What is the best Ultima game?

Just got the Origin subscription and when I filtered "RPG" it turns out I have access to all the Ultima games.

Was wondering which ones were your favorite, and why?

Do I need to play in order?

Thank you!

@mrbojangles25: 7. To this day it still feels like the first modern open-world RPG.

All I know is Ultima 4 on SMS has more hours than almost any other game I've ever played. You will either love it or hate it though and it will likely be the pc version which is not as pretty or playable as the sms version.

When it comes to idiosyncratic charm - it has it in spades. You need to talk to everyone and it is always rewarding and often funny. I've never even come close to completing it though - it is a ridiculously long game.

Just remember ginseng and garlic makes cure which you will need if you walk onto a poison tile. You should start with some. But if you die, you just start again in the throne room with some food.

One of the very first and most truly open world games. You can interact with every tile with talk, attack etc and ankhs often talk.

Why not try to go through every game. It should keep you busy for about the next 7 years.

I too have wondered for awhile now which Ultima game to try out, and will likely only give into a single entry. The fanbase can be pretty divided, and because the series is very retro and niche it's difficult to know how to look into the series with an opinion not riddled in bias nostalgia.

For next I'm in a big RPG mood I too find this an interesting question, as it'll be a nice follow-up to the modern RPGs I've played recently.

Read here on GD previously the Ultima series is the reason we have The Elder Scrolls and Divinity: OS the way they are, and if nothing else that intrigues me. D:OSII is certainly a game I hold with very high praise.

The Ultima series seems far too big to try them all in order, otherwise we'll have time for little else. Not to mention just personally want to see if it's acceptable to anyone who didn't grow on the franchise decades gone. Have no issue with retro games but some games are known to be "products of a time" which in my view is a weak argument. Tetris and Pac-Man remain excellent, as does Chrono Trigger, D00M and Dungeon Keeper_

So with the well explained view and recommendation from @Yams1980 it seems Ultima VII is the go-to game I'm personally interested in giving a chance, maybe. Which for non subscribers can be bought on GOG very cheap, along with the mentioned fan mod Exult seeming to make it more compatible with modern P.C.s. Probably best to wait and see what gets mentioned from other fans of the series before finalising a decision. But Yams made a good case and it's better to value earnest over bias views.

In 1996 Computer Gaming Worldnamed Ultima IV as #2 on its Best Games of All Time list on the PC.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ultima_IV:_Quest_of_the_Avatar

I am now researching for my own edification which is the best Ultima game @mrbojangles25 because I want to know, without bias, which is the best.

I've not finished my research yet, but I will say now. Ultima 7 is not a true open world game.

One of the big lies of Ultima 7 is that it’s an open world game

https://www.pcgamer.com/uk/rpgs-may-never-top-ultima-7-but-divinity-original-sin-2-comes-close/

It seems to me at this point that Ultima 7 has achieved an undeserved legendary reputation as the best Ultima game and like Shakespeare, is seriously overrated due to an effect known as received knowledge, that is opinions past down and accepted without criticism.

Now I will talk about Ultima 4 again...

Versions

Ultima 4 has a port on the Apple II, PC88, NES, SMS, PC-DOS, Atari-ST and Amiga that I can be bothered to research right now. I'm not sure any other entry got this many ports. I feel this stands as a testament to the strength of it's design.

Lore

Richard Garriot came under criticism for his themes in the previous Ultima games, having you slaughter a bunch of villagers as part of the required quest in an earlier title. He is quoted as finding this quite distressing on a personal level and design the nest three games (4-6) as the Age of Enlightenment Trilogy which focus on moral actions as the ultimate goal and prerequisite of completion of the game as there are no antagonists in these versions. It is based on the occult, Greek and Egyptian mythology and creates a system of philosophy (as well as invented old-english based language and character set and set of connected principles). Here is a sketch I made from my Ultima 4 tomb of how they connect.

Travel

In Ultima 4, the map is 16 times the size of Ultima 3 and truly open world. You can travel by foot, horse, ship, hot air balloon, moongate (from walking into one) or moongate spell (cast from anywhere). It has wind direction (for sailing and using the 'lighter than air device'). You can use wind spells to speed your progress.

Objective

In Ultima 7 you are tasked to solve the crime of a murder. I believe this to be the thrust of the game and ultimate goal. It is, as mentioned above, a linear game and quests must be completed in sequence.

Ultima 4 is a masterpiece of game design and is completely non-linear. You have multiple objectives to complete in literally any order you like. You don't even need to recruit a single additional party member if you don't want to.

