realMYST Easter Eggs

In the early ’00s, Spyder, previously known for doling out clues to the Riven Easter Eggs and The Vault, began to post clues in Cyan Chat to easter eggs found in realMYST. These were documented faithfully by the late community member Mark “Zardoz” Plummer on his realMYST Easter Egg Hunt website.

A couple of the clues documented there are loose ends that may or may not yield secrets yet unseen. However, on the evening of April 10, 2012, over a decade after the original Egg Hunt, Spyder again showed up in CC with a new clue, seemingly also about the original realMYST:

[22:00] \\\\\[Spyder]  <links in from somewhere on the internet Age>/////
[22:01] [Spyder] Have any of you tried shooting the moon yet?
[22:01] /////[Spyder]  <mistakenly used an unsafe linking book without a maintainer's suit *ZZZZZWHAP*>\\\\\
[22:08] \\\\\[Spyder]  <links in from somewhere on the internet Age>/////
[22:09] [Spyder] Vintage MYST from Reality
[22:09] [Spyder] Get In My sights you see...
[22:09] [Spyder] Shoot The Moon To Raise The Mast
[22:09] [Spyder] And Get a Wild Blast Straight from the past
[22:10] /////[Spyder]  <mistakenly used an unsafe linking book without a maintainer's suit *ZZZZZWHAP*>\\\\\

Over the next ten years, there would be occasional flurries of activity around this new clue, but nothing has yet been discovered.

Line 1

Vintage MYST from Reality

This seems to tell the fans that the game being spoken of is the original realMYST. At the time this clue was given, there had been no new releases of realMYST since the Mac version came out in 2002, so "Vintage" realMYST was the only existing realMYST. However, the iPad version would come out two months later, and it's possible that by this time it had been publicized and was eagerly anticipated by fans. So the word "Vintage" could have been a clue to look to the old version, not the imminent one. It could also merely be there to say "Yes, you're really getting a new clue about a 12-year-old game."

Line 2

Get In My sights you see...

One of the original realMYST Easter Eggs was known in the game files as "YourInMySightsNow". To activate the egg, you input two patterns into the fireplace. The first is referred to as "logo", resembling the Cyan dingbat:

..XXXX..
.XXXXXX.
XX......
XX......
.XXXXXX.
..XXXX..

…and the second is known as "plus", resembling a crosshair:

...XX...
...XX...
XXX..XXX
XXX..XXX
...XX...
...XX...

Doing these makes the turret from the Myst Mayhem April Fools' gag protrude from the library tower, pointing toward whichever landmark the Tower Rotation is currently set to. (All non-locked-in Tower Rotation positions make the turret point directly away from the island; there are no fine adjustments to be made.) After waiting about 30 seconds, the gun barrel will aim, point slightly upward, and recoil with a BANG sound (in actuality using the sound of the giant tree releasing boiler pressure), then lower to its original position.

So this line of the new clue seems to indicate that activating YourInMySightsNow is a prerequisite to finding the unknown egg in question.

Line 3

Shoot The Moon To Raise The Mast

The nut. These seem to be the direct instructions on how to activate the unknown egg. Many possibilities of their meaning have been theorized and tested, to no avail thus far. Whatever "Shooting The Moon" means, it sounds like it will result in a mast raising; the obvious interpretation, since YourInMySightsNow takes place on Myst Island, is that it's somehow involved in raising the ship by the dock. Which might mean that "Shooting The Moon" is some process by which the correct constellation symbol pillars will be lit up.

In some card games, "Shooting The Moon" means to do the opposite of what you normally do, and thereby achieve the best result. (For instance, in Hearts, if you collect every single card that would normally penalize you, every other player is penalized a lot.) This could mean that all the pillar symbols start activated, and you deactivate the incorrect ones to raise the ship. Many permutations of this have been tried, and none have been discovered to succeed yet.

But also, the Myst clock tower has an ornament with an arrow and a moon. And there is a constellation pillar with an arrow symbol. So perhaps merely turning off the arrow to raise the ship is involved. Furthermore, the arrow pillar is a vital part of the Torsk Easter Egg: If you set the cabin safe to the combination 423 you will carry an unusable grenade launcher (another Myst Mayhem reference) any time you are outside on Myst Island and the arrow pillar is activated. This allows for several combinations of metaphorical/literal moon-shooting. But again, no success has been had (or at least noticed) with many combinations of these concepts.

