Pub for those that can’t get to Mysterium conventionally or for those that can’t afford it.
    • You can find more info and additional news in our dedicated post.

    And that was it for this month. Please consider donating to keep the Cavern open!

    February ended with the CavFunding at 133% (CavCon 4.3) and the reserve at 555%, with no extra expenses. Population was at 43,973 (⇑332), with 1393 unique visits.

    The next All Guilds Meeting is planned for Saturday, April 2 (Leenovoo 15) at 13:00 KIT.

    The role of Moderator is currently vacant, with Kelsei A.T. filling in for the time being; if anyone would like to take the role, it is your chance to step up 😉

    Until then!

  • January 2022 All Guilds Meeting Summary

    Here is the summary for the 141st All Guilds Meeting, along with the raw and cleansed chatlogs!

    Contents

    1. Mysterium news
    2. Events in the Cavern
    3. A new era in D’ni
    4. The Fall of D’ni Memorial
    5. D’ni Language Classes
    6. R’Tayrtahn’s Story Nights
    7. Cavern Tours
    8. Fan Ages Touring Club
    9. Miscellanea

    Mysterium news

    Calum Traveler reported some quick news about the convention:

    • early bird registration is available until May 15 at two different rates: Standard ($25) will provide admission to the event and any swag, such as pins; Premium ($40) includes everything from Standard as well as a Mysterium 2022 T-shirt;
    • the T-shirt design has not been chosen yet; if you are planning to submit a design (submissions are open until February 20), the Committee recommend holding off on registering, since your shirt will be free if your design is selected;
    • if you submitted an entry for the Writing & Artwork table for 2020 or 2021, you will need to re-submit it for this year;
    • attendees will likely be required to be up to date with COVID-19 vaccinations (the CDC’s definition of fully vaccinated); staff will provide more details on how to provide proof at a later time.

    Events in the Cavern

    Minasunda announced the start of MOULa’s XII anniversary week, on February 6, starting with Ghaelen’s opening ceremony. Special events are already planned, in addition to the regular ones, including a fantastic Nulp Dance Show in Gahreesen.

    More details will be announced at the February AGM. A preliminary schedule was posted in the #anniversary-planning channel of the MOULa Event Discord server.

    If you need help with organising an event (not only for the festivities), or just want to spread the word about it, you can join a Discord server, a Facebook group, or you can contact Minasunda via KImail (#5667000).

    A new era in D’ni

    Doobes announced he started working on the Myst V Ages: Tahgira, Todelmer, Noloben, Laki’ahn, and Direbo, which were originally meant for MOUL. He came up with a hopefully viable path to bypass the bahro magic and use traditional linking methods, to see all the sights and allow completion of the puzzles. The events of Myst V may be alluded to, but only lightly, so any spoiler should be minor.

    All this of course will hinge on Cyan’s approval; they will have an opportunity to see the converted content and give their thoughts. Descent will take a back seat for the time being, until the Myst V Ages are complete.

    Doobes also mentioned that the entries for Grandbad and Battlebotsboy, who sadly passed away at the end of 2021, will soon be added to the Veelay Tsahvahn journals, after some testing on the Minkata shard.

    Finally, he noted that, with the next MOULa update, Tiam hopefully will be given a linking panel in the Nexus, which will allow linking to Tiam via the Nexus and also allow for KI invites to work. For now, explorers will need to use the Share feature in the linking book in Chiso Preniv.

    To keep updated on Doobes’ work, check his blog and his Facebook page.

    The Fall of D’ni Memorial

    Christopher Therburg announced his Fall of D’ni Memorial project has been moved from its original planned location in the Kings Lookout to a separate small island in the Cavern, the reason being that some believes that Ae’gura is not the right place for it.

    The island is a small stalagmite that naturally fractured sometime after the Fall of D’ni; the remains of the upper part, partly underwater, can still be seen. It will be accessed via a boat ride, and there will also be a Nexus terminal.

    The Memorial is currently scheduled to be unveiled on the date of the Fall, Leesahn 8, or July 12. Updates will posted on the Beneath IC forums.

    D’ni Language Classes

    R’Tayrtahn gave two announcements, one for the D’ni Language Classes and one for the Story Nights.

    More about the D’ni Language Classes (click to expand)
    • Those who would like to attend the lessons should contact Rehn via PM or KImail (KI# 58324); be sure to include your KI number in the message!
    • The Guild of Instructors’ Hood will be open and public unless a class is in session, currently on Monday–Friday starting at 12:00, 13:00 or 14:00 KIT, and on Wednesday–Friday starting at 20:00, 21:00 or 22:00 KIT, depending on the student’s schedule.
    • Last-minute changes to class times are posted on the left-hand imager in the hood.

    R’Tayrtahn’s Story Nights

    Story Night Europe is starting from the beginning: the D’ni creation myth.

    Original Story Night is continuing the bi-annual Bahro Glyph Tour.

    R’Tayrtahn has restarted upload recordings of the Nights to his YouTube channel, and is in the process of uploading the backlog of videos from previous sessions. Be careful if you PM r’Tay, as messages will be visible in the videos 😉

    More about the Story Nights (click to expand)
    • Story Nights are held in Tsahno’s Hood every Saturday, gathering at the fountain at around 23:00 KIT, with the story starting at about 23:30 KIT.
    • For Story Nights – Europe, the gatherings are on Saturday starting at 13:30 KIT, with the story starting at about 14:00 KIT. On All Guilds Meeting days, the event will begin at 14:00 KIT or 15 minutes after the end of the AGM, whichever is later.
    • The stories are told using voice chat, so you will need to have your speakers, headphones or KI devices on. If you would like a reminder, please send r’Tayrtahn (KI# 58324) a KImail with your KI number included in the text, so that he can add you to his buddies list.
    • Last-minute changes to Story Night times are posted on the left-hand imager in the hood.
    • Recording of the Stories are available on r’Tayrtahn’s YouTube channel; however some hardware issues are preventing r’Tayrtahn from uploading the latest episodes.

    Cavern Tours

    The Cavern Tour was held on Saturday 8 at 11:00 KIT (just before the Meeting), starting from the Cavern Tour’s Hood. The host, Larry LeDeay, uses his Twitch channel for the presentation, so you will need to keep a browser or the app open in the background. Videos will be available for two weeks after the tour. The stream is simulcasted on Facebook and Youtube.

    The tours occasionally visit hard to reach places. Mir-o-Bot (KI# 32319) is often employed for special effects and long-distance travel (and to avoid stairs). If you arrive late, you can PM Susa’n (KI# 9122427) to join the in-progress tour – but do try to arrive in time!

    Fan Ages Touring Club

    Korov’ev gave a quick update on the Fan Ages Expeditions he is hosting on the Deep Island shard, every Sunday at 11:00 KIT.

    In December they visited some fairly complex ages like Jo’nae, Jo’nae Hood, Takla Ma’kan, and investigated the mysteries of Sonavio.

    In January, the plan is to visit the entries of the first Rapid Age Development contest: Abysos, a couple of Ahra Pahts shells and Zephyr Cove; then a few assorted ages like Aerie, TINA, Kahntinoy, Fena Barel (a summary of fan-run ‘episodes’ held in 2008); and conclude the month with a few works by Nadnerb and by Andy Legate.

    More about the Expeditions (click to expand)
    • The expeditions are streamed (without comments), and the videos will be available for two weeks after. Be careful if you PM Korov’ev, as messages will be visible in the videos 😉
    • After the tour, those who still have the energy are welcome to Korov’ev’s Gahreesehn for some Wall training (feel free to send a message to #194197 for an invite).
    • A gallery of fan ages with some details is available on the Writers’ wiki. Setting up a Deep Island client can be a bit tricky in some situations; a quick guide is available in our Troubleshooting section.