You need to: be an eight parts avatar, attained through moral actions during the course of the game by doing things like not bragging during conversations, not killing innocent people or animals. This includes allowing animals to escape by mashing pass if they are running away. Not running away from fights (although it is very notable that this does not apply to dungeons) for valour and so on. You can check your progress from the seer in castle Britannia.

Once you are virtuous enough in a particular virtue "thou art virtuous enough now, go and meditate" - paraphrased fromHawkwind the seer, you can meditate for three cycles at the appropriate shrine given you know the location, the mantra and have the rune. Meditating for 1 or 2 cycles gives you insight in how to attain.

Once you have achieved full avatarhood you can acquire the mystic arms and weapons. Now you are finally baddass and Balrog's will cower at your might.

Then you need 8 stones scattered throughout the map. The stones are used in various combinations at the shrines at the bottom of dungeons. For reasons. I've not done even one yet so can't remember exactly why you are doing this.

Here is a map I made of how the dungeons connect together form the altar rooms (truth, love and courage) on the bottom levels.

You can speed run through them if you want with Up and Down and exit at any time with eXit.

Then when you have all the special items and a ship with a strengthened hull with the magic wheel you are ready to enter the Stygian Abyss.

To say this game is epic is a serious understatement. There are no restrictions on actions but if you stray you will lose an 'eighth' and it makes a sound that will haunt your dreams. "Argh! What was that noise!" "Thou hast lost an eighth" "Thou hast lost an eighth" "Thou hast lost an eighth" "Shit, I should not have been lazy and just turned away from that beggar." Back to giving your last coin to a beggar ten times in a row for compassion/humility.

Combat

Ultima 7 is a linear detective game and has little to no combat, of which, has no strategy. It is just mashing fire. So there is very little depth to combat in U7.

U4 on the other hand has a deceptively deep combat system. Yeah it's annoying at first because everyone moves so slowly but here are some tips. Don't move forward. Let them move to you. This gives you the first hit when they move in. Mash pass rapidly to get them to walk up to you, this will make fights move more briskly. Then just mash attack until they're all dead. There are spell to buff your army, represented by a letter in the lower-right where your avatarhood progress is usually displayed (slowly becoming an ankh when you have all 8 virtues).

Magic

There are 26 spells, one for each letter of the alphabet (pretty much). They are created by combining re-agents, bought in shops, some of which are hidden.

Mandrake root and Nightshade can only be collected from a single tile (you will need a sextant) at specific points at the moon cycles which are constantly moving like a clock, one faster and one slower each with eight positions.

If you make a mistake you will lose your reagents so this can be bad if you set it to mix 20 or so. "It fizzles" is a bad message.

Make lots of quick spells. This will allow you to plough through fights with lots of enemies without taking damage and will last into more than one fight if you get fights in quick succession.

Blink spell is very useful in getting to hard to reach places combined with gems to see a map overview of your position.

^ shops with reagent costs

Soundtrack

As far as a soundtrack goes. Ultima 4 is the best. Composed by Garriot's friend Kenneth W. Arnold (included in the game as Iolo). That is iolo not Lolo as I always thought due to me being dumb and not being able to tell the difference between a capital I and L. The tunes somehow manage never to get annoying. Even after the ten trillionth play.

My favourite version is the SMS version due to the simple clarity of the simple tones of the SMS psg sound chip. I am learning the score on a simple Casio keyboard for fun as they are so charmingly simple but at once kind of epic and rousing and not challenging to play.

This is followed by the Apple II 'mocking bird' sound card version. Then the PC88 version with it's twangy tones. C64 SID chip version which is more crunchy and raw. The NES version took liberties and threw out the legendary soundtrack for a generic medi-evil score, although it is decent in itself. You could also, as it's midi, run it though any sound card you like.

Conclusion

The age of enlightenment trilogy is a very unique rpg series with truly open world and non-linear progression based on a strict morality system which severely punishes transgressions in your moral actions.

With no protagonist, the pace feels very mellow and with no sense of urgency, you are encouraged to consider your surroundings more closely and thoughtfully.

The soundtrack is driving and haunting at the same time (apart from on NES) and the jester's wildly flailing their arms around and getting in your way are somehow an genuine salve to the the seriousness.

Does the mad bagger really make the sun rise every morning? We may never know.

I can say with confidence this game is worth playing today without the fog of nostalgia clouding my vision.

The sense of scale of the world for newcomers is overwhelming at first and you are frustrated by having no hand holding at all. The original came with a map and booklet with all but a few of the spells which you need to find out in the game (iceball is one of them) so it's not cheating to write all the originally provided spells down (apart from the hidden ones) and have a map to hand (if not the screenshotted map as this can make it a bit too easy). Better to user the hand drawn map as it also come with things like 'Beasties here' written on it.

