House Of Cyan Creators Of The Myst Computer Game Hope New Headquarters Help Employees Relax And Have Fun
Dry moats, bridges, waterfalls … an entry arch that appears to have burst from the building’s facade. Just what you’d expect from the imaginative folks at Cyan Inc. who created Myst, the best-selling CD-ROM game ever.
But this isn’t another fantasy structure tucked into a corner of Myst Island. It’s Cyan’s new corporate headquarters just outside Spokane. To get there, you head … oops, giving directions would be like revealing which brother, Achenar or Sirrus, is the bad guy in Myst. You wouldn’t want us to do that, would you?
Of course not. And besides, Cyan officials asked that we not reveal their location. But we can share a few clues about the new building.
First off, insists Chris Brandkamp, vice president/operations, the building definitely wasn’t intended to resemble anything out of Myst. (Even though he admits he and Cyan kingpins Rand and Robyn Miller toyed with the idea of installing a fog machine in the moat to create a little atmosphere.) The idea was merely to build something efficient, flexible, offbeat and not too expensive, so Cyan could move out of Brandkamp’s 1,200-square-foot garage, which had been the company’s base of operations since 1994, when work on Myst 2 began. (And the two-story garage was actually a step up for Cyan. Rand worked on Myst in his bedroom, while Robyn and Brandkamp toiled in their respective basements.)
“We originally intended to make (the new building) more industrial-looking,” recalls Brandkamp, “with a lot of steel. One of the guys here described the early sketches as resembling a Happy Meal box.
“From there, we started looking at lots of magazines, and the design evolved.”
Impacting the evolutionary process was the addition of Spokane architect Chris Green, who knew the Millers
through their father Ron’s Northview Bible Church and had played Myst.
“Chris made this thing happen,” says Brandkamp. “We pretty much knew what we wanted, but it’s so critical to have an architect for a project like this.
“When we changed (from a boxy, industrial look) to a more castlelike structure, the whole design had to change, and it was essential to have his knowledge and information readily at hand.”
“Castlelike” may be a bit of a stretch. What Cyan ended up with is a neotraditional-looking two-story structure that probably could pass for an early 20th-century schoolhouse or fire station, were it not for the playful masonry details and the wonderfully inviting informal landscape by Land Expressions’ Kathy Swehla.
Oh yes … and the fact that the structure rises out of a rock-lined crater, so that lower-lever windows look out onto the moat area and waterfall, and the upper, or main, level is approachable only via one of three bridges.
Once past the free-standing portal and through the front entry, visitors encounter a visual cacophony of rough and smooth wood finishes, corrugated steel, exposed ventilation systems, polished steel, glass, and even patches of pea gravel on the floor.
Don’t be surprised if there’s no receptionist at the front desk. Though the building was designed to accommodate up to 50 employees - and can expand even further from there - Cyan’s work force has reached only 25 so far (up from only four when Myst was made).
There’s so much spare room, in fact, that one computer artist tossed a futon in a vacant corner so he could catch a few Z’s during marathon sessions working on Myst 2, due out next summer.
Cyan’s 10 artists work downstairs in a dimly lit, loungelike room decorated with wharf pilings, two 3,500-pound basalt columns and a ceiling star field illuminated with fiber optics.
“Creativity comes at various times,” explains architect Green, “and this building allows that to happen. If artist block hits at 10:30 in the morning, the artist doesn’t have to sit at his or her work station and struggle.”
They can take a break by the waterfall, shoot some hoops in the parking lot or play a round of Frisbee golf among the site’s Ponderosa pines.
The 10,000-square-foot headquarters also includes private offices, a conference room equipped with a computer-linked drawing board, a sound studio, and a trophy room lined with national and international awards garnered by Myst.
Brandkamp won’t say how much the building cost but dismisses the notion that he and fellow Mystmeisters have virtually unlimited resources.
“Myst has done well,” he admits, with sales of the $50 game surpassing 3 million units. “But budget was still a big deal.”
So how does Cyan’s headquarters compare with others in the industry? “Most (software) headquarters I’ve been in are one of two kinds,” says Brandkamp. “The first projects an image that says, ‘We are a corporation,’ and you get a suit-and-tie feel when you walk in. A little stiff, a little neutered - sort of the fancy-looking, lawyer’s-office kind of feel.
“Then there’s the flip side, where it’s so creative that you really don’t even know who’s in charge or where to go. Everyone’s just kinda, ‘Hey, how are ya doing?’ and all you want to do is say, ‘I have a meeting with Mr. Smith.”’ Cyan’s new building blends the two styles, Brandkamp says, “although we didn’t intentionally plan it that way.
“I think people suspect all this has some special, secret meaning. … It doesn’t. It’s just a building, and we’re here, and the front of the building that’s exploded off is something we did because we thought it would look kind of cool.
“But we’re basically private people,” says Brandkamp. “We weren’t looking for a way to wave a flag and shout, ‘Hey, look at us.’ “We don’t want people coming here and doing the ol’ I-want-your-autograph stuff, which explains why the sign out front is a white board with $1.99 letters nailed onto it.”
Sorry, Myst fans … we can’t even tell you how many letters are on the sign. You’ll have to solve that mystery yourself. (Besides, they’re numbers, not letters.)
, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: 3 color photos
MEMO: To learn more about Myst, other Cyan games and game-related products, visit the company’s Internet address at http://www.cyan.com.