    Miscellanea

    • Minasunda filmed and edited a lovely year end wrap up video for 2021; Calum Traveler also made a video, with more focus on places.
    • A new Age was released in December: Tiam, by Ametist (more info in the dedicated post). New clothing items have also been added: some are immediately available in the Relto wardrobe, others can be found in thematically appropriate locations. There are some unexpected render issues that are being worked on. Note that the second backpack was released by mistake, and may have removed Zandi’s shirt and the field vest; these can be re-collected in their original locations.
    • A story book by Jules Lavisham was also released in Chiso Preniv: “The Painter”. The “Heritage Documents” and “Activity in the Cavern” books have been moved to a different shelf, grouped together, and given numbers on the spines for easier picking up of the correct volume.
    • Serene now has the snow storms from the original version, and a ‘special guest’ during the festivities 🙂
    • The Kirel podium has been enabled: the plan is to get new audio recordings out once every quarter to serve as a recap of recent events. For now there are two tracks: one covering the last few months of activity, recorded by Tyion, and a historical recording from Dr. Watson.
    • Initial testing for reactivating the Gahreesen Wall have begun; more info will be revealed Soon™.

    And that was it for this month. Please consider donating to keep the Cavern open!

    December ended with the CavFunding at 205% (CavCon 4.10) and the reserve at 546%, with 25% extra expenses. Population was at 42,976 (⇑426), with 1588 unique visits. Unbelievable month for donations and updates: two donations accounted for more than 50% of the total amount; the number of new accounts added per month also nearly doubled.

    The next All Guilds Meeting is planned for Saturday, February 5 (Leevosahn 28) at 13:00 KIT.

    The role of Moderator is currently vacant; if anyone would like to take the role, it is your chance to step up 😉

    Until then!

  • The December 2021 update

    The December 2021 update

    On December 15, 2021 MOULa got a big update, with lots of interesting additions; a full list is available at the bottom of this post. Let’s go over some highlights and answer some questions that may have arised:

    A new Age

    The most anticipated addition is probably the Age of Tiam, designed by Ametist. As announced by a post on Cyan’s own Twitter channel, an opening ceremony will be held at the Chiso Preniv library on Monday December 20, 2021 at 13:00 KIT: there will be a short presentation and the new linking book will be made available.

    Tiam is an Age that was created for a family to relax and enjoy the fresh air and sunshine; there, you will be able to unlock and discover how this family spent their time there. To get there, the direction is going to the Nexus, then the Watcher’ Pub, then to Chiso Preniv using the book in an alcove.

    It will be a good idea to have the client fully updated before the ceremony; to do so, one way is to open the game’s folder and delete TOS.txt; this will enforce a re-check of all the game files.

    New clothing

    Next, if you visit your wardrobe you will find some new items have been added, including some that have been available in the offline game for years. Some of the additions are rewards for completing the Journeys, while others require visiting logically related places 😉

    A special note about the second backpack: it was enabled by accident, as it has a visual bug that was still being worked on; if you have it and lost the old one, you can re-acquire it where you first got it.

    Serene

    The snowfall is back, and an indigenous ‘person’ has appeared for the holiday season 🙂 Both are original to Andy Legate’s design: the snowfall (a type of particle system) could not be handled by the Guild of Writers’ Age building tool Korman until recently, and the ‘indigenous’ was hidden in the Age files.

    A bit of code makes the latter appear automatically in the PotS version, but on MOULa the code interferes with multiplay and can have the opposite effect of hiding it, so the code was disabled.

    A journal that actually gives some background about the Age has replaced the previous one, hidden somewhere close to the gazebo.

    Graphics and sound improvements

    The Kirel podium has been given a new recording. More may come in the future! A story book (not a Linking Book) has been added to Chiso Preniv, while the Heritage Document and Activity in the Cavern have been moved to another shelf, close together. Various improvements to textures were made in Baron City Office, Teledahn, K’veer, Chiso Preniv and more.

    A note on bugs

    When an update, especially one as large as this one, hits MOULa it is almost inevitable that unexpected bugs will show up; for all the testing that can be done, Minkata never sees as many concurrent players as the official server, and not all issues can be catched. No addition from Cyan is to be expected for the foreseeable future, apart from server updates, so all improvements and additions will come from fan developers, who dedicate their limited free time to at least try to let MOULa be the best it could potentially be.

    So the best way to deal with bugs is to have patience and report them, mentioning where you were and what you were doing, be it on Cyan’s Discord, OpenUru’s Discord or OpenUru forums. If you fancy contributing your work and/or helping with bug fixing, those places are also excellent starting points to be part of the Restoration Team 🙂

    OpenUru Build #200a Build Update (click to expand)

    Known Issues (that will be fixed in a hotfix):
    – There is a crash when linking to Myst full screen without alt-tabbing while linking.
    – If you wear Catherine’s robes, and then change while another player is in the Age, they will see through your body.
    – Serene Xmas decorations are intermittent
    Client changes:
    – [Fixed]: A lot of under the hood fixes for stability {11}
    – [Fixed]: Fix client audio caching {10}
    – [Fixed]: Fix stack trace popup on error to provide meaningful information {10}
    – [Fixed]: Graphics cleanup for modern graphics cards {11}
    Content changes:
    – [New]: A new age! {1} (Stay tuned for the opening ceremonies!)
    – [New]: Add audio player back to Kirel Auditorium Podium, new recordings {9}
    – [New]: Clothing additions (and updates from CC) {7}
    – [Updated]: Improvements and additions to Chiso Preniv, Guild of Messengers Pub and Veelay Tsahvan {2}
    – [Updated]: Serene journal enhancements {3}
    – [Updated]: SpyRoom updates {5}
    – [Updated]: Upscaled fabric textures in Baron City Office and Teledahn {8}
    – [Fixed]: Ayoheek messages reference Garrison rather than Gahreesen {6}
    – [Fixed]: Er’cana Graphical Fixes {6}
    – [Fixed]: Fix view through telescopes on ultra-wide displays {6}
    – [Fixed]: Graphical updates to K’veer {2}
    – [Fixed]: Improve bad text resolution in Baron City Office Marie note {12}
    – [Fixed]: Prevent Kirel Egg Room Bahro Stones from being active {6}
    – [Fixed]: Repair formatting in many journals and book text {12}
    – [Fixed]: Repair getting stuck in Great Zero Mission GUI {6}
    – [Fixed]: Serene Snowfall Effects {4}
    – [Fixed]: Use correct cover for Negilahn journal {6}
    Attributions:
    {1} Ametist
    {2} Doobes
    {3} Doobes, Dot, CTraveler, Adam{Hoikas}
    {4} Doobes, EhrenCG
    {5} Doobes, Hazado
    {6} Hazado
    {7} Hazado, Adam{Hoikas}, CTraveler, Larry LeDeay
    {8} Hazado, CTraveler, Tweek, Yali
    {9} Hazado, DapperAndy, Tyion, Skyisblu, Neurovac, CP-Dimensions
    {10} Adam {Hoikas}
    {11} Adam {Hoikas}, rarified
    {12} dgelessus

  • December 2021 All Guilds Meeting Summary

    Here is the summary for the 140th All Guilds Meeting, along with the raw and cleansed chatlogs!

    Contents

    1. Events in the Cavern
    2. Door Run Competition
    3. The Fall of D’ni Memorial
    4. Minkata
    5. Cavern Tours
    6. Fan Ages Touring Club
    7. D’ni Language Classes
    8. R’Tayrtahn’s Story Nights
    9. Miscellanea

    Events in the Cavern

    Minasunda announced a few events for the coming festivities:

    • on December 17 at 13:00 KIT there will be a Christmas Show by the Nulp Dance Group, in Serene: to get there, PM “link” to Mir-o-Bot (#32319). The link-in platform will be the stage, so please leave the platform as soon as you arrive. Pictures will be published on Facebook and Discord. Seeker will provide the music stream, that will start at about 12:30 KIT and continue until around 15:00 KIT.
    • on December 18 at 11:30 KIT there will be a Door Run Competition; the meeting point is in Nosi La’s Hood. If you have any questions, you can contact her on Discord (Nosila#5296) or in the Cavern (#9902277).
    • on December 24 at 13:00 KIT there will be a Magic Christmas Show by Yoda, in a surprise location: to get there, PM “link” to Mir-o-Bot. Seeker will provide the music stream.
    • on December 31 at 13:00 KIT there will be a Magic New Year’s Eve Show by Yoda, in Magic Kadish Tolesa: to get there, PM “link” to Mir-o-Bot. The fireworks will start at 16:00 KI! Seeker will provide the music stream, that will start at 12:45:54 KIT and continue until after 18:00 KIT.
    • Like every years, there is an Uru advent calendar: PM “sendme 8833282” to Mir-o-Bot to get a marker game (you will need to have completed the red and green marker missions). With the marker game you can find 24 numbers hidden all around Ae’gura. In each of these numbers there are two YouTube links, one in English and one in German, filmed in MOULa and Deep Island by Minasunda, Mabe and Eternal Seeker.