And of course, any of the above could be completely, entirely wrong. There are other masts around: the sunken Black Ship on Mechanical, for example. We know of no way to raise that one, and it seems like this step should happen on Myst like the other Easter Eggs, but we just can't be sure.

Line 4

And Get a Wild Blast Straight from the past

This seems to be a description of the Egg itself. Perhaps something different happens when the YourInMySightsNow turret fires? Could it be another Myst Mayhem artifact? You could be the first to find out!

Other thoughts

It's possible that the odd capitalization of the clue bears a cipher of some kind; however, Spyder's grammar has been known to be eccentric before. ^{[citation needed]}

Possibilities + Interpretations

There are multiple interpretations for the clues given by Spyder, but so far, the solution possibilities have been far too broad to attain a solution. Thus, to help others in their interpretations of the clues, ideas mentioned before in this article are included here for completeness sake.

Shoot The Moon To Raise The Mast

• Shoot the moon (Literal interpretations):
  • The Moon + Arrow Vane on top of the clocktower
    • There is a crescent moon shape alongside an arrow on top of the Mechanical Gate clocktower at the end of the island. However, there is no way to interact with this object, save for moving up to it by hacking one's configuration files to change the gravity settings.
  • The Rocketship
    • Often referred to what would become the 1960s-1970s Apollo missions, a moon shot, the idea of a mission to explore Earth’s moon was an idea also often explored in science fiction. One can change many settings in the code box containing the link to Selenitic, but no code has been found that produces another effect other than the one that activates the viewscreen above it.
  • YourInMySightsNow
    • This easter egg produces an effect where a gun barrel protrudes from the viewing slot of the Rotating Tower on the mountain behind the library, as a reference to the 1999 April Fools image of "Myst Mayhem", to announce realMyst. However, this can only be pointed at the four certain landmarks on the island, and will point backwards unless directly at these landmarks, so one cannot point the barrel at the Moon Vane on the clocktower.
  • Torsk
    • This easter egg produces a grenade launcher that appears only for aesthetic purposes, again in reference to the 1999 April Fools image of "Myst Mayhem". However, this does not affect gameplay, and cannot be fired at anything, not even the Moon Vane.
  • The Black Ships:
    • There is a Black Ship Emblem in Atrus' Journal about the Mechanical Age. What purpose this serves is unknown.
    • In the Mechanical Age, there is a sunken Black Ship with a skeleton hanging off of it, along with a flag with their emblem hanging just below it. This object cannot seemingly be interacted with.
• Shoot the moon (Figurative interpretations):
  • Hearts: In the Hearts card game, it means 'take every point possible' or to try to collect all the hearts and the queen of spades, making all of the wrong moves to produce a desirable result. This nets the winning player the maximum score of 26.
    • The Generator powerhouse contains displays that only allow for two-digit numbers. 26 as a power input (As opposed to 59, the normal voltage) does not produce any discernable effect.
    • (In conjunction with the "Raise the Mast" clue:) The Sunken Ship at the dock can only be raised by selecting the three correct symbols in the pillar garden. The interpretation of shooting the moon can also mean to choose the wrong symbols. However, again, this has not produced a discernable effect.
  • The Rocketship + YourInMySightsNow:
    • One could interpret the clue as being to point the barrel of the tower turret to the Rocketship, as the Rocketship is doubly associated with both the "moon shot" idea, as well as the Selenitic Age. (where Selene, the root of the name, comes from the Greek goddess of the moon) Again, no effect.
  • At a High Level: The other interpretation of "shooting the moon" is the definition of "to attain great or high heights." There are only two places on the island where this can happen:
    • The Giant Tree:
      • One can ride the tree elevator to its apex, by turning up the gas valve to maximum, and running back outside to catch the elevator as the pressure pushes it upward. Even with the Torsk or YourInMySightsNow easter egg active, this does not produce any discernable effect, again.
    • The Rotating Tower:
      • The Rotating Tower is the highest viewpoint on the island. However, even if active, one cannot see the YourInMySightsNow gun barrel while inside of the tower, nor does it produce any noticeable effect.
  • The Black Ships:
    • In the Mechanical Age, the Black Ship with a skeleton hanging off of it has the flag with the emblem, and in this case, "shooting" can be interpreted as "shooting a look".