Cyan Worlds has shown a publisher-facing trailer for Project Anglerfish, a cancelled Myst universe prototype, revealing both a tantalizing sequel direction and the studio's uncertain next step.
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Cyan opens the door on a Myst game it is not making
Cyan Worlds has publicly shown Project Anglerfish, a prototype for a new game set in the Myst universe, while making clear that the project is no longer moving forward in its current form. In a video titled "A path not taken: Project Anglerfish," released on Cyan's YouTube channel on July 26, development director Hannah Gamiel and creative director Eric A. Anderson said the team spent about four months on the prototype over a year ago, according to PCGamesN and Eurogamer.
The tension is immediate for anyone who has waited for a true Cyan Worlds new Myst project. Cyan did not announce a game, a release window, platforms, or a publisher. It released a farewell artifact. Gamiel's disclaimer, quoted by Eurogamer, was explicit: "Everything we're about to show you is not actively in development, and will not be released in its current form." PCGamesN reports that Cyan said Project Anglerfish would not move forward "for a variety of reasons."
That makes this a rare kind of reveal. Most cancelled games vanish into portfolios, forum rumors, or leaked pitch decks. Cyan instead chose to show a teaser originally made for "publisher-eyes only," as the studio described it in the YouTube post quoted by Kotaku. The studio said it was still proud of the work the team did, which turns the trailer into both a creative statement and a business clue. Project Anglerfish was built to convince someone else. Now it exists as public evidence of a Myst sequel cancelled before it was ever formally announced.
What Project Anglerfish actually showed
The confirmed details are narrow, but the trailer described by multiple outlets sketches a vivid direction. PCGamesN reports that the teaser shows a player character traveling into a book, with the destination identified as an "Age," a core Myst concept. The player is tasked with collecting another book for a mysterious green-cloaked man. Kotaku describes the figure as a bespoke gentleman asking for trust, and notes that Ages can create worlds in one moment and imprison the player in another.
The footage, as reported by PCGamesN and Eurogamer, moves through environments that shift from clean and elegant spaces into ruinous, almost horror-like areas. Eurogamer describes subterranean pathways, hidden crevices, puzzles, and a search for a mysterious book on behalf of a well-dressed benefactor. PCGamesN highlights the final stretch of the teaser as intense and strongly acted. Kotaku points to Myst signatures in the prototype: vistas, alluring architecture, unstable crystals, and commanding character animation.
Read as a vertical slice, this sounds like Cyan was testing a more directed dramatic rhythm than the silent postcard pace many players associate with early Myst. The setup has a clear scene partner, an urgent errand, and the old danger of linking books sharpened into a more theatrical exchange. That is interpretation, not confirmation of the full design. Cyan has not said whether Project Anglerfish would have been first-person, VR-compatible, puzzle-led in the traditional sense, or structured like the recent remakes. What the trailer appears to confirm, through the reporting around it, is that Cyan was experimenting with a Myst universe story that foregrounded performance, atmosphere, and betrayal-adjacent tension alongside environmental puzzle spaces.
The trailer hits hard because Myst has been waiting for a new chapter
Longtime adventure fans are reacting to more than a cancelled prototype. They are reacting to a gap. Kotaku notes that Myst, released in 1993, changed PC gaming with its computer-rendered landscapes, atmosphere, music, and CD-ROM-era sense of place. The outlet also states that the series has not had a new entry in roughly 20 years, with Anglerfish potentially standing as the first new entry since 2005's Myst V.
That history changes the weight of a three-minute pitch trailer. Myst is not a franchise built around seasonal cadence or sequel churn. Its major entries arrive as events, with the act of entering a world, reading its architecture, and learning its rules serving as the real set-piece. For players raised on Myst and Riven, a new Age is the equivalent of a new combat arena in an action game or a new route through a cinematic heist. The question is not only what puzzles are there, but what kind of world logic Cyan wants you to inhabit.
That is why Project Anglerfish matters to the adventure audience even though it is not playable. The trailer reportedly centers on the oldest Myst promise: a book as doorway, trap, invitation, and threat. A suspicious patron gives the journey a human pulse. Ruinous spaces and unstable visual elements suggest a world under pressure. None of that proves the final game would have worked, but it does show Cyan exploring a sequel-shaped idea with enough confidence to make a publisher-facing teaser.