    Next February will be the 12th anniversary of MOULa. The Nulp Dance Group is already working on a show, but if anyone has ideas for the occasion, let Mina know!

    If you need help with organising an event (not only for the festivities), or just want to spread the word about it, you can join a Discord server, a Facebook group, or you can contact Minasunda via KImail (#5667000).

    Door Run Competition

    PodHopper talked about the Door Run, which will involve teams of 5 players (including the Caller), each running in a different Delin (to avoid bugs). There will also be an oppportunity for teams of 2 if people feel brave enough.

    PodHopper also announced his ‘Spiral Door Simulator’, an online tool for learning the symbols on the Garden Age doors and a training tool for those who want to know how to do a Door Run. It has a help section containing information about the tool itself, as well as information and tips about what to do during a Door Run.

    The simulator combines 2 independent projects: PodHopper’s own about learning how exactly the timing on the Spiral Door works, and Mabe’s Jalak project that led to Mabe’s Rebus event a few months ago. The pictures from Mabe’s Rebus are the reward for opening the Spiral Door in the simulator.

    The Fall of D’ni Memorial

    Christopher Therburg announced his Fall of D’ni Memorial project, to erect a memorial that fits the style of the D’ni City, in a visible location, to honor the D’ni who died at the hands of Veovis and A’gaeris.

    The plan is to place the memorial at the Kings Lookout, between the Palace and the stairs to the Canyon Mall. There will be a few benches, with vases as decorations, and there will also be a book to summarize the events of the Fall of D’ni.

    The Memorial is currently scheduled to be unveiled on the date of the Fall, Leesahn 8, or July 12. Updates will posted on the Beneath IC forums.

    Minkata

    Rarified gave the quarterly update about the open source client and content development. They are coming to the conclusion of the cycle: the upcoming update is intended to emphasize content and fixes; it is a big one that touches existing areas in D’ni as well as something new.

    Testing is still undergoing on the Minkata shard. Almost all of the changes have been assembled; after that, only fixes to the updates will appear on Minkata. A list of fixes and changes is available on the OpenUru forums. The hope is to deliver the updates to Cyan in a couple of weeks; then, after a period on the Cyan beta server for a last check, it will be released to the public.

    This year marks the 10th anniversary of the Minkata shard; Rarified thanked all the volunteers and contributors who over the years have gone through ups, downs, and a lot of strong feelings to get where we are now.

    How to be a tester (click to expand)

    To be a tester, you will need to open an account on the Minkata shard; it is highly recommended to read the Tester’s Guide to understand what is expected. To test the cutting edge additions, you can sign up for the Minkata alpha shard.
    To report bugs, you can post on the OpenUru Discord server (channels #hood or #dev); on Discord you can ask to be added to the Testers role to be notified of testing requests, which sometimes need quick response in terms of hours, not days.

    Cavern Tours

    The Cavern Tour will be held on Saturday 11 at 11:00 KIT, starting from the Cavern Tour’s Hood. The host, Larry LeDeay, will use his Twitch channel for the presentation, so you will need to keep a browser or the app open in the background. Videos will be available for two weeks after the tour. The stream will be simulcasted on Facebook and Youtube.

    The tours occasionally visit hard to reach places. Mir-o-Bot (KI# 32319) is often employed for special effects and long-distance travel (and to avoid stairs). If you arrive late, you can PM Susa’n (KI# 9122427) to join the in-progress tour – but do try to arrive in time!

    Fan Ages Touring Club

    Korov’ev gave a quick update on the Fan Ages Expeditions he is hosting on the Deep Island shard, every Sunday at 11:00 KIT.

    In November they visited the rest of the early Ages made available at the end of 2005: Second Age of Dustin, Kato’s Lab, Setal Gahmarin, Vaiskor Area 1 & 2, Terrati Lab. Then they skated in Pre-Swaltu, explored Tyndior, Prad, the Maze, and outlined the concept behind the Ahra Pahts project. Finally they explored the buildings in Janga, and found their way to its nighttime version, Janga Lela.

    In December, the plan is to explore some more complex Ages, like Jo’nae and Jo’nae Hood, Takla Ma’kan, and uncover the secrets of The Company, in Sonavio. They may even manage to visit the entries of the first Rapid Age Development contest.

    More about the Expeditions (click to expand)
    • The expeditions are streamed (without comments), and the videos will be available for two weeks after. Be careful if you PM Korov’ev, as messages will be visible in the videos 😉
    • After the tour, those who still have the energy are welcome to Korov’ev’s Gahreesehn for some Wall training (send a message to #194197 for an invite).
    • A gallery of fan ages with some details is available on the Writers’ wiki. Setting up a Deep Island client can be a bit tricky in some situations; a quick guide is available in our Troubleshooting section.

    D’ni Language Classes

    R’Tayrtahn gave two announcements, one for the D’ni Language Classes and one for the Story Nights.

    More about the D’ni Language Classes (click to expand)
    • Those who would like to attend the lessons should contact Rehn via PM or KImail (KI# 58324); be sure to include your KI number in the message!
    • The Guild of Instructors’ Hood will be open and public unless a class is in session, currently on Monday–Friday starting at 12:00, 13:00 or 14:00 KIT, and on Wednesday–Friday starting at 20:00, 21:00 or 22:00 KIT, depending on the student’s schedule.
    • Last-minute changes to class times are posted on the left-hand imager in the hood.

    R’Tayrtahn’s Story Nights

    Story Night Europe is starting the bi-annual Bahro Glyph Tour, visiting all the ages that contain bahro glyphs; some have explanations while others just generate more questions. The first part of the Tour will start in Mir-o-Bot’s Hood (#32319). The tour will take three parts until December 18; after that, SNE will be on hiatus until after the holidays, returning on January 8, 2022.

    Original Story Night is continuing with the fan fiction written by Janai, originally posted on the MOUL forums back in 2009. The bi-annual Bahro Glyph Tour will begin on December 18.

    After the Tour, Story Night will restart from the very beginning, the D’ni story of creation. R’Tayrtahn can once again upload recordings of the Nights to his YouTube channel, and is in the process of uploading the backlog of videos from previous sessions. Be careful if you PM r’Tay, as messages will be visible in the videos 😉

    More about the Story Nights (click to expand)
    • Story Nights are held in Tsahno’s Hood every Saturday, gathering at the fountain at around 23:00 KIT, with the story starting at about 23:30 KIT.
    • For Story Nights – Europe, the gatherings are on Saturday starting at 13:30 KIT, with the story starting at about 14:00 KIT. On All Guilds Meeting days, the event will begin at 14:00 KIT or 15 minutes after the end of the AGM, whichever is later.
    • The stories are told using voice chat, so you will need to have your speakers, headphones or KI devices on. If you would like a reminder, please send r’Tayrtahn (KI# 58324) a KImail with your KI number included in the text, so that he can add you to his buddies list.
    • Last-minute changes to Story Night times are posted on the left-hand imager in the hood.
    • Recording of the Stories are available on r’Tayrtahn’s YouTube channel; however some hardware issues are preventing r’Tayrtahn from uploading the latest episodes.

    Miscellanea

    • A new IC forums for story progression – in the vein of the DRC forums – opened, hosted by Tweek’s Beneath website.
    • Cyan has new items in its store, including notebooks that look like the Myst, Haven, and Spire books. Note that at the time of this writing they already sold out, but they will likely come back at some point.
    • Mysterium’s second Creative Prompt is “Gift Giving”: it can be related to one of the season’s holidays, or just gifts in general; gifts do not even have to be positive ones. The deadline for this prompt is New Year’s Eve, December 31 at 21:00 KIT.
    • Another round of D’ni words will be released this month for Lexember, on Cyan’s Twitter.
    • December 10 is the anniversary of the discovery of the Lost Book of Birenni; the 11 is the anniversary of the Minkata Shard; the 22 is the anniversary of Starry Expanse, now an official Cyan project.

