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Ultima Collecting -- I am in big trouble!


Albert

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I started playing Ultima IV a few days ago. So far it's been more enjoyable for me than I, II, or III. Considerably more NPC interaction (a hallmark of the later Ultimas), the overworld is MUCH larger than any of the previous games, and there are considerably more "quests" to manage. I have five party members thus far, have found four or five of the shrines, have thoroughly explored all the towns I've been to so far, mapped the moongates, explored much of the seas with a ship, and various other things. However, swamps still stymie me and I need to start working on casting magic so I can cure poison (which is a huge pain in the ass in this game). I haven't gone into a single dungeon yet, though, and I know that is definitely a requirement in this game!

 

..Al

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I'm really enjoying this thread, following Albert's and everyones travels back into the Ultimas.

I hopped onto gog.com and picked up Ultima VIII Pagan, and plan on playing it again since that was

one that always stood out for me at the time. I know it's a weird one, but it had some enjoyable attributes.

Let's see if I still like it...

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I hopped onto gog.com and picked up Ultima VIII Pagan, and plan on playing it again since that was

one that always stood out for me at the time. I know it's a weird one, but it had some enjoyable attributes.

Let's see if I still like it...

 

Man, I very rarely hear anything positive about Pagan. However, I do look forward to playing it, since I didn't get terribly far on my first attempt when the game came out. I vividly remember walking through a dungeon, having the ground open up below me, falling into fiery lava, and dying. And because this wasn't Britannia, you weren't resurrected in Lord British's castle, you were D-E-A-D. Needless to say, after this happened a few times, I just put the game away in disgust. Random death was never a part of any previous Ultimas. I hope whoever thought THAT would be fun got out of the games business. Plus there were the jumping puzzles where you'd miss a jump and fall to your DEATH. I'm sure the same person who designed random fiery lava death also put this in. I know both of these problems were addressed with a later patch, otherwise I probably wouldn't play the game!!

 

..Al

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I started playing Ultima IV a few days ago. So far it's been more enjoyable for me than I, II, or III. Considerably more NPC interaction (a hallmark of the later Ultimas), the overworld is MUCH larger than any of the previous games, and there are considerably more "quests" to manage. I have five party members thus far, have found four or five of the shrines, have thoroughly explored all the towns I've been to so far, mapped the moongates, explored much of the seas with a ship, and various other things. However, swamps still stymie me and I need to start working on casting magic so I can cure poison (which is a huge pain in the ass in this game). I haven't gone into a single dungeon yet, though, and I know that is definitely a requirement in this game!

 

..Al

 

Quest of the Avatar!

 

One of the best RPG's of all time for me. Since then games have eclipsed it but I remember booting that up on my old C64 in 1985 and was blown away by the music and vastness of the world. Played it for years. For a month or two I remember thinking "what the heck am I supposed to be doing?". At that age I really didn't "get" the idea behind what the quest was really about. Truly innovative.

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I started playing Ultima IV a few days ago. So far it's been more enjoyable for me than I, II, or III. Considerably more NPC interaction (a hallmark of the later Ultimas), the overworld is MUCH larger than any of the previous games, and there are considerably more "quests" to manage. I have five party members thus far, have found four or five of the shrines, have thoroughly explored all the towns I've been to so far, mapped the moongates, explored much of the seas with a ship, and various other things. However, swamps still stymie me and I need to start working on casting magic so I can cure poison (which is a huge pain in the ass in this game). I haven't gone into a single dungeon yet, though, and I know that is definitely a requirement in this game!

 

..Al

 

Man, I remember playing IV back on my C64 many years ago, which was the only Ultima game I really played through. Sadly, despite spending a ton of time on it, I never finished it 100%.. Maybe I was just dumb then or didn't think it through, but I remember always getting angry and stymied around one shrine that was in the middle of a swamp, or something like that.. was awful.

 

May yours go better than mine did.

 

Enjoy!

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Maybe I was just dumb then or didn't think it through, but I remember always getting angry and stymied around one shrine that was in the middle of a swamp, or something like that.. was awful.

 

Yeah, I'm not a fan of the swamps introduced in Ultima IV. I can't heal myself yet, so I haven't even gone into that shrine sitting in the swamp (I know which one you are talking about). This game is considerably more complex than previous Ultimas, such as the magic system where you need to acquire and mix reagents before you can even cast spells! But at least there's only one spell book, as opposed to separate Wizard and Cleric spells. It'll take much longer to play through this than Ultimas I - III. Probably longer than some of the later games!

