Cyan, the prolific developers behind Myst (1993) and Riven (1997), is giving away Obduction (2016) on the Epic Games Store starting next week. Obduction is Cyan’s first VR-compatible puzzle adventure, and supports SteamVR headsets.

The game is set to be free on the Epic Games Store from July 15th – 22nd. Make sure to add it to your wishlist so you don’t miss out.

Like the studio’s other beloved adventure games, Obduction is a slow and plodding affair that requires patience and problem solving skills. You’ll do plenty of thinking and backtracking across the game’s large sci-fi universe, which is mysteriously dotted with little pieces of Earth. We gave it a solid [8.5/10] in our review for its patented charm, challenging puzzles, and excellent visuals.

Upon release in 2016, Obduction essentially required top specs to run, although it has since been optimized to some degree and also performs much better on recent hardware. You’ll probably at very least want to play on an Nividia GTX 970 or AMD R9 290 for decent results.

Cyan has also released its built-for-VR refresh of Myst (2020), which is available across Oculus Quest headsets. A version is still set to launch at some point for SteamVR headsets.

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Scott Hayden
Well before the first modern XR products hit the market, Scott recognized the potential of the technology and set out to understand and document its growth. He has been professionally reporting on the space for nearly a decade as Editor at Road to VR, authoring more than 4,000 articles on the topic. Scott brings that seasoned insight to his reporting from major industry events across the globe.
  • DanDei

    Only played a bit of it some years ago when it was on Viveport. Did they fix the horrible blurriness in the meantime?
    Back then the game felt basically unplayable to me because of the terrible AA implementation. You either had it off and looked on a pixelated mess, or you turn it on and feel like your are searching a blurry world for your lost glasses, or you go into the VR driver and supersampel your framerate into the ground untill a very relaxed game gives you motion sickness. Is it still those three bad options?

    • Torsten Balle Koefoed

      I remember the blurriness issue but managed to fix it somehow. Can’t quite remember how, but likely by turning off AA and using the super sampling setting with Oculus Tray Tool instead (same as Resolution Scale in SteamVR settings). I have no idea if it’s fixed as it’s been a long while since then.

    • User_Name_24601

      I’ve played it a bit on my Q2 with a 1050ti and the graphics seem “fine” given my limited graphics card. No blurriness to note (other than the slightly reduced resolution so I could play it on my card). Looking forward to finally getting a NextGen card so I can run it at ultraRes on my next play through.

    • Rosko

      As soon as I got my 1080ti it ran great and looked fantastic on my old rift. One of my favourite vr games of all time.

  • Torsten Balle Koefoed

    Quite good game. Grabbed it when it was free on GOG long time ago and enjoyed the playthough.

  • I thought the world was pretty cool, but it didn’t run perfectly on my PC VR headset (i5-7500, GeForce GTX 1060 6GB, and 16GB RAM) so it was a bit motion-sickness inducing after a while. And I wish the human characters used a form of 3D scan to create the effect in the VR version rather than just 2D film footage for them as on the PC version; I think that would have looked very cool and indeed more convincing in VR.

    • Yes, it would have been great to see them getting into volumetrics for the VR version of the FMV performances. Maybe a bit ahead of the curve given it came out in 2016 though.

  • I really enjoyed Obduction back in 2016. I found it to be a really well-executed adaptation of the classic Cyan format into VR. It was a good deal more accessible, too; I’ve always enjoyed the idea of Myst a lot more than actually playing it. This definitely makes me want to pick it up and revisit it, as I only got several hours in and hadn’t left the first major area yet.
    I was surprised by how regressive the Quest version of Myst felt by comparison. The free-roaming locomotion didn’t add anything to the experience of the game and many of the interactions felt bizarrely antiquated. It was kind of shocking after they made such a strong entry into VR with Obduction, especially while retaining all of the things that made it feel like another Myst game. Maybe they were just hamstrung by the expectations of it being Myst, maybe it was in production for longer than Obduction, who knows. I’m looking forward to the next game though.

    • Elite-Force_Cinema

      http://disq.us/p/2iuk6oz

      And you’re trying to say you want to force exclusivity to die as a thing, like, right now, FOR FUCKING EVER, just so that we can forget about this good business practice as a thing, like, right now, FOR FUCKING EVER? Cause it sounds like you are!

      • Uhhh, what? Are you talking to me?

        • Elite-Force_Cinema

          Yes! I AM talking to you, you exclusivity hating clown!!!

          • Not sure where you picked up on that vibe? I never said anything to that effect.

  • mirak

    Best VR game.
    A real story, depth, amazing worlds, it’s just art.
    No compromission is made to the genre because of VR, it’s just perfectly suited to VR.

  • Slow…. slow, slow,slow,slow. I really wanted to get into Obduction, it looked great! Bought it a few years ago with high expectations. But the environments are really large, and your character walks reeeeeeally slooooow. After 4 hours of gameplay, barely covering 2 miles of movement, I just got tired of walking around. Some pipe puzzle had me walking a few hundred feet, back and forth, at a leisurely pace, and that just broke me. Never played the game again. You need GOD-LIKE patience for Obduction.

    Also, like all “puzzle” games, more then a few puzzles will only make sense to the programmer and his/her mother. It’s a pretty game, but I think the praise shown here is a bit unwarranted. I had more fun playing TORN. That was a beautiful game that never left me feeling tired of walking nor bored. So-So ending, but the rest was great!

    • User_Name_24601

      I’d encourage you to tweet the request for a faster walking speed to their handles. I did the other day and received a positive response from them. If enough people do it, they might add a patch which would be a light lift for them since they build in Unreal. It probably would involve them just adjusting the ‘walking’ variable to a higher rate.

    • Dakota Dunn

      Hi Cyan,

      If you’re reading this, please increase the walking speed.

  • Ben Ward

    added a calendar reminder for this game and it has disappeared off of the epic store :(

    • Bryan Slygh

      its there not sure how to play in vr tho