    And that was it for this month. Please consider donating to keep the Cavern open!

    November ended with the CavFunding at 163% (CavCon 4.6) and the reserve at 395%, with no extra expenses. Population was at 42,550 (⇑277), with 1185 unique visits. A very good month with a fan update on the horizon!

    The next All Guilds Meeting is planned for Saturday, January 8 (Leevosahn 6) at 13:00 KIT.

    The role of Moderator is currently vacant; if anyone would like to take the role, it is your chance to step up 😉

    Until then!

  • November 2021 All Guilds Meeting Summary

    Here is the summary for November’s Meeting, along with the raw and cleansed chatlogs!

    Contents

    1. Fan Ages Touring Club
    2. Mysterium news
    3. Deep City Lecture
    4. D’ni Language Classes
    5. R’Tayrtahn’s Story Nights
    6. The Waterlogged Relto Book
    7. Minkata
    8. Miscellanea

    Fan Ages Touring Club

    Korov’ev gave a quick update on the Fan Ages Expeditions he is hosting on the Deep Island shard, every Sunday at 11:00 KIT.

    In October they started a new cycle, visiting the very first ages (at least those still around) released in 2005: First Age of Dustin, Eder Rilteh Inaltahv, Galamay, Atlantis Outpost, Niveerah.

    In November, the plan is to visit more of these early ages, then Pre-Swaltu, Janga, and outline the concept behind Ahra Pahts.

    More about the Expeditions (click to expand)
    • The expeditions are streamed (without comments), and the videos will be available for two weeks after.
    • After the tour, those who still have the energy are welcome to Korov’ev’s Gahreesehn for some Wall training (send a message to #194197 for an invite).
    • A gallery of fan ages with some details is available on the Writers’ wiki. Setting up a Deep Island client can be a bit tricky in some situations; a quick guide is available in our Troubleshooting section.

    Mysterium News

    Event submissions are now open: T-shirt designs until February 20, Events until May 22, Writing & Artworks until July 31. There will not be Pins submissions, because the Committee still has those submitted for 2020 and will use those.

    They also launched a new section in the Mysterium Discord server called Creativity Prompts: periodically they will post a topic and invite everyone to submit any creative works you can come up with. Music, fanfics, costume designs, etc. are all welcome.

    The only requirements are that it must incorporate the posted topic, and somehow be related to Cyan’s games (including Obduction, and Cyan Ventures like Zed).

    The inaugural topic is Giving Thanks – not necessarily related to Thanksgiving, any expression of gratitude fits the requirements. The deadline for this Prompt is November 30 at 21:00 KIT.

    Deep City Lecture

    Former ResEng G.Buddell announced a lecture he and J.D. Barnes will hold on Sunday 7 at 15:00 KIT, to share with the Community some new historical information they have found combing through the DRC archives, about the Mee-Dis War.

    The lecture will be streamed on Twitch and on CyanChat, and will be uploaded to the Guild of Archivists’ YouTube channel at a later time. They plan to hold a lecture every couple of weeks, taking a break in December to help with Lexember.

    D’ni Language Classes

    R’Tayrtahn gave two announcements, one for the D’ni Language Classes and one for the Story Nights. There are now three more instructors in the Guild of Instructors: shokhootahn Ana, shokhootahn Jo, and shokhootahn phoenixRisen.

    More about the D’ni Language Classes (click to expand)
    • Those who would like to attend the lessons should contact Rehn via PM or KImail (KI# 58324); be sure to include your KI number in the message!
    • The Guild of Instructors’ Hood will be open and public unless a class is in session, currently on Monday–Friday starting at 12:00, 13:00 or 14:00 KIT, and on Wednesday–Friday starting at 20:00, 21:00 or 22:00 KIT, depending on the student’s schedule.
    • Last-minute changes to class times are posted on the left-hand imager in the hood.

    R’Tayrtahn’s Story Nights

    Story Night has started a special, five-part story of fan fiction written by Janai. After the Meeting, Story Night Europe began chapter 3, while Original Story Night began chapter 1.

    Then it will be time for the bi-annual Bahro Glyph Tour, visiting all the ages that contain bahro glyphs; some have explanations while others just generate more questions.

    After that, the Stories will restart from the very beginning, the D’ni story of creation.

    More about the Story Nights (click to expand)
    • Story Nights are held in Tsahno’s Hood every Saturday, gathering at the fountain at around 23:00 KIT, with the story starting at about 23:30 KIT.
    • For Story Nights – Europe, the gatherings are on Saturday starting at 13:30 KIT, with the story starting at about 14:00 KIT. On All Guilds Meeting days, the event will begin at 14:00 KIT or 15 minutes after the end of the AGM, whichever is later.
    • The stories are told using voice chat, so you will need to have your speakers, headphones or KI devices on. If you would like a reminder, please send r’Tayrtahn (KI# 58324) a KImail with your KI number included in the text, so that he can add you to his buddies list.
    • Last-minute changes to Story Night times are posted on the left-hand imager in the hood.
    • Recording of the Stories are available on r’Tayrtahn’s YouTube channel; however some hardware issues are preventing r’Tayrtahn from uploading the latest episodes.

    The Waterlogged Relto Book

    Calum Traveler gave an update on the saga of the waterlogged Relto book, found mangled by the Docks in late October. The book belonged to an explorer named Wayne Todd, who went ‘camping’ in an industrial area of the Cavern. He is fine, but did not tell anyone where he was going.

    Wayne discovered a facility that appears to be part of one of the D’ni’s ‘safety measures’ to prevent spikes of overfeeding the lake. The feasibility of restoring this particular facility to functionality is currently being debated.

    It was also confirmed that lake water samples taken at the area are matching the composition found at the Docks and elsewhere: oxygen and carbon dioxide levels are becoming more consistent, and the lake algae are definitely beginning to glow in sync.

    Tis means that the lake light may begin to cycle again quite soon, possibly around December or January, if explorers continue feeding the lake as consistently as they have been.

    Minkata

    Rarified gave an update about the OpenUru testing shards. Between bug fixes, client improvements and fan ages testing, they will probably release the next set of changes on MOULa in late November or mid December.

    A lot of work is still in the pipeline; during the next month, they will need as many visitors as possible on Minkata to help make sure things are safe for release.

    The KI bug is next on the list of bugs being worked on from Cyan’s end, but that too appears to be difficult to debug.

    How to be a tester (click to expand)

    To be a tester, you will need to open an account on the Minkata shard; it is highly recommended to read the Tester’s Guide to understand what is expected. To test the cutting edge additions, you can sign up for the Minkata alpha shard.
    To report bugs, you can post on the OpenUru Discord server (channels #hood or #dev); on Discord you can ask to be added to the Testers role to be notified of testing requests, which sometimes need quick response in terms of hours, not days.

    Miscellanea

    • A new IC forums for story progression, in the vein of the DRC forums, opened; it is hosted by Tweek’s Beneath website.
    • Forecast says Serene will be getting its snowfall again, likely by December.
    • November 11 is the Third Feast of the Maker, and the anniversary of Uru ABM; the 17 is
    • the anniversary of Prologue; the 22 is the anniversary of the coronation of King Kerath.

    And that was it for this month. Please consider donating to keep the Cavern open!

    October ended with the CavFunding at 107% (CavCon 4.1) and the reserve at 346%, with no extra expenses. Population was at 42,273 (⇑284), with 1142 unique visits. Donations are back to normal.

    The next All Guilds Meeting is planned for Saturday, December 4 (Leevobro 7) at 13:00 KIT.

    Until then!

  • October 2021 All Guilds Meeting Summary

    Here is the summary for October’s Meeting, along with the raw and cleansed chatlogs!

