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Mysthas had a plethora of remasters and re-releases over the years, and it has recently come to Microsoft’s subscription service Game Pass. Myst’s inclusion in Game Pass will bring a whole new audience to Myst, and many players will be developing an itch to play some more excellent puzzle games.

Updated on January 14, 2022, by Jack Pursey: Since Myst was released in 1993, the puzzle genre has slowly but surely descended in prominence. There are still handfuls of puzzle games releasing every month, though it feels like a truly great puzzle game only comes around about once or twice a year.

Thankfully, there are bucket-loads of excellent puzzle games from the past that offer enjoyable, challenging, and rewarding experiences. So, to give puzzle fans some more ideas of what to play next, this list has been updated to include a few more suggestions of puzzle games like Myst.

13 Grim Fandango

Grim Fandango was released in October 1998 and is considered to be the final major release of the point-and-click genre’s golden age. Grim Fandango provides a fitting end to this golden age, as the game incorporates everything that people loved about LucasArts’ games in the genre, with well-written dialogue, genuinely funny humor, and a captivating story.

Like many games in the genre, especially during the 90s, the Grim Fandango does somewhat suffer from moon logic puzzles, which can significantly disrupt the flow of the story if the player gets stuck and doesn’t want to use a guide. Still, Grim Fandango is an all-time gaming classic, and Year Two is still one of the best levels in gaming history.

12 Full Throttle

1995’s Full Throttle is another point-and-click game from LucasArts. The story goes in a completely different direction as Grim Fandango, however, by centering around a gritty biker gang.

Full Throttle often isn’t spoken about as much as LucasArts’ other graphic adventures like Day of the Tentacle, The Secret of Monkey Island, and the aforementioned Grim Fandango, though it can certainly hold a candle to their quality. The game is only 4 hours long, though it crams plenty of memorable story moments, dialogue, and puzzles into that short time.

11 The Talos Principle

The Talos Principle was initially released in December 2014 on PC and has since come to almost every system under the sun, indicative of its commercial success. Furthermore, a virtual-reality version of the game was released in October 2017 on the Oculus Rift and HTC Vive, offering a unique experience for puzzle fans.

The Talos Principle puts players in control of a conscious robot and gives them over 120 puzzles to solve across a range of environments. The game was very well-received by critics, exemplified by its 88 Metascore on PS4.

10 Return Of The Obra Dinn

Return of the Obra Dinn had plenty of hype behind its release, as it was the first game from Lucas Pope since the surprise hit Papers, Please.

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Like Papers, Please, 2018’s Return of the Obra Dinn takes players back in time and tasks them with a job that, on the surface, seems mundane. In this case, the player is taken back to 1807 and must investigate a ship that went missing four years prior. Return of the Obra Dinn was showered with praise and even awards upon release, including the Seumas McNally Grand Prize at the Independent Games Festival Awards.

9 Captain Toad: Treasure Tracker

Captain Toad: Treasure Tracker was initially released in 2014 as a Wii U exclusive before - like many Wii U exclusives - making its way to the Nintendo Switch a few years later, along with the 3DS. The game expands upon the “Adventures of Captain Toad” stages from Super Mario 3D World, which were a big fan favorite.

It may initially appear that Captain Toad: Treasure Tracker is predominantly aimed at children and that seasoned puzzle fans won’t find much challenge in the spin-off title. However, like most Super Mariogames, Captain Toad makes completing the main story fairly simple to satisfy causal fans but makes beating the game 100% a far harder task.

8 Riven

Riven is an obvious choice for fans of Myst, as it is a sequel to the classic game. Riven was released four years after Myst in 1997 and threw players into a new set of islands for players to explore and solve numerous puzzles.

Retrospectively, many people consider Riven to be just as good, if not better than Myst - though this was far from the case at the time. Riven was heavily criticized in 1997, as it featured a very similar brand of point and click gameplay to Myst, which some people felt had become outdated.

7 Obduction

Obduction was released in August 2016 and, like Riven and Myst, was developed by Cyan Worlds. The game begins with the player being transported to an unknown location and forces them to solve a range of puzzles to find their way home.

Obduction struggled to reach the heights of Riven and Myst, but it was still relatively well-received, exemplified by its matching 76 critic score and 7.6 user score on Metacritic.

6 The Witness

The Witness had a ton of interest and hype behind it leading up to the game’s release, largely thanks to its designer and director Jonathan Blow, who is best known for his work on the revolutionary indie game Braid.

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Thankfully, 2016’s The Witness didn’t disappoint - the game puts players on a beautifully designed island that is filled to the brim with difficult puzzles to solve and secrets to find. IGN was particularly complimentary of The Witness and recently ranked it as the 53rd best video game of all time.

5 The Room

The Room was first released in September 2012 on iOS and became one of the most highly regarded mobile games of its era. The Room has since had multiple sequels and been released on numerous other consoles, helping the franchise reach 11.5 million sales in 2016, making it one of the highest-selling puzzle games of all time.

As the name suggests, The Room puts players in a room with little more than a box in it; this box has far more to it than it originally seems, though, as it is the source of all the game’s puzzles. Despite all of the puzzles being implemented into a box, The Room has great depth and range to its puzzles that will keep players engaged until the end.

4 RiME

RiME is yet another game on this list that strands players on a mysterious island. The adventure puzzle game is split into five large levels and features a recurring spirit that acts as a guide. RiME differentiates itself from the previous entries on this list with its third-person perspective, though its emphasis on environmental puzzles is reminiscent of Myst.

RiME was well-received by critics, exemplified by its 82 Metascore on Xbox One.

3 The Secret of Monkey Island

Myst was far from being the only successful graphic adventure in the 90s, as the decade was packed with critically acclaimed, beloved point and click adventure games. A significant amount of these games came from LucasArts, including Grim Fandango, Full Throttle, and The Secret of Monkey Island.

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The Secret of Monkey Island has numerous differences to Myst, but anyone wanting to try more puzzle games from the 90s should definitely give the original Monkey Island a try. Although The Secret of Monkey Island has a great range of tricky puzzles, it’s the game’s humor stands out - largely thanks to one of gaming’s most iconic protagonists, Guybrush Threepwood.

2 Day of the Tentacle

Day of the Tentacle is, like The Secret of Monkey Island, a LucasArts graphic adventure from the 90s that has many differences to Myst but is essential for any puzzle fan.

Whereas Myst requires the player to travel to various ages, Day of the Tentacle has three protagonists who travel through time and need to work together to stop the evil Purple Tentacle. Like Myst, Day of the Tentacle Remastered is currently available on Game Pass.

1 Quern – Undying Thoughts

Aside from the games that were made by Cyan Worlds themselves, Quern - Undying Thoughts offers the closest experience to Myst on this list. The game’s similarities are immediately apparent from its visuals, soundtrack, and sound effects, while the style of puzzles also shares many similarities with both Myst and Riven.

Quern – Undying Thoughts can get tedious at times, with much of the runtime being spent working out where the puzzles are rather than how to solve them - though it’s still an excellent puzzle game that Myst fans will love.

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