If your not bothered about authenticity or Garriot's original vision and grew up in 1980's USA you may prefer Nintendo's jrpg version. But this is of course, sacrilege.

Probably the very best Master System game. But the PC trilogy, I'd wager are quite playable too.

My original thread 'Moral Choices in RPG’s and why Ultima 4 is the best game ever made'. https://www.gamespot.com/forums/system-wars-314159282/moral-choices-in-rpgs-and-why-ultima-4-is-the-best-33433214/

"I personally think it’s one of the best games ever developed." - Peter Tieryas

Peter Tieryas is a character artist who has worked on films like Guardians of the Galaxy, Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs 2, and Alice in Wonderland...

His writing has been published in places like Kotaku, Kyoto Journal, Tor.com, Electric Literature, Evergreen Review, and ZYZZYVA

https://www.tor.com/2015/03/18/whats-the-point-of-an-rpg-without-a-main-villain-how-ultima-iv-changed-the-game/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ultima_IV:_Quest_of_the_Avatar

NES review.

Metal Jesus Rocks series retrospective.

I'm told 4 has the best story but 7 is the most modern of those worth playing. You don't really have to play them in order I think.

Thank you for the responses everyone. @jackamomo that was an incredibly detailed response, thank you for that. I will have to come back and read it all.

@mrbojangles25: Hopefully anyone with the time will find something interesting in there too.

It seems Ultima's 7-9 take a more action approach to the rpg genre than the first 6.

I am more interested in Ultima Underworld 1 and 2 (plotline continuing from 6) and the Ultima Online game, amazingly, still going.

But really Shroud of the Avatar genuinely excites me although I don't think it's official cannon.

[EDIT] U4 was released on these systems:

Amiga, Apple II, Atari 8-bit, Atari ST, C64, DOS, FM Towns, MSX2, NEC PC-8801, NEC PC-9801, NES, SMS, Fujitsu FM-7, Sharp X1, X68000.

https://strategywiki.org/wiki/Ultima_IV:_Quest_of_the_Avatar

At least it come downs to two games so far, that's a relief.

Wonder if we'll get more Ultima veterans discussing if VII is better than IV, or vice versa?

Case we don't however found this on GFAQ, take it as one will. . it is GFAQ after all

Best game for a newbie to the Ultima series?

Hi C 7 parts 1 and 2 are by far the best game in the series.

MarceloSampaio To me, the best on the series are 4-6. They are AMAZING games, that DESERVE to be played. Also, they are easy to get into, mostly

7 is great too, but the inventory system sucks, and the battle system is too automatic for my tastes. Still, the story is amazing, the world is huge and the interactivity with the background items is perfect. BTW, the game is almost completely open. It's not the best entry for a newbie, since you'll be overwhelmed with so much freedom.

The cranky hermit Ultima VII is a must play. Every serious gamer should play it. I wrote about why here:

http://thecrankyhermit.shoutwiki.com/wiki/GA101_-_Ultima_VII

Ultima VII is a great RPG out of the box.

Golden_Gonads Personally, if I were to play them now, the main two I'd be interested in are Ultima IV and Ultima VII. U4 sets up the world perfectly, and has a unique story, pretty much completely different to anything else I've ever played. U7 is a lot more traditional, and personally I consider it to be the father of modern RPG's. It doesn't quite hold up to modern standards, but the story I think makes up for that.

fargus2 4 is a piece of gaming history and it's free on GOG, although it's immediate successors improved on the gameplay.

Ultima 7 still has pretty amazing stuff in terms of gameplay, great interactivity in terms of items and NPC's, the writing improves upon the previous games, and the quests are more complex and numerous. However, the combat kind of takes a step back, being a clunky real time mess. Ultima 7-2 uses the same engine to tell a more focused story, but with a more linear structure.

l337Bossman Ultima VII is the best one but if you start with it you're going to be missing a lot. Your companions are supposed to mean something to you but you won't even know who they are. Honestly, if you want the full experience you should start with 4 or 5 and go on from there.

There was also a book that covered 4, 5, and 6 if I remember correctly which could be a good way to catch up.

I checked and Ultima IV is still free on GOG.

Oh man, 47 mb install for Ultima 7. That's the one I'm going to try f irst.

Feel free to share your thoughts I'm leaning towards VII myself, but likely won't dive in till summer.

Ashamed to say this, but...I can't play it. I gave it a few minutes (not long enough, some might say), but just couldn't do it.