    Contents

    1. Events in the Cavern
    2. Lake pellets
    3. Net2 errors
    4. From the Surface to D’ni
    5. Fan Ages Touring Club
    6. D’ni Language Classes
    7. R’Tayrtahn’s Story Nights
    8. Mysterium news

    Events in the Cavern

    Minasunda announced two upcoming events:

    • on Friday 8 at 13:00 KIT Karel will host a party onboard the Argosy, a beautiful ship built by Jaruku; sea shanties will be played on the music stream. The party will be held on the Deep Island shard; to get to Argosy, use the “Puzzle Ages Volume II” book in your Relto and link to Laki’anay. From the link-in point, take the ferry then head to the lighthouse, where you will find the linking book. You can find a video guide here.
    • On October 31 at 14:00 KIT there will be a Halloween Party, in Mir-o-Bot’s Teledahn. To get there, PM “to teledahn” or “link” to Mir-o-Bot (#32319). As this year Halloween is on a Sunday, Radio Free D’ni will take over the music stream. Yoda will provide the creepy ambience with his special effects and the Nulp Dance Group will conjure the ghosts!

    Additionally, the Cavern Tour will as usual be held on Saturday 9 at 11:00 KIT, starting from the Cavern Tour’s Hood. The host, Larry LeDeay, will use his Twitch channel for the presentation, so you will need to keep a browser or the app open in the background. The stream will be simulcasted on Facebook and Youtube.

    Lake pellets

    Calum Traveler first asked age builders to test new ages on dedicated shards like Destiny or Minkata Alpha.

    Next, he mentioned that tests are being held to restart the Cavern lake light cycle. Time to warm up the Er’cana factory ovens! If you plan to contribute pellets, keep in mind that consistency if preferable over quantity.

    Net2 errors

    Rarified gave an update about the “Net2 error” crashes. A possible fix has been found (there was a transcription error in some code that was adopted from H’uru during the last update). If the testing goes well, it will be handed to Chogon for testing on Staging and ultimately on MOULa.

    The Net2 error is particularly insidious to debug, because it originates from the server software; fan shards, including Minkata, use alternatives (MOSS or DirtSand) where the problem does not show up, and only the live MOULa server has a population sizable enough to produce mega-neighborhoods.

    The next scheduled MOULa update will happen late November or early December and will focus on (a lot of) fan content.

    How to be a tester (click to expand)

    To be a tester, you will need to open an account on the Minkata shard; it is highly recommended to read the Tester’s Guide to understand what is expected. To test the cutting edge additions, you can sign up for the Minkata alpha shard.
    To report bugs, you can post on the OpenUru Discord server (channels #hood or #dev); on Discord you can ask to be added to the Testers role to be notified of testing requests, which sometimes need quick response in terms of hours, not days.

    From the Surface to D’ni

    Doobes announced that Descent is nearing the Phase 1 final checks, and Phase 2 will start soon. Once they will be sure the content from Myst V is properly converted, they will start building the rest of the path to D’ni.

    All interested age builders are welcome to help with the process, assembling a section of the path that lies past Descent. Calum Traveler already submitted a section between the caldera and the first cave, to make the first locations fit better under the volcano.

    Once Phase 2 nears completion, the results will be hosted on Minkata Alpha so that testers can examine and pick it apart. After that will come phase 3, wiring everything so that the entire path will be navigable without spawning.

    To keep updated on Doobes’ work, check his blog and his Facebook page.

    Fan Ages Touring Club

    Korov’ev gave a quick update on the Fan Ages Expeditions he is hosting on the Deep Island shard, every Sunday at 11:00 KIT.

    Recently, they explored Kohdalan and Tyldalan, by Corvus, Wodan, Itep Edor and other creators; the rest of the month they took the Path of the Lost Ages, by Melvin, starting in Palamary bay.

    In October, they will investigate the mysteries of Alabaster’s Depths, by Dulcamara. After that, the main plan is to start again from the very beginning, a few ages from 2005, but they may also dedicate a few weeks to the most popular ones, either guided or free-for-all.

    More about the Expeditions (click to expand)
    • After the expeditions, the participants will be able to share their observations in dedicated threads in the Guild of Writers’ forums (listed in the index). The expeditions are streamed (without comments), and the videos will be available for two weeks after.
    • After the tour, those who still have the energy are welcome to Korov’ev’s Gahreesehn for some Wall training (send a message to #194197 for an invite).
    • A gallery of fan ages with some details is available on the Writers’ wiki. Setting up a Deep Island client can be a bit tricky in some situations; a quick guide is available in our Troubleshooting section.

    D’ni Language Classes

    R’Tayrtahn gave two announcements, one for the D’ni Language Classes and one for the Story Nights. Students are taking the classes at various stages of completion.

    More about the D’ni Language Classes (click to expand)
    • Those who would like to attend the lessons should contact Rehn via PM or KImail (KI# 58324); be sure to include your KI number in the message!
    • The Guild of Instructors’ Hood will be open and public unless a class is in session, currently on Monday–Friday starting at 12:00, 13:00 or 14:00 KIT, and on Wednesday–Friday starting at 20:00, 21:00 or 22:00 KIT, depending on the student’s schedule.
    • Last-minute changes to class times are posted on the left-hand imager in the hood.

    R’Tayrtahn’s Story Nights

    Story Night has started the stories of the Restoration. After that, there will be a special, five-part story of fan fiction written by Janai, planned to start on October 23; r’Tayrtahn will be assisted by Axenna.

    Then it will be time for the bi-annual Bahro Glyph Tour, visiting all the ages that contain bahro glyphs; some have explanations while others just generate more questions.

    After that, the Stories will restart from the very beginning, the D’ni story of creation.

    More about the Story Nights (click to expand)
    • Story Nights are held in Tsahno’s Hood every Saturday, gathering at the fountain at around 23:00 KIT, with the story starting at about 23:30 KIT.
    • For Story Nights – Europe, the gatherings are on Saturday starting at 13:30 KIT, with the story starting at about 14:00 KIT. On All Guilds Meeting days, the event will begin at 14:00 KIT or 15 minutes after the end of the AGM, whichever is later.
    • The stories are told using voice chat, so you will need to have your speakers, headphones or KI devices on. If you would like a reminder, please send r’Tayrtahn (KI# 58324) a KImail with your KI number included in the text, so that he can add you to his buddies list.
    • Last-minute changes to Story Night times are posted on the left-hand imager in the hood.
    • Recording of the Stories are available on r’Tayrtahn’s YouTube channel; however some hardware issues are preventing r’Tayrtahn from uploading the latest episodes.

    Mysterium news

    The date for the XXIII Mysterium in Denver will be August 12–14, 2022. The theme will be Myst III: Exile, celebrating its 21st birthday, with a particular emphasis on Voltaic.

    Submissions for t-shirt designs are open. Favoured design will be those incorporating Blucifer, Denver International Airport’s demon horse sculpture.

    No announcements are expected at the moment about Starry Expanse. All we know is that the project has not been cancelled.

    Rand’s Let’s play was really popular, hopefully he will be up for something similar, along with Robyn. The committee will look into hybrid events held both in-person and online; panels in the future will have short breaks between them.

    And that was it for this month. Please consider donating to keep the Cavern open!

    September ended with the CavFunding at 58% (CavCon 2.6) and the reserve at 330%, with 24% extra expenses. Population was at 41,989 (⇑340), with 1284 unique visits. Donations were down but reserves are still healthy; the extra expenses were due to the Net2 errors/backend crashes.

    The next All Guilds Meeting is planned for Saturday, November 6 (Leevofo 14) at 13:00 KIT.

    Until then!

  • September 2021 All Guilds Meeting Summary

    Here is the summary for September’s Meeting, along with the raw and cleansed chatlogs!

    A new moderator has not been found yet, so this time the meeting had a more anarchic format – and given the Net2 error situation (see below), it was the only way to get the announcements across 🙂

    Contents

      1. Cavern Tours
      2. Net2 errors, and Korman
      3. OpenUru
      4. D’ni Language Classes
      5. R’Tayrtahn’s Story Nights
      6. Fan Ages Touring Club
      7. Cyan news

    Cavern Tours

    The Cavern Tour will be held on Saturday 11 at 11:00 KIT, starting from the Cavern Tour’s Hood.The host, Larry LeDeay, will use his Twitch channel for the presentation, so you will need to keep a browser or the app open in the background. Videos will be available for two weeks after the tour. The stream will be simulcasted on Facebook and Youtube. Due to the Net2 crashes issue, Mir-o-Bot may not be online, and the tour itself may be held entirely on Twitch.