 

May yours go better than mine did.

 

Thanks! I'm enjoying it, but I've only had one session with it thus far. :)

 

..Al

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Man, I very rarely hear anything positive about Pagan. However, I do look forward to playing it, since I didn't get terribly far on my first attempt when the game came out. I vividly remember walking through a dungeon, having the ground open up below me, falling into fiery lava, and dying. And because this wasn't Britannia, you weren't resurrected in Lord British's castle, you were D-E-A-D. Needless to say, after this happened a few times, I just put the game away in disgust. Random death was never a part of any previous Ultimas. I hope whoever thought THAT would be fun got out of the games business. Plus there were the jumping puzzles where you'd miss a jump and fall to your DEATH. I'm sure the same person who designed random fiery lava death also put this in. I know both of these problems were addressed with a later patch, otherwise I probably wouldn't play the game!!

 

..Al

 

The patch is part of the reason I'm wanting to give it another go. I remember the isometric view and storyline, and all the other stightly off-kilter Ultima goodness calling to me back then. I, like many, got frustrated at several points, but still enjoyed aspects of it, so I hope it plays better now. I think it was ahead of it's time in some ways... but behind in much of what made Ultima... Ultima.

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The patch is part of the reason I'm wanting to give it another go. I remember the isometric view and storyline, and all the other stightly off-kilter Ultima goodness calling to me back then. I, like many, got frustrated at several points, but still enjoyed aspects of it, so I hope it plays better now. I think it was ahead of it's time in some ways... but behind in much of what made Ultima... Ultima.

 

For me, the pinacle of the Ultima series was VII and VII Part II. I love the full-screen user interface, the story, the dialog, and interaction with the world. The one downside is you have such a small view of the world relative to earlier Ultimas. Everything is HUGE, and they got rid of the "overworld". And VII ran damn slow on most computers when it came out. But I have very fond memories of playing these two games.

 

So we went from that to Ultima VIII, which took place in a strange world, the color palette is just awful, the "rendered" graphics look terrible (in my opinion) compared to the hand drawn graphics of VIII, and the random death and jumping death were two new elements that Ultima did NOT need. Coming after Ultima VII, the failure of VIII was a pretty big blow. I then tried IX when it came out, and that was even worse in I couldn't even get the damn game to run for more than a minutes without crashing. Never even got off Earth! Heck, I don't think I got out of my house!!

 

..Al

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For me, the pinacle of the Ultima series was VII and VII Part II. I love the full-screen user interface, the story, the dialog, and interaction with the world. The one downside is you have such a small view of the world relative to earlier Ultimas. Everything is HUGE, and they got rid of the "overworld". And VII ran damn slow on most computers when it came out. But I have very fond memories of playing these two games.

 

So we went from that to Ultima VIII, which took place in a strange world, the color palette is just awful, the "rendered" graphics look terrible (in my opinion) compared to the hand drawn graphics of VIII, and the random death and jumping death were two new elements that Ultima did NOT need. Coming after Ultima VII, the failure of VIII was a pretty big blow. I then tried IX when it came out, and that was even worse in I couldn't even get the damn game to run for more than a minutes without crashing. Never even got off Earth! Heck, I don't think I got out of my house!!

 

..Al

I'm gonna have to go back and play the others too. That's why I've been liking this thread so much. I just missed them somehow... I remember playing the NES version of Exodus, and Underworld, I just don't remember playing the others. I do remember playing Zork and the D and D SSI games on computer though... When I get me some free time, I'm gonna have to get friendly with Gog.com. I noticed they had a couple of the Ultima games for free right now as well. Maybe Martian Dreams and Savage Empire... I know when I signed up it immediately gave me like 10 games.

 

I'm definitely gonna have to play me some VII too.

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So we went from that to Ultima VIII, which took place in a strange world, the color palette is just awful, the "rendered" graphics look terrible (in my opinion) compared to the hand drawn graphics of VIII, and the random death and jumping death were two new elements that Ultima did NOT need. Coming after Ultima VII, the failure of VIII was a pretty big blow. I then tried IX when it came out, and that was even worse in I couldn't even get the damn game to run for more than a minutes without crashing. Never even got off Earth! Heck, I don't think I got out of my house!!