No disrespect to the game--I am sure it is a great game--but it's just too dated for me :(

*sigh*

@mrbojangles25: Hahaha, is it that dated? only seen it from screenshots. While to each his or her own, didn't look as ugly on the eyes as some of the retro games I've jumped on.

Did you use the Exult mod in the link? It's suppose to tidy up the visuals to a modern set-up. May help ツ

At anycase can relate, tend to find early 3D games very difficult to play. Especially those in a first person perspective due to up close blurry textures, triggers my nausea symptoms. 2D games I tend to think hold together better.

I heard good things about Dude, Where's My Avatar. Truth Love and Courage have been replaced by Sex, Drugs and Rock'n'Roll

http://crpgaddict.blogspot.com/2011/09/ultima-iv-part-2-what-happend-in.html

@mrbojangles25 Ultima 7 is riding the hype train right now. It doesn't control well. I watched a video. The mod just increases the resolution which you probably don't want as things would then be too small.

If your not bothered about fancy graphics play Ultima 1-6. The first three are actually short games and you get to fly a magic carpet.

If your really, really not bothered about graphics try Lords of Midnight from the ZX Spectrum for a history lesson in western rpgs.

It was somewhere between a text adventure and err, graphical text adventure.

What hype train? The game is older than D00M. While I have no real say on Ultima just yet as a series, I don't really follow your logic on UVII and much of the above seems to contradict what I found in this fan review, seems pretty open ended, not that it would be a feature I'm looking forward to. . .

GA101 - Ultima VII

The first three are actually short games and you get to fly a magic carpet.

Emm, ok. . UVII has a magic carpet also

Which really begs the question. Are you slamming a game you haven't played. . again?

Or did you give up on UVII early-on? (according to the review the carpet can be found in the first hour) Seems to me another case of you casting false judgement on games you've never played. ala Resident Evil games, Dragon's Crown, D00M (2016), Armored Core. It's not as though you don't already have a history for this Jackamomo. But c'mon!

You can root for Ultima IV, that's awesome. Seems to be a fan favorite as well but do you really need to go out your way playing salesman against the other well praised entry, when you know nothing about it?

The mod just increases the resolution which you probably don't want as things would then be too small.

Actually is for optimising on modern platforms and changes the visuals to look less jarring. Apparently completely redrawn from the ground up according to the Exult page. Won some award for how well received it was likewise.

Shouldn't make wild assessments on a random Youtube video. You already did that for Armored Core and I called out a lot of contradictions to your inaccurate evaluation. Would have thought you would have learnt that wasn't really a wise way to assess a game. Sure you wouldn't like us to do that with Ultima IV so why feel inclined to do so yourself constantly.

At anyrate I'm having an issue even getting Ultima VII prepped as I can't find a range of language subtitles for me to play. While I put on a good show here, English is certainly not my preferred language. So if Ultima can only be played in English, French and German as the options grant, that is awful. And seems your UIV suffers a similar issue. So I have to pass anyway.

Too bad, I was looking forward to a Retro RPG in the summer when I have more time. .

*Someone (probably not Jackamomo) let me know if a fan mod exists for different languages in either UIV or UVII. Reliable mods/ links only please. Would be appreciated

@RSM-HQ: Oh c'mon RSM, you can read English fine. I'm sure you could handle a few thee = you and thine = yours, thats about the only derivation from modern english in those games.

I'm not precious about Ultima 4. If you diss it I won't mind too much. It is ancient after all. But it has alot of heart so I'm recommending it mostly for it's unusual style within the genre and overall witty writing and thoughtful plot.

It's honestly the only tile based rpg I ever played. By the time I had a pc, it was a 486dx66 so those tile based rpgs were in the past already.

You really need to use your imagination in a game where characters are only 12x12 pixels but there is enough to look at to bring you into it's world and the music is most effecting.

I'm not saying U7 is bad. It's just not as free as the previous games in terms of movements and actions. You can ride the magic carpet but you can't control it, it's like a taxi ride.

The old pc versions are quite dark in Ultima's 1-6 which could be off putting. The NES or SMS versions might be better to play these days as you don't have to type everything like 'talk' and you get menus to mix spells and such.

Thats the thing about the old Ultima games, they were of their time, but the Nintendo and Sega ports of U4 treat it with alot of care and make them more playable these days. Perhaps there is a Japanese NES version of U4.

Ultima 5 on PC98 should be playable in Japanese and has nicer graphics than it's pc counterparts I think.

Ultima 5 - PC98
Ultima 5 - MS-DOS

Having said that, as Ultima 4 was released on a number of Japanese only pc's, I'm sure you can play it in Japanese.