    The tours occasionally visit hard to reach places. Mir-o-Bot (KI# 32319) is employed for special effects and long-distance travel (and to avoid stairs). If you arrive late, you can PM Susa’n (KI# 9122427) to join the in-progress tour – but do try to arrive in time!

    Net2 errors, and Korman

    Doobes explained what is going on with the “Net2 error” crashes. They did not come up on the staging server because it does not have nearly the population that the main MOULa server does. The problem appears to be on the server side, which can only be fixed by Cyan, and is likely related to neighborhoods with too many members. In particular, DRC (67) Bevin has around 1000 members, and anyone in that hood is highly advised to move to a different one. In the meantime, this could be a good time to explore some of the fan maintained shards 😉

    He also announced the release of Korman 0.12a, the age building tool by the Guild of Writers. This iteration adds goodies like grass shaders and random sound mods to the mix, as well as a ton of lighting fixes. It also introduces a self-contained platform called Blender for Korman.

    Lastly, Doobes announced that Descent is nearing the Phase 1 final checks and will be uploaded in a Github repository soon. Descent is going through a phase system a bit different from the DRC scale, with 1 being “Near identical to Myst V” and 5 being “Final Release for MOULa”.

    To keep updated on Doobes’ work, check his blog and his Facebook page.

    OpenUru

    Rarified announced, after the Q3 update that focused on QoL fixes, the Q4 update for MOULa will focus on fan content, and a lot is planned for it.

    How to be a tester (click to expand)

    To be a tester, you will need to open an account on the Minkata shard; it is highly recommended to read the Tester’s Guide to understand what is expected. To test the cutting edge additions, you can sign up for the Minkata alpha shard.
    To report bugs, you can post on the OpenUru forum or the Discord server (channels #hood or #dev); on Discord you can ask to be added to the @testers role to be notified of testing requests, which sometimes need quick response in terms of hours, not days.

    D’ni Language Classes

    Shokhootahn Rehn gave two announcements, one for the D’ni Language Classes and one for the Story Nights. Six students are taking the classes at various stages of completion.

    More about the D’ni Language Classes (click to expand)
    • Those who would like to attend the lessons should contact Rehn via PM or KImail (KI# 58324); be sure to include your KI number in the message!
    • The Guild of Instructors’ Hood will be open and public unless a class is in session, currently on Monday–Friday starting at 12:00, 13:00 or 14:00 KIT, and on Wednesday–Friday starting at 20:00, 21:00 or 22:00 KIT, depending on the student’s schedule.
    • Last-minute changes to class times are posted on the left-hand imager in the hood.

    R’Tayrtahn’s Story Nights

    Story Night has started the stories of the Restoration. After that, there will be a special, five-part story of fan fiction written by Janai; for that, r’Tayrtahn will be assisted by Axenna. After that will be the bi-annual Bahro Glyph Tour, visiting all the ages that contain bahro glyphs; some have explanations while others just generate more questions. After that, the Stories will restart from the very beginning, the D’ni story of creation.

    More about the Story Nights (click to expand)
    • Story Nights are held in Tsahno’s Hood every Saturday, gathering at the fountain at around 23:00 KIT, with the story starting at about 23:30 KIT.
    • For Story Nights – Europe, the gatherings are on Saturday starting at 13:30 KIT, with the story starting at about 14:00 KIT. On All Guilds Meeting days, the event will begin at 14:00 KIT or 15 minutes after the end of the AGM, whichever is later.
    • The stories are told using voice chat, so you will need to have your speakers, headphones or KI devices on. If you would like a reminder, please send r’Tayrtahn (KI# 58324) a KImail with your KI number included in the text, so that he can add you to his buddies list.
    • Last-minute changes to Story Night times are posted on the left-hand imager in the hood.
    • Recording of the Stories are available on r’Tayrtahn’s YouTube channel; however some hardware issues are preventing r’Tayrtahn from uploading the latest episodes.

    Fan Ages Touring Club

    Korov’ev gave a quick update on the Fan Ages Expeditions he is hosting on the Deep Island shard, every Sunday at 11:00 KIT.

    Recently, they explored two ages by by Jhon J. Jaguar, Tentsahveet and the recently released Edereden; then two ages by Semjay, Terahgrahm and Zahlto. Lastly they started Koh-dalan, by Corvus, Wodan, Itep Edor and other creators.

    For September, the plan is to finish Koh-dalan; then they will begin the Path of the Lost Ages by Melvin, starting in Palamary bay.

    More about the Expeditions (click to expand)
    • After the expeditions, the participants will be able to share their observations in dedicated threads in the Guild of Writers’ forums (listed in the index). The expeditions are streamed (without comments), and the videos will be available for two weeks after.
    • After the tour, those who still have the energy are welcome to Korov’ev’s Gahreesehn for some Wall training (send a message to #194197 for an invite).
    • A gallery of fan ages with some details is available on the Writers’ wiki. Setting up a Deep Island client can be a bit tricky in some situations; a quick guide is available in our Troubleshooting section.

    Cyan news

    The release of the new Myst for PC/VR was mentioned, which recently got a patch that, among many fixes, officially gives the option to use the old FMV animations (except for the ending, where it was not possible).

    The original game’s 28th anniversary is also near, on Friday 24.

    And that was it for this month. Please consider donating to keep the Cavern open!

    August ended with the CavFunding at 102% (CavCon 4.0) and the reserve at 377%, with no extra expenses. Population was at 41,649 (⇑487), with 1382 unique visits. Another good month of donations with an increase in new accounts, all despite persistent server crashes that started after the last update. Top MOULa devs are hunting for this elusive bug!

    The next All Guilds Meeting is planned for Saturday, October 2 (Leevot 15) at 13:00 KIT.

    Until then!

  • MOULa update OpenUru#195b

    A new update for MOULa was released on Wednesday 18, with numerous fixes and improvements. Thanks to all the fans that helped create, build and test this update!

    Client changes:

    • Accelerate linking to ’hoods (especially with large memberships) {1}
    • Add taskbar loading indicator (Win7 and up) {2}
    • Allow numlock to function normally {8}
    • Eliminate some client pauses (waiting on a network message) {2}
    • Fix aspect ratio on avatar portraits taken in Relto closet {9}
    • Fixed incorrect avatar placement when exiting Gahreesen gear {2}
    • Flash for attention when paged & client not in foreground {7}
    • Highlight mentions of your name in chat {7}
    • Improved experience with some elevators & chairs (subworlds) {2}
    • Release Notes no longer require magnifying glass {1}
    • Unlocked the frame rate for silky smooth animation {2}
    • Improved introductory video with better sound synchronization {10}
    • Fix race condition resulting in missing Er’cana and Ahnonay linking books {1}

    Server changes:

    • A fix to stop adding new explorers to an already overcrowded neighborhood. This does not fix the ones that are already overcrowded. {11}

    Content changes:

    • [Added]: Add red butterflies to [redacted] {6}
    • [Fixed]: Bahro stone dimensions and hotspots {5}
    • [Added]: Double-sided pages for Relto book (less page-flipping) {4}
    • [Fixed]: Improved experience with elevator in Kadish Tolesa {4}
    • [Fixed]: Improved graphic for the GZ Pride shirt {3}
    • [Fixed]: Improved multiplayer experience with Er’cana Harvester {1}
    • [Fixed]: Sound effects for neighborhood fire marbles {1}

    Attributions:

    • {1} Adam {Hoikas} Johnson
    • {2} Adam {Hoikas} Johnson & Marten
    • {3} dpogue & Adam {Hoikas} Johnson
    • {4} Hazado
    • {5} Hazado & CalumTraveler
    • {6} Hazado & Sirius
    • {7} Mystler, Adam {Hoikas} Johnson & Marten
    • {8} Zrax & Marten
    • {9} johnsojc & Marten
    • {10} rarified
    • {11} Chogon

  • August 2021 All Guilds Meeting Summary

    Here is the summary for August’s Meeting, along with the raw and cleansed chatlogs!

