Myst VIEW resources

VIEW resources are the candidate Myst card representations, as they glue other resources together. In particular they seem to describe what to show on screen, what sound to play and where to find additional data about the card.

Original hints by Petroff Heroj.

Basic Format

The data is split into five sections with variable size and different meanings:

• card flags
• pictures
• sounds
• element list
• other resources

Card flags

This is just

unsigned short

card_flags

card_flags seems either 0 or 1. It's 0 for regular cards, while 1 is suspected to disable game saving in that card.

Picture section

This section defines the card background picture, which may be static or dependent on the values of variables. The section starts with

unsigned short

count

If count = 0 then there is a single, static background picture and the whole section reduces to

unsigned short	count = 0
unsigned short	picture_id

where picture_id is the WDIB (or PICT) resource ID.

Otherwise, if count > 0, the section contains count conditional blocks:

unsigned short	count
variable	conditional blocks

Each conditional block associates a variable with an array of picture IDs:

unsigned short	variable
unsigned short	id_count
short	picture_ids[id_count]

The card will use the value of the specified variable to index the ID array and display that picture.

Sound section

This section specifies ambient sounds for the card. It uses a basic "command" mechanism to continue with the already playing sound, alter it or start a different one.

short

sound

If sound is -1 or -3, the section stops here.

• -1 seems to continue with the current sound.
• -3 seems to stop the current sound at all.

If sound is not negative or -2, the section includes a second field:

short	sound
short	flags

A positive sound stops the currently running sound and starts the given one, while -2 seems to continue with the currently running sound, but different flags. flags could also be volume/balance control.

Finally, if sound is -4, there is a conditional block similar to those in the picture section:

short	sound = -4
unsigned short	variable
unsigned short	count
variable	sound specifications

Each sound specification is a single short, followed by a second one if it's not negative or -2, similarly to what happens for the first field of the section. This probably chooses the sound/flags combination based on the given variable.

Element list

This section seems to list elements (pictures, sounds) available to the card. It is suspected that those elements can then be activated by scripts.

unsigned short	count
variable	element specifications

Each specification begins with an unsigned short type describing what the element is.

• Type 1 is a picture (WDIB or PICT). Resource ID follows.
• Type 2 is a sound (MSND). Resource ID follows.
• Type 3 is a conditional block associating a variable with an ID array. This structure follows:

unsigned short	variable
unsigned short	id_count
unsigned short	u0
short	ids[id_count]

The variable value is used to index the ID array. IDs can be -1, probably meaning that nothing should be done in that case.

• Type 4 seems to refer to pictures, since a WDIB ID follows.
• Type 5 seems to refer to sounds, since a MSND ID follows.

Other resources

The final section points to associated resources that further describe the card, namely RLST, HINT, INIT and EXIT:

unsigned short	rlst_id
unsigned short	hint_id
unsigned short	init_id
unsigned short	exit_id

These values can be zero, indicating that the corresponding resource does not exist (i.e. a card might not have an associated HINT). It happens that all the IDs match the VIEW ID when they are not zero. Furthermore, rlst_id is always set: no cards exist without hotspot descriptions.

Old Case Studies

image name and sub-images (akin to Riven PLSTs)

0	0	3001	-1	0/0	3001	3001	0	0
		name	neg.	bytes	(name name 0 0)

0	0	3002	-2	0/144	0		3002	3002	0	0
0	0	3003	-2	0/144	1	[1 3004]	3003	3003	0	0
		name	?		count	entry	(name name 0 0)

• I think 3004 is the name of a sub-image (small image to be placed in another) of 3003 here.

0	0	3005	3005	0/144	1	[1 3006]	3005	3005	0	0
		name twice				(name name 0 0)

0	0	3012	-2	0/50	5	[1 3013]	[1 3008]	[1 3009]	[1 3010]	[1 3011]	3012	0	0	3012
		name	?		count	entries					(name 0 0 name)

14	1	1	5	2	3030	3031	FFFC 3 2 3031 00_A0	4031	x00A0	2	2 4030	1 3030			3031	3031	0	0
44	1	1	2	2	3095	3096	FFFC 15 2 3095 00_A0	4095	x00A0	4	2 4095	1 3562	1 3097	2 5095	3095	3095	3095	0
348	1	1	16	2	3536	3535		3535	x0060	0					3535	3535	0	0
359	1	1	5	2	3550	3552	FFFC 3 2 6552 00_80	3552	x0080	4	4 3550	4 3552	2 4552	2 5552	3552	3552	0	0
47	1	1	10	2	4140	4141		5141	x0090	1	2 4141				4141	4141	4141	4141
50	1	1	10	2	4148	4149		4149	x0090	0					4149	4149	4149	0
51	1	1	10	2	4150	4151		FFFE	x0070	0					4150	4150	0	0
94	1	1	10	2	4243	4244		4244	x0050	0					4244	4244	0	0
116	1	1	40	2	4292	4294	FFFC 40 2 4292 00_50	4292	x0060	2	1 4293	2 5292			4292	4292	0	0
145	1	1	0	2	4358	4357		FFFE	x0030	0					4357	4357	0	0
287	1	1	34	3	4698	4701		4702	xFFFD	4	1 4699	2 4698	2 5698	2 6698	4698	4698	4698	4698
295	1	1	10	2	4717	4719		4717	x0040	1	1 4718				4717	4717	0	0