Pretty much all the Ultima's 1-6 are on these systems: MSX2, NEC PC-8801, NEC PC-9801, Fujitsu FM-7, Sharp X1, X68000. Which were Japan only pc's.

There was a mobile port of Ultima 4 which lasted a year, on iOS but it was a micro-transaction game with multiplayer and really just used the setting.

Ultima 6 is the last to use tiles but they are the prettiest tiles.

I feel like I'm nearing finishing U4 and may well go on to play 5 next.

Another game which reminds me of these games is Heroes of Might and Magic: Warriors of the Eternal Sun. It has dinky combat but the intro theme is seriously rocking.

As for how Ultima 7 got so hyped. It stems from a gushing article a year or two ago from Rock Paper Shotgun that grossly exaggerated the amount of interaction with the world you can have, focusing on bread making and claims of freedom and world interactivity which are just not true.

For me a modern gamer should play the hack and slash Pagan games (8&9) or Ultima Underworld games. The worlds first true 3d first person games.

Looking into the console ports if U4, the NES is paired back a bit but it's mostly there and the soundtrack, although not from the original, is still quite good.

The PC version of U4 looks pretty crap though. You can't fire in diagonal directions with projectiles during combat, only horizontal or vertical (what?!) and the graphics are also a bit weak compared to the NES or SMS versions. The 3d dungeons are no Phantasy Star dungeons and everything needs typing in.

https://ultima.fandom.com/wiki/Console_Ports_of_Ultima_IV

Ultimas 1-6 are relics from the MUD (multiple user dungeons) of pure text based gameplay though. I actually used to know a guy who ran his own, who clearly had a god complex. Wherein the point is that any action is possible and the dungeon master can change anything he likes on a whim in a truly open world, like a (none-computer) D'n'D game.

Ha do I sense sarcasm

To give a serious answer. Would find it more difficult knowing it's a text heavy series as the above states "conversations make 90% of all Ultima games" couldn't handle that much without a translation mod. It would take me hours to follow 20 minutes of 'gameplay'.

I'm not precious about Ultima 4. If you diss it I won't mind too much. It is ancient after all. But it has alot of heart so I'm recommending it mostly for it's unusual style within the genre and overall witty writing and thoughtful plot.

Have nothing against a game which have yet to experience. That's the intent I was making in that scenario. It seems you are passionate about a game and that's fantastic! And want people to at least give UIV a fair chance, respectful. Even go as far as to down another well regarded game in the series as much as possible. . not so much.

Which honestly didn't help when other views contradict what UVII actually offers. You should be confident a good game you enjoy stands on its own merits without doing that.

Moving on, one well written game personally found continuously witty was The Secret of Monkey Island. its sequel was more fart humor. And the voice dub voices are very good all considering. Otherwise I rarely consider games well written or telling great stories anyhow, I'm more interested in the actual RPG mechanics in these games.

Couldn't tell you the overall plot for Divinity: Original Sin II and I've beaten that game three times. Thinking it's a very good game. Knowing that series was inspired by Ultima is the real reason for my interest. Also I do like these kind of european myth and legends games following Dungeons and Dragon systems.

You really need to use your imagination in a game where characters are only 12x12 pixels but there is enough to look at to bring you into it's world and the music is most effecting.

Have no issue actually trying to see what developers intended to accomplish with older hardware. Sometimes I even find it charming what developers did with such limitations. Baburu Boburu is a game made around the same time and I adore that game.

I'm not saying U7 is bad. It's just not as free as the previous games in terms of movements and actions. You can ride the magic carpet but you can't control it, it's like a taxi ride.

And that strikes me as odd. When most shown who follow Ultima use the term "freedom" for UVII. As though it broke out its mould. Am I assume it was because they moved away from this tile movement system?

As for the carpet. Wonder if they have a design reason to do that so it couldn't be exploited. Eitherway it does seem the movement is an issue, early form of free roaming around wide spaces are likely a result of limitations. One of the posts in the poll above does state the inventory and movement is "clunky". I'm sure if nothing I can adjust to the games intent. So long as the fundamentals are solid.

The NES or SMS versions might be better to play these days as you don't have to type everything like 'talk' and you get menus to mix spells and such.

It seems that's part the issue, have noticed you give the Mark III version the most praise as did the poll from GFAQ sadly I avoid illegal emulation for various reason, is also just not a subject Forums take kindly. And I do not have the retro console.

Assume if I do find a language mod for IV, it will be the P.C. version at any case. Though at this point it'll be first come first serve between VII and IV. They come across as the best of the bunch. So long as one is in a preferred language I can give it a go. Otherwise may just look into something else_

Thats the thing about the old Ultima games, they were of their time

Hope they're more than that. That phrase usually means they was never good, but people put up with it anyway. Like 3D Sonic the Hedgehog games. . And Bubsy the Cat.

