Remember when a 4x CD ROM drive was screaming fast, or when "CD" was part of a computer model number because it was a premium feature? Those were the days when MYST made that CD ROM drive a necessity, because in its day, it was the premiere game, a must have, and Macintosh fanatics love to point out that MYST was released first on the Mac. But now, 15 years later, can it possibly still stand up and be considered fun? With its release on the Nintendo DS, we're about to find out.

Myst is a point-and-click mystery-solving game. With very little backstory to get you started, you literally fall onto MYST Island, trying to find out why you're there and what's going on. The complex and unique story slowly unravels as you find cryptic clues, throw switches, and press hidden buttons. In the original and PC versions, you used a mouse to click around, but on the DS, replace the mouse with a stylus. This adds an increased level of difficulty, however, since the mouse cursor changed, revealing hot spots you could click, similar to the arrow turning into a finger over links in your web browser. With Myst DS, you get no such clues. Given that this is already a difficult game, an option to press a button to reveal these hot spots would have made the game more accessible to those struggling with it.

Graphically, the game is faithful to the original, visually pretty much a direct port. Since this game was originally released in the days of 640x480 monitors, it translates fairly well to the small DS screen, but at times, you need to see some detail like a hidden button, and even thr magnifying glass doesn't help, since it doesn't work on every screen. Since some buttons are almost invisible on the small screen, magnification on every screen would help a lot. Magnification sometimes shows pixelation and betrays the age of the game, though, but in all, the unique beauty of the game shines through.

When playing this game, make sure you have headphones or turn the volume up, as some of the clues are auditory. The sound comes through well for such an old game on small speakers.

The one word that defines this game, though, is challenge. My 12-year-old, who enjoys an intellectual challenge, played for about an hour during a long road trip, and she got frustrated after not being able to solve even one puzzle. I was equally frustrated. Given how old the game is, FAQ's and walkthroughs abound, but even that won't completely help you, since this version includes a never-before-played "Age" (level), but honestly, if you need to cheat your way through the game, you won't enjoy it.