Long before I got my first Mac I asked for the CD-ROM game Cosmic Osmo and an AppleCD drive. I ended up borrowing a friend of the family’s Mac Plus to play the game and I was hooked. You could say my love affair with apple products started with this game.
Cosmic Osmo is a game set on exploring a surrealistic world. You start off in a strange spacecraft that can visit pre-planets ranging from a giant fish to a planet with a house on one side and a boat on the other. This game was created by Cyan, the creators of Myst and was an evolutionary step in Cyan creating Myst.
This game has no start or end and is pure exploration. Almost anything you see in this game is click able and will start a animation and music sequence.
Recently I downloaded a program called Mini VMac which lets you run old MacOS 6 programs. After booting up an old system hard drive and I opened up my Cosmic Osmo CD and booted it up. It worked, although some of the sounds were out of sync, some of the audio was scrambled and some animation was too fast.
Many people have fond memories of Cosmic Osmo. It was the first CD I ever played on my Sony Diskman (the game had a music track with jazz songs from the game). I also know that my nephews in Portland played the game quite often. So what games can be compared to Cosmic Osmo? Unfortunately there arn’t any.
Myst focuses on solving puzzles, which isn’t the main focus of Cosmic Osmo. There is Leo’s Great Day, a Flash 3 game by Pepworks, but once again this is a story with a beginning and end and a few puzzles, although the animation style and game design approach seems to be similar to Cosmic Osmo. There are really no other games out there like Cosmic Osmo where you can just explore and interact with the world.
So if Cosmic Osmo is so great, why isn’t anyone selling it now? Well for one it was released as a B&W game just for the Macintosh using Mac only technology. There were hints at a masterpiece update to this eleven years ago from a story writeup on the creators of the game, but unfortunately there hasn’t been much progress or cash to throw at a project like this - until recently.
I happened to buy a piece of software last year that is similar to HyperCard, called Runtime Revolution. Every month or so the company that creates the software sends me a developer newsletter. Normally this goes into my special circular file called a trash can, but the last one caught my eye because it was an interview with a developer who is updating and converting Cosmic Osmo. Here are the facts I picked out of the article:
- This game will no longer be released as a HyperCard based game
- At least 90% of the original game can be ported, the other 10% will be re-created for modern operating systems
- All of the original sounds and music will be included in the game
- There is a hint at a technology advance that is available and that was not available in the original HyperCard version (I imagine this is hinting at color graphics)
There is one more point from the article. This will be released as a Windows only application - even though it is being developed and can be ported to an updated Mac version with the flip of a switch. This started out as a Mac game, and is being released on Windows even though a Mac version could be created by a flip of the switch, or as the developer puts it:
There are currently no plans to re-release a Macintosh version, though if that should change it would be trivial to recompile the main stack for OS X, which is all that would be required.
I understand the need to release this for Windows, but what about all the loyal fans who have been waiting for a re-release. This is really heartbreaking.
How do you feel about this? Please leave your comments here for requesting a Mac version of Cosmic Osmo.
11 responses so far ↓
Adam Bezecny // June 21, 2007 at 00:02
Although I weep for those who shall not be able to play this, I am a great fan of Cyan Worlds and am overjoyed at this! When is the release date?
grafixx4u // June 27, 2007 at 21:02
Hypercard and Cosmic Osmo were one of my first experiences on the mac. This is 15 years ago. My children and me had very much fun with it. It was one of the best games for the mac, i assume.
I dont’t want to buy a Windows PC for playing this again.
My opinion: Cyan, go back to the roots ;-))
lote // July 14, 2007 at 07:06
I purchased the game cosmic osmo and the worlds beyond the mackerel and i cannot find out how to play it, that is what to play it on My se/30 is broken and i have no cd rom drive for it. It is truly frustraighting because as a child I would play cosmic osmo non-stop and if anyone knows how to play the game please type back
james // July 14, 2007 at 07:13
i would lovvvvvvvvvvveeeee a rerelease of cosmic osmo i am sad that its for pc and windows but still i would give anyy thing to play it again. i wish it was still in gray scale but if u find anything about the release date please post possttttt!
Chris // July 26, 2007 at 06:52
I would love to play Cosmic Osmo again!
I remember being 10 years old and making my own hypercard stacks where you could click around and go on an “adventure,” because I was inspired to by this game. I hope they bring it out again one way or another.
Jo // September 7, 2007 at 09:53
We played Cosmic Osmo from a library disk and the library trashed it and charged us for it. I have not be able to find a copy for sale anywhere.
Cosmic Osmo was great fun and a refreshing change from the shoot ‘em up games on computer. I have the Mac equipment and OS to play the original CD and would love to have a copy.
If you run linux, have Basilisk, a ROM image of an old machine, copies of System 6, Hypercard player, and can see the CD in System 6 under emulation, you should be able to play the game.
Jo // September 7, 2007 at 21:23
I loved Cosmic Osmo also and would like to have a copy of it.
For those wanting old Mac equipment to play the game, I have several CD-ROM drives/drivers, cables, an LCII etc. if you are interested.
Jo // September 7, 2007 at 21:26
If you would like to have Cosmic Osmo re-released, you can sign a petition at http://www.petitiononline.com/csmcosmo/
It does not let you add comments like Mac version.
DocumentN // January 2, 2008 at 10:37
What I want to know is will it finally be possible to have music playing and do things at the same time?
Jen // March 11, 2008 at 05:50
For years I researched whether Cyan would release Osmo for PC. For years they released for Mac. Now, I’ve bought a MacBook, and they are finally releasing it again, but only for PC? How sad and limited of vision…
retrodig // May 5, 2008 at 10:50
Well, here is some partially relevant news. Cyan is releasing a 3-D “sequel” to Cosmic Osmo.
http://www.hexisle.com/
However, the circumstances are very different from the 1990 release. This one is a puzzle game, more or less, with our favorite alien working his way through various obstacles. I wish this was the sequel we were all looking for, but it is not.
I think Cyan contracted this project to another company; dig for info on this to find out. The modelling and design, however, are very clean and colorful, so that is an attractive counterpoint to my inner fan, which really misses the simple, surrealistic permanence suspended in monochrome, reminiscent of “La Jette”. Yeah, like that’s what I thought when I was a snot-nosed kid playing this jewel to the bone.
Do you really think Cyan will close the book on this one?
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