Anyhow rarely write off a game solely because it's old, some retro games from my experience run circles around majority of the modern gaming market. Even most the popular ones in arcades are well past my age.

Perhaps there is a Japanese NES version of U4

On a Famicom never seen a copy. Super Potato is a known chain I visit for retro games, and honestly didn't even know Ultimas existence till mid last year. Believe it's either extremely rare or just never came overseas.

Having said that, as Ultima 4 was released on a number of Japanese only pc's, I'm sure you can play it in Japanese.

GOG claims to cover all regions of the games physical release. If it has no Japanese option, it was either lost to time or was published in another language which would not be surprising. Some games are released in English or German. Especially older games of european or american ports.

Ultima 6 is the last to use tiles but they are the prettiest tiles.

Assure you a game doesn't need to be pretty to get my attention. The conversation with @mrbojangles25 was referring to Ultima VII at anycase. Which I assume is considered the best looking up till that point.

Unless it's found out UVII was only liked on visuals it just oddly is the one getting more my attention.

Heroes of Might and Magic: Warriors of the Eternal Sun. It has dinky combat but the intro theme is seriously rocking.

No games perfect, but that theme is really good.

Well I still hope to get one of them set-up to try out so till then glad we cleared that one more peacefully. I prefer less confrontation

IMO, skip 4 and go for 7. 4 has not aged well. At all. It's free on GoG if you want to give it a go. But there are a lot of classic RPGs that have aged far better (I.e. are more fun to play NOW), even if they were less revolutionary in their time

Would love to read some suggestions, and may be helpful to OP as well.

@RSM-HQ: well like I said, 7 is great and much more palatable. Phantasy Star IV and Chrono Trigger are on my mind a lot these days. All Black Isle games, for something newer. But to the OP my vote is 7 for today. 4 is damn old, and it shows; no matter how special it was at the time. My 2 cents

@xantufrog: Love Chrono Trigger on the DS, great taste! I'll look into Black Isle, tried two Phantasy Star games and well. I don't want to be negative_

Thank you for the suggestions

@RSM-HQ: Phantasy Star 1 Sega Ages on Switch looks amazing - was a better game in theory than 2, now more in truth thanks to some big quality of life improvements. But I haven't had a chance to give it a go yet. So between 2 and 4, there's the same issue between Ultima 4 and 7 - the former just feels too dated (although Ultima 4 is much more dated)

Check out the Wizardry and Shining Force series for some other interesting old school RPG variety! Black Isle are much newer - but I mean, Planescape Torment and Baldur's Gate... Really some of the best RPGs to still play today

@RSM-HQWould find it more difficult knowing it's a text heavy series as the above states

U4 is not text heavy at all. What I meant was that they are influenced by text based MUD online games from the 80's but there is actually very little dialogue in U4.

The only thing about this game is it has no journal. You are given all the information needed to finish it, piecemeal from npc's scattered across the world in no particular order. That is this game's biggest challenge. You will need a pen and paper, it's designed like that. You could use alt-tab and Notepad too obviously.

The pc ports of this game are nothing like as good as the SMS version. It sad you won't use emulation as there is no other way to play these games aside from the pc-dos/mac versions on gog because the strategywiki states they were all released in Japan and they came out on everything that was going at the time.

They were of there time but I don't mean they are clunky or difficult to play. Ultima 4 remains the most revolutionary rpg in terms of game design but that open philosophy was never copied. Garriot's vision was to have your actions have ramifications within the game world and to have you role play like a true d'n'd'er. Not to play for stats and equipment but to consider how your actions may actually affect the game world at large.

The thing is, Ultima 4 on PC is very different to the SMS version. Notably, you can only fire projectiles at horizontal or vertical 90 degree angles on pc. This seem crazy to me coming from the SMS version which has no such limitation. Also the PC versions have you guess the keywords to ask people to progress the game whereas in the SMS version additional conversation options present themselves if you ask the right question initially or have completed the first part of the quest to unlock that conversation option. It tends to be asking about their "Job?".

Having looked more into the NES version I can say it looks horrible. They have really cut out alot of key features such as wind, food and spell mixing and your party is limited to 4 members.

Oh yes and it's Dungeons and Dragons, not Heroes of Might and Magic: Warriors of the Eternal Sun. Duh.

The sms version of this game is quite playable today if you have the patience to accustom yourself to an old fashioned game. Far more accessible than the pc versions which are in fairness quite ugly in comparison.

Oh yes and Chrono Trigger is a Final Fantasy clone and Phantasy Star 3 is better than 4.

Ultima 5 and 6 fix many of the problems of 4 such as no diagonal firing of projectiles on pc and seem quite playable and are the true free roaming games that 7 falls short of actually being.

Oh and I never mentioned, Ultima 4 has a psychoanalysis test at the beginning to determine your class for you from a set of moral dilemmas you are asked to answer.

This reviewer from 2009 did not like this game. His review is about 4 paragraphs but may well be what most people coming cold into this series could feel.

You just need to not be in a hurry and go around chatting to people. They say some pretty interesting stuff.

You're doing that thing again Jack. Making false statements.

Anyone who plays Chrono Trigger for at least an hour knows actions have consequences, and in a very interesting way. Aspects are even closer to a point and click adventure games. Characters die based on your actions, protagonist cease to exist, and the court judges seemingly mundane actions. Plenty of endings, some of which can be achieved very quickly. Not to mention a 'active' combat system, while still turn base it was already pushing for thinking on the fly for accessibility.

These kind of choices I don't recall being a feature in the Final Fantasy games I played, Final Fantasy is much like its combat, overly scripted. Though Final Fantasy is a large series so I may have missed some with at least more player paths_

And this scripted way of turnbase gameplay was in Final Fantasy and no offence the Phantasy Star games. Looking back at my SEGA collection I dipped in both PS III and IV. They're less about the mechanics and routes, but the story and character development. Good for people who like both, now as games Phantasy Star while older came across as a worse Suikoden game. Not to battle the two but Suikoden II is a better Phantasy Star game than Phantasy Star IV. And this is why I avoided bring up before.

Recall Phantasy Star also coming across as insultingly streamlined, you could set moves in an order before you even get into an encounter. . This removes connection to the player, which begs the question why even have combat at all.

I can say that as someone who has experienced both series.

You Jackamomo have not played Chrono Trigger, try it one day, your YT isn't giving you a good perspective.

*Final Fantasy games I've tried are Final Fantasy IV 3D, Final Fantasy VII, and Final Fantasy X. Non play like Chrono Trigger.

Ultima 7 is the most well balanced one. And is the game that served as the inspiration for divinity: original sin.

Ultima 5 has the best story. Ultima 6 has the best combat.

@RSM-HQ: Chrono Trigger is a Final Fantasy clone based on the battle system and style of story progression. Jeez. It is the same as FF1 on NES in that regard but nicer graphx.

I have no time for any PS game apart from 3 which I admit combat is kind of simple, despite having a more complicated system than it's siblings in the rows and columns, splitting enemies into four groups with some weapons hitting a whole row and some a column.

Combat is streamlined in PS3 to the point battles can be over in under a second and that's not an exaggeration. You can fully automata the battle (they just keep attacking) or automate one round (usually enough to kill everything) or you can get them defending each other or casting spells of course if you think it will be a tough fight.

Backgrounds are less detailed the PS4 but better then PS2 (just a grid). The music in PS3 is epic though. You just go through the story and pick up new weapons when it's time for new weapons. It's very linear.

Technique can be rebalanced along four different axis to specialise a character in a particular spell of the four spells each character starts and ends with. So you can experiment with different character builds in that respect.

It's a story focused game and basically linear but if you get far you can travel across maps using Wren (they all hop on his back and you fly to airports) or shrines scattered around the worlds when you get the ring or something.

I do not like the characters in PS4, they are dicks. I don't like SNES jrpg's they are too twee.

Will defo check out Suikoden II if it's in english. But I'm all about the Mega Drive right now so no time for PSX games.

More on Ultima 4 (SMS)

I’ve spent several hours revisiting Ultima 4 on the SMS now. It’s been a good number of years since I played U4 (NES version not included) and I’d think I’d forgotten just how good it was. It’s providing a constant challenge but there is always a goal within reach and enough variety to keep my interest going. A game this old is never going to be an easy sell to a younger gamer but once Ultima 4 grabs your attention it’s not hard to see why the game is regarded as such a classic in the genre.

The combat system does have one tweak over Ultima 5 in that I can cycle between monsters when choosing what to attack which is a real timesaver.

http://www.pixsoriginadventures.co.uk/ultima-4-sega-master-system-part-2/

The pc versions 1-6 have patches to improve upon the original versions. http://www.pixsoriginadventures.co.uk/category/ultima-patcher/

But I think, coming new into this series, stop being a baby and just play the first 6 as they defined what the games are in tone and storylines.

They are not that difficult and the graphics aren't that bad. The music and writing is key to these games I think and only a tile based game can be truly open world.

Overall rating (out of four stars): 4 – Ultima IV is the Ultima game to play. This game was revolutionary in a way that’s hard to explain today. There was simply nothing like it. This game captivated me when I was young and I daresay it actually helped make me into a better person. I recommend this game to anyone who is looking for something different and willing to take the time and patience to master it.

http://retrosensei.com/2018/12/review-ultima-iv-quest-of-the-avatar/

I think Ultima VII is the game to play.

You know what, this argument isn't worth having not when it's very late here. Anyone who plays Chrono Trigger knows better, going to move goalposts back to languages ok_

Found a link about languages on the exult.sourceforge website with custom text mods, one discussion linked a Japanese setting that is 1MB large. Case the link isn't safe won't post here. I would rather not risk it.

Apparently the only Ultima game to be in complete Japanese was Ultima: Underworld. A collection was released in Japan Ultima 1-5. But was entirely in German outside of the box art and manual.

Skip the first 3 and play 4-7 and the Underworld games.

7 is cool, but unfortunately the combat really sucks and was much better in previous games.

I think overall 5 or 6 is the best from the mainline Ultima games.

The Underworlds are great (especially the first one) but they're a completely different deal all together and not really representative of the main series.

@RSM-HQ: he's got his axe to grind. I'm just ignoring it.

Don't blame you, he's a very dismissive person. Basing majority his paragraphs about unplayed games on watching clip shows and pondering thoughts. Usually from IGN using rave background music and five seconds of gameplay. Which is not factual/ useful. Seen this for Metal Wolf, Streets of Rage Remake, Dragon's Crown, Armored Core, Dark Souls, and the list goes on. Sure he's done so since joining the forums_

I admire when Jackamomo is passionate about games (likely because he's at least played them for an hour), even inspired me to play a game a while back with a blog about World of Tanks. And some of his Ultima IV information above was interesting.

Commonly pretentious towards games out of his comfort-zone, so I have to believe it's intentional. If someone likes it, he won't

Every Ultima game reviewed in depth by an Ultima uber-fan.

He's quite funny too.

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLpaNqz1vDmSixriNnNTD3FKXJ5D_y9wKS

[EDIT] It's clear no-one here has actually played Ultima 7 because they would have corrected me when I said you can't control the magic carpet when you actually can, so yeah.

I might be the only person in this thread who has actually played an Ultima game so that kind of gives me the authority here.

4 is still the best. :P

Be interesting to see the TC's opinions once they play 4 and 7

mrbojangles25 already checked out on Ultima. Look at post #13

It's why I thought the other recommendations would be helpful.

@jackamomo said:

[EDIT] It's clear no-one here has actually played Ultima 7 because they would have corrected me when I said you can't control the magic carpet when you actually can, so yeah.

So you admit lying to newbies looking for honest opinions about this franchise, just to put your favorite game over UVII?

4 is still the best. :P

You've made it clear that you are in no position to make that claim with credibility.

@RSM-HQ: ah yes - well it's safe to say they will not side with Jackamomo if they ever give 4 a try then. I love retro gaming, but sometimes old games just feel... old.

Digital Antiquarian just released this article on 7 a few days ago...

https://www.filfre.net/2019/02/ultima-vii/

As mentioned in #5 I never dismiss a game solely on its age. It is however my opinion that some games are beloved on a shallow gimmick. And eventually that magic wears off, as at its core offers little enjoyable. Whether that be visuals, story, music, just to name a few. These features can enhance an experience but should never be the be-all-to-end-all of a game (example-Heavy Rain)

If we look back at Tetris, D00M, Worms, Pac-Man, Super Mario Bros. All these games are still exceedingly enjoyable. Your avatar Lemmings, again, a very enjoyable game. I could name way-way more. And its because mechanically they are designed to be fun, replayable, and didn't just rely on something shiny and hollow to get customers attention.

Will probably never try IV, while I was already leaning towards VII, Jackamomo has put me off IV. Chances are he's troIIing us newer kids (me and TC) to play an inferior product for kicks.

@RSM-HQ: I'm just being honest. Ultima 7 looks ok but the combat has little strategy aside from preparation. You press a button and everyone auto-attacks until everything is dead. Movement is a bit jerky too, but that might not bother everyone.

1-3 are genuinely old and coded by Garriot on his own, aged 15 on an Apple II. They are a bit silly compared to 4-6 which were made by actually more than one person and much fleshed out games.

It was in 4 that the series gained it's hook which is being the avatar who strives for virtue and laid out the system of virtues. 5 and 6 build on 4 in scope and technology.

7 is a bit of a departure in gameplay style form the first 6 games and the inventory system has been mentioned to be a pain.