    Thanks to Chogon who restarted the servers, on his day off too, to let the Meeting continue after a crash.

    Contents

    1. Events in the Cavern
    2. Cavern Tours
    3. A new era in D’ni
    4. OpenUru
    5. Fan Ages Touring Club
    6. D’ni Language Classes
    7. R’Tayrtahn’s Story Nights
    8. Mysterium news
    9. Moderation duties

    Events in the Cavern

    Minasunda announced two upcoming events: the first is a Caribbean Night on Friday 13 at 13:00 KIT, with hot music and cool (virtual) drinks, in Mir-o-Bot’s Eder Gira (PM “to gira” to him, KI# 32319). Eternal Seeker will provide some music.

    The second event is the D’ni Day of Dancing on September 3 at 13:00 KIT, in Mir-o-Bot’s Teledahn (PM “to teledahn” to him). Eternal Seeker will again stream some music. The first part of the event will be a show by the Nulp Dance Group, the second part will be dance for everyone.

    Mir-o-Bot will use his choreographing magic to make multiple avatars dance; if you do not want to be part of the dance, PM “ignoreme” to him, but note that this will apply to all the bot’s commands; there is also no automatic un-ingnore function, you will need to ask Mirphak or Minasunda.

    If you have an idea for an event and need help organising it, there is a Discord server, a Facebook group, or you can contact Minasunda via KImail (#5667000).

    Cavern Tours

    The Cavern Tour will be held on Saturday 14 at 11:00 KIT, starting from the Cavern Tour’s Hood; new info will be shared at this tour! The host, Larry LeDeay, will use his Twitch channel for the presentation, so you will need to keep a browser or the app open in the background. Videos will be available for two weeks after the tour. The stream will be simulcasted on Facebook and Youtube.

    The tours occasionally visit hard to reach places. Mir-o-Bot (KI# 32319) is employed for special effects and long-distance travel (and to avoid stairs). If you arrive late, you can PM Susa’n (KI# 9122427) to join the in-progress tour – but do try to arrive in time!

    A new era in D’ni

    Doobes gave an update on the status of Descent, which he is restoring and improving for MOULa. Thanks to a few more additions and fixes from Sirius to the ZLZ Age Importer, he was able to reimport Myst V’s version with more usable animations, which will save considerable time with the animations. Using the DRC phases as model, this is the current plan:

    • Phase 1: preliminary conversion of the old content (e.g. Myst V’s versions of Descent, the most ‘complete’ available for easy conversion.
    • Phase 2: once the content is fully converted, changes, adjustments, and additions are made to help bring things more in line with canon as well as add new features, including content from the Intangibles (in Descent’s case, the best elements from the Dirt demo, the Uru version, and the Myst V one).
      • This phase is also open to suggestions for not-too-intrusive explorer content, to get the community more involved and to show the Shaft as being well-traveled and with a strong explorer presence.
    • Phase 3: wiring. This is going to be tricky as Myst V’s Descent has not been wired for multiplayer before; the hope is that the whole thing can be solvable either alone or together.
    • Phase 4: testing. This is when things are good enough for proper testing on the Minkata alpha shard (see next section for more info); arguably the most important phase, as most if not all the bugs and inconsistencies need to be catched before it is sent for inclusion on MOULa.
      • There will likely be an open call for any and all testers who want to go through the entirety of the new Descent to see and break things if they can, so they can be fixed properly; if Cyan sends any request for changes, then those will need to be rechecked once implemented.
    • Phase 5: release on MOULa opening the path to D’ni to the general public!

    No deadline can be given, as this project will require all the care and regard it needs. Depending on how much lore and modeling work will be required, the path may need to be opened in stages, starting with a little more than the distance down the path as in Myst V, then gradually more and more until one can take the full path down from the surface.

    Direbo will also show up, but without the bahro bubbles, just a rest age; there will also be less ‘rest areas’ (eder tomahn-tee), as those in Myst V were only added for gameplay purposes. An alternative mechanism will be worked on to save progress along the trip.

    To keep updated on Doobes’ work, check his blog and his Facebook page.

    OpenUru

    Rarified announced, in the spirit of adhering to a schedule of quarterly updates to send to MOULa and Cyan, that they just completed work on the August update, with a great deal of help from Marten, Adam and other contributors and testers. A non-exhaustive list of fixes in the works is available here. The current plan is to put together the parts to deliver to Cyan’s Staging shard, where they should be given a week of exposure before the final move to MOULa.

    Some new visitors to Minkata have remarked on the improvements they have noticed, both to the client as well as specific locations. Community involvement has grown greatly in the past year, with different skills and talents coming together to produce content and fixes for the upcoming release. Testing does not guarantee every release is perfect, but ensures that all the major bugs get catched.

    How to be a tester (click to expand)

    To be a tester, you will need to open an account on the Minkata shard; it is highly recommended to read the Tester’s Guide to understand what is expected. To test the cutting edge additions, you can sign up for the Minkata alpha shard.
    To report bugs, you can post on the OpenUru forum or the Discord server (channels #hood or #dev); on Discord you can ask to be added to the @testers role to be notified of testing requests, which sometimes need quick response in terms of hours, not days.

    Fan Ages Touring Club

    Korov’ev gave a quick update on the Fan Ages Expeditions he is hosting on the Deep Island shard, every Sunday at 11:00 KIT. Recently, they finished Alabaster by Dulcamara, explored Laki’anay (and connected ages) by the New Age Project, and began working on Tentsahveet by Jhon J. Jaguar.

    For August, the plan is to finish Tentsahveet. JJJ just released Edereden, the last age in his series; Korov’ev suggested to wait at least until it is released for offline play before holding an expedition there. Next, they will visit two ages by Semjay, Terahgrahm and Zahlto, to find out what souvenir shop owner Ella Darrington is up to; then either this month or the next they will begin the Path of the Lost Ages by Melvin, starting in Palamary bay.

    More about the Expeditions (click to expand)
    • After the expeditions, the participants will be able to share their observations in dedicated threads in the Guild of Writers’ forums (listed in the index). The expeditions are streamed (without comments), and the videos will be available for two weeks after.
    • After the tour, those who still have the energy are welcome to Korov’ev’s Gahreesehn for some Wall training (send a message to #194197 for an invite).
    • A gallery of fan ages with some details is available on the Writers’ wiki. Setting up a Deep Island client can be a bit tricky in some situations; a quick guide is available in our Troubleshooting section.

    D’ni Language Classes

    Shokhootahn Jo gave two announcements on behalf of shokhootahn Rehn, one for the D’ni Language Classes and one for the Story Nights. There have been a number of graduations of late; shokhootahn Rehn would like to personally acknowledge the graduates at the September All Guilds Meeting.

    More about the D’ni Language Classes (click to expand)
    • Those who would like to attend the lessons should contact Rehn via PM or KImail (KI# 58324); be sure to include your KI number in the message!
    • The Guild of Instructors’ Hood will be open and public unless a class is in session, currently on Monday–Friday starting at 12:00, 13:00 or 14:00 KIT, depending on the student’s schedule.
    • Last-minute changes to class times are posted on the left-hand imager in the hood.

    R’Tayrtahn’s Story Nights

    Story Night will soon begin the stories of the first Restoration. These will last for several weeks, followed by Myst V, then the second Restoration, the diaspora and the reopening.

    More about the Story Nights (click to expand)
    • Story Nights are held in Tsahno’s Hood every Saturday, gathering at the fountain at around 23:00 KIT, with the story starting at about 23:30 KIT.
    • For Story Nights – Europe, the gatherings are on Saturday starting at 13:30 KIT, with the story starting at about 14:00 KIT. On All Guilds Meeting days, the event will begin at 14:00 KIT or 30 minutes after the end of the AGM, whichever is later.
    • The stories are told using voice chat, so you will need to have your speakers, headphones or KI devices on. If you would like a reminder, please send r’Tayrtahn (KI# 58324) a KImail with your KI number included in the text, so that he can add you to his buddies list.
    • Last-minute changes to Story Night times are posted on the left-hand imager in the hood.
    • Recording of the Stories are available on r’Tayrtahn’s YouTube channel.