 

..Al

 

I forced myself through Ultima 9 and beat it. I really wanted to see the ending.

 

It wasn't that bad if you can get it to run. The patch they released came out pretty late. I remember receiving a replacement install disc (with the final patch) directly from Origin with a letter saying "sorry about the bugs etc".

 

Two things that killed Ultima 9 IMO besides being a rushed product:

 

- Bugs

- Lack of reference to older Ultimas.

 

The ending was pretty much what I thought it would be.

 

I think there is a very good fan patch out there that fixes the references and changes the dialogue. I may revisit Ultima 9 again with that installed. (Have to check the patcher to see if its included)

Edited by cimerians
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Ultima IV is definitely when the series hit it's stride. 3 was almost perfect. Just a little rough in the "character" department. The towns folk are all still kind of derpy like in Ultima 2.

 

I don't fault Pagan too much. It's unfinished, so I excuse parts of it.

 

the atmosphere of the game is AWESOME. Tenebrae is still one of the eeriest towns in any game, ever.

 

 

I get annoyed by the stupid platforming, and the bland tiles in dungeons, but overall, it was the last good Ultima.

 

 

 

don't get me started on Ultima IX.

 

 

"whats a paladin".

 

goddamn. Whoever scripted that needs to have their balls stepped on by dinosaurs for all of eternity.

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The favorite games in the series are definitely IV, V and VII. I enjoyed III, but it wasn't a very long game, the interaction with NPCs is very shallow, and the plot is nearly identical to the previous games (KILL THE BAD [computer?] GUY!), except that you can't just march in to kill the bad guy without first acquiring some information, items, and information about those items. ;)

 

..Al

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I disliked 6 and 7's move away from the tile based gameplay and first person dungeons. I mostly hated the lack of first person dungeons. and the lack of turn based combat in 7 is just afjglfdhj;eLWGRJFGHTYRGF

 

 

You get Iolo the triple xbow and you just shrug off every battle.

 

then when you have the black sword, you can basically just win everything, ever. :)

 

 

overall, I vote 5 as the best because of the gameplay elements and overall theme.

 

 

 

 

 

Reconstruction.Voyd.Net

 

 

Everything should go here and enjoy everything.

Edited by Arkhan
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Its also extremely huge c

I haven't played U5 at all and know next to nothing about the game's plot. So I really look forward to that one, especially since so many people speak very highly of it. :D

 

..Al

It plays like Ultima IV, but has way more story, interaction, and character development.

 

Right but the Shadowlords were annoying as hell not to mention running out of food again.....

 

I love Ultima V as well but its just short of Ultima IV and maybe even Ultima VII. Mainly due to the difficulty. I had a hard time beating that. Didnt do till the 90's.

 

Best Ultima's are 4-7 in my opinion.

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I disliked 6 and 7's move away from the tile based gameplay and first person dungeons. I mostly hated the lack of first person dungeons. and the lack of turn based combat in 7

 

I have to agree but I really enjoyed it for what it was.

 

Played that game to death along with part 2.

 

Underworld came out around that time.

 

Ultima was king! I miss those days.

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I mean, I like U6 and stuff.

 

Savage Empire was awesome, and uses the engine. It's just, I really like first person dungeons. Sucks they went away.

 

 

Serpent Isle man. That's some more awesome stuff. That game ruled. Easily the best new-style Ultima

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Through one of the links on this thread, I came across a .pdf version of "The Official Book of Ultima 2ed". I am only about half-way through the book, but it is a great read so far. This is more of what I was looking for when I purchased "Ultima: The Ultimate Collector's Guide: 2012 Edition" last year. Lots of information on how and why Ultima I - VI were designed and developed.

 

Another great book I have is called "Sams Teach Yourself Game Programming with DirectX in 21 Days" by Clayton Walnum. Clayton begins the book by talking about playing Ultima on his Atari 400. This book is a step-by-step guide on how to build an Ultima like game in C++ and DirectX.

 

Both books are a little dated, but have great information on designing and developing these types of games.

 

Bill

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I'm not sure how I feel about Ultima X. It's nice that it continues the Ultima story, but it's an MMORPG and I'm not a big fan of them. I mean, MMORPGs are fun, but they are a SOUL SUCKING SUCCUBUS and it's best if I avoid them. :) If I had to play just one MMORPG right now, it'd probably be Eve Online.

 

..Al

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