A cancelled Myst sequel, or a cancelled Myst universe prototype?
There is a wording gap worth keeping intact. Kotaku frames Project Anglerfish as what could have been a new Myst sequel, and a ResetEra thread describes it as an unannounced Myst sequel. Cyan's own wording, as quoted by PCGamesN and Eurogamer, is more careful: the team built "a new prototype for a game in the Myst universe." That distinction matters.
Calling it a Myst sequel cancelled is understandable search language, especially because Kotaku reports that Anglerfish would have been the first new entry since Myst V. But Cyan has not publicly named it Myst VI, has not placed it in the series chronology, and has not announced whether any story, characters, Ages, or systems from Anglerfish will return. The studio's "in its current form" phrasing also leaves room for ideas to be reworked, though that is only a possibility, not a promise.
The safest read is this: Project Anglerfish was an unannounced Myst universe prototype with sequel implications, built for a publisher pitch, and cancelled before full public announcement. The trailer is real. The cancellation is real. The future use of its concepts is unannounced.
Unreal Engine, remakes, and the cost of building impossible places
Kotaku reports that Project Anglerfish, like Cyan's more recent Myst and Riven remakes, was developed using Unreal Engine. That detail is important because it connects the cancelled project to Cyan's modern production pipeline rather than to an isolated concept reel. The studio has spent recent years rebuilding its defining worlds for contemporary hardware, including the Myst remake and the 2024 Riven remake noted by Kotaku. PCGamesN points players back toward Myst's 2021 remake and the Age of Rime update as the available way to return to the series for now.
For an adventure game studio, Unreal Engine solves some problems and creates others. It can help deliver the rich light, material texture, and spatial continuity that modern players expect when they step through a linking book. It also raises the bar for animation, performance capture, traversal feel, and environmental density. Kotaku specifically praised Anglerfish's character animation, which suggests Cyan was not only building empty architectural wonder. It was working on a more performed, character-driven presentation.
The financial side is harder to read because Cyan has not tied the cancellation to budget, staffing, technology, or publisher feedback. Kotaku reports that the Riven remake's sales did not prevent rounds of layoffs at Cyan Worlds, while also noting that how much those layoffs relate to Anglerfish's cancellation is unsaid. That caveat is essential. The public record supports a studio that has faced layoffs and a prototype that did not move forward. It does not support a clean cause-and-effect claim.
What the cancellation says about Cyan's future
The only confirmed roadmap is deliberately vague. PCGamesN reports that Cyan said it is "still hard at work on other new Myst universe things" and that there is "more on that to come." Eurogamer similarly reports Anderson emphasizing that Cyan is still working on "new games and experiences" set inside the Myst universe. That language is encouraging, but it is not an announcement of a replacement for Project Anglerfish.
The business signal inside this reveal is that Cyan had at least one new Myst universe concept polished enough to take to publishers. The studio then decided, for undisclosed reasons, that it could not proceed at the time. Releasing the publisher trailer now keeps the fanbase informed, preserves goodwill around work that would otherwise disappear, and reminds potential partners that Cyan still has active Myst ambitions. Those are reasonable readings of the move, but Cyan has not stated those motives beyond pride in the team's work.
For players, the practical guidance is simple. Do not wait for Project Anglerfish as a future release. Cyan says it is not active and will not be released in its current form. There are no announced platforms, price, launch timing, preorders, demos, or store pages for this cancelled Myst game. If you want a current Myst experience, the source material points to Myst's modern remake, its Age of Rime update, and the recent Riven remake as the live thread of Cyan's current era.
The more interesting question is whether Cyan's next public Myst move will be another remake, an update, a smaller experience, or a new game carrying lessons from Anglerfish. The studio has confirmed that Myst universe work continues. It has also shown, unintentionally or not, how fragile the path from evocative prototype to shipped adventure can be. Project Anglerfish gives fans a glimpse of a doorway opening, then closing before anyone can step through.