    Mysterium news

    Korov’ev reported some quick news about the convention:

    • the location for next year is Denver, precise dates are still to be decided;
    • some t-shirts are still available until August 15 on the convention store;
    • those who registered should receive a survey in the next few days, which will be useful to plan the next convention;
    • more volunteers are always welcome by the Committee, if there’s something you’d like to help with, please contact them.

    Moderation duties

    Korov’ev closed the meeting by announcing he is stepping down from moderating the AGM. He has been moderator for 5.5 years, reputedly longer than his predecessors; he feels the time has come to pass the torch, and let someone else take the responsability. The next moderator has not been definitely picked yet, so if you feel up to it, this is your chance!

    And that was it for this month. Please consider donating to keep the Cavern open!

    July ended with the CavFunding at 197% (CavCon 4.10) and the reserve at 377%, with no extra expenses. Population was at 41,162 (⇑260), with 1334 unique visits. Another great month, with a big donation along the normal ones, and fan devs working hard!

    The next All Guilds Meeting is planned for Saturday, September 4 (Leetahr 22) at 13:00 KIT.

    Until then!

  • Gehn.28 Is Now Live!

    Gehn.28 Is Now Live!

    A few days after the 10th anniversary of H’uru/Plasma, the Guild of Writers H’uru team has released the latest version of the Gehn shard with Gehn.28!

    This update was a long time in the making, and as such there are a host of new fixes and additions, including:

    • Add /roll command for rolling n-sided die/dice
    • Add latest revisions of all fan Ages from Doobes
    • Allow KI commands to match player names without regard to case
    • Change out most of the guts
    • Fix /p KI command to not be case sensitive
    • Fix Er’cana harvester position issues if Age empties while in motion
    • Fix issue whereby the bahro would fill the server error log with nonsense if they were smoking in Relto
    • Fix many goofy colliders in several Ages, especially Ae’gura
    • Fix many memory leaks
    • Fix Neighborhood clock globe animation
    • Fix Relto hut dark mode
    • Fix remote players not placing hand on book before linking out
    • Fix shroomie gate state being toggled (on re-link) if the power is off
    • Fix spurious noises in the Teledahn workroom
    • Fix working line obliteration issue when accessing chat history
    • Improved output of some KI commands
    • Migrate to publicly auditable build process
    • Update from PhysX 2.6 to PhysX 4.1
    • Update from Python 2.7 to Python 3.9
    • Synthesize gravity

    To get the latest version of Gehn Shard, simply log in to the shard as normal and the client will do the rest. If you have not signed up for Gehn Shard yet, you can find step by step instructions for Gehn in our guide to installing the shards.

    Congratulations to the GoW for another successful release!

  • Reflecting on 10 Years of Open-Source Uru

    It was 10 years ago today that Cyan unexpectedly released the source code for the Uru game engine client and related development tools. I recall thinking it was inconvenient timing, because I was less than a month away from being finished with school, but right in the middle of final projects and exams when the source was released. It’s funny looking back at all the excitement – and politics – and seeing where it led to.

    A lot changes over the course of 10 years. Sometimes a lot stays the same too. Our group of developers has seen people come and go over the years, and I’m incredibly grateful to get to work alongside many of these people — in some cases for over 15 years developing tools and Uru-related projects long before the engine codebase itself was released. It’s not an understatement to say that Uru is directly responsible for my becoming a software developer, and I owe a lot to these folks who patiently explained concepts and patterns to self-taught younger me.

    A lot changes in a codebase over the course of 10 years too, and that’s what I want to focus on today.

    There have been almost 700 pull requests merged to the Plasma project since we mirrored the original source code on GitHub. Some of the highlights include:

    • Replacing the Visual Studio 2003 project files with the CMake build system, which allows building on multiple platforms with various compilers and IDEs.
    • Updating the physics engine to PhysX 4.1 which is open-source and cross-platform.
    • Updating the scripting library to Python 3.9.
    • Simplifying management of library dependencies, and writing new user-friendly build instructions.
    • Significant code modernization by adopting features of new C++ standards in favour of custom implementations.
    • Various performance improvements and gameplay enhancements, such as clipboard functionality and widescreen support.
    • Lots of code cleanup to allow for 64-bit and (in future) native macOS and Linux clients

    This work has been a group effort, with lots of contributions from the core H’uru team as well as numerous community contributions. A big thank you to everyone who has contributed to Uru over the years, whether through code changes, bug reports, tutorials and documentation, or gameplay testing.

  • News roundup #12

    A few news from Mysterium, which will be held in Washington, D.C. on July 16–18:

    • To help with the uncertainty brought by COVID-19, cancellation policy for registration refunds has been shortened to 45 days.
    • The Triumvirate have put together a brief survey to gauge how people are feeling about this year’s convention; the deadline is April 4.
    • They are still accepting submissions for events (through May 31), activity book pages (through April 25), and the writing and artwork table (through July 1) for this year’s convention.

    A few news from Cyan:

    • In 2019, application requirement changes for macOS Catalina (and all subsequent macOS releases, including Big Sur) caused Myst IV, Myst V, and Uru: CC to stop launching. Cyan is still working with Codeweavers to make the games run on these versions again and will update everyone about the completed fix as soon as it is available.
    • Strange Seeds, Unwritten’s live stream, this month is moved to Saturday 10, 14:00 KIT.
    • On April 1st they announced a revolutionary, never-before seen VR gaming experience called … Myst Sayber!

  • News roundup #5

    • After more than three months, a new update was posted in Thursday about Firmament. It mentions how, in the first few months after the Kickstarter’s end, Cyan needed to hire more employees, especially in the art department; Rand’s enthusiasm for the story, but the need to improve on the gameplay and setting aspects of the game; encouraging internal feedback from all stages of production; the official hiring of a member of the Starry Expanse team; and the transition to a fully work-from-home model.
    • On Wednesday, a new MOULa patch was released (OpenUru#159); here are the release notes:
      • Win10 mouse handling fix
      • Increased the avatar step offset by a tenth of a foot (less tripping)
      • Panic link fixes
      • Lots of internal engine fixes
      • Physics update [the client will not close with a stack dump if PhysX Legacy is not installed]
      • Build improvements and changes
      • Upgraded Database minor release
      • One step closer to new fan content!
    • On April 1, Corvus released a video of a reproduction of Tay (from Riven) he made in Dreams (Media Molecule).

  • News roundup #4

    • The Mysterium Committee has announced that there will not be an in-person convention in August this year. However, some form of online gathering is still being planned. Refunds will be available, but also will roll-overs to next year’s in-person convention. More details will be announced soon.
    • realMyst: Masterpiece Edition has been released for the Nintendo Switch on Thursday 21, with a 20% discount for a limited time. To celebrate the launch, the Cyan Store is also having a 20% discount on all merch. GrayDragon is also giving away a few codes on the Cyan Discord server.
    • There will be a MOULa server downtime on Wednesday 27, starting at 11:00 KIT. The update has lots of under the hood changes, but also includes the long awaited fix for the Windows 10 mouse bug from the GoW.
    • Episode 10 of The Lost Art machinima by Mystitech Productions will premiere on Saturday 30 at 14:30 KIT.

  • Weekly news roundup #2

    • On Thursday, a small update for MOULa was released, 918.OpenUru#153:
      • the status message on the login screen now works, and also displays the donations coverage for the previous month;
      • marker games are now limited to 300 markers, as some of the larger decoration sets were causing issues to the server. However, the problem persists, so for a while all marker games will be disabled.
    • Cyan also retweeted the announcement from Limited Run of the pre-orders for the physical edition of realMyst for the Nintendo Switch, on February 28 at 10 am ET.
    • A new update for Firmament was also published, with a video giving some insights into the development process.
    • If you enjoyed Ars Technica’s recent interview with Rand about the making of Myst, a nearly 2-hour long extended version came out on Friday.
    • The Digital Antiquarian wrote a detailed essay on the history of (the original) Myst, in the context of what people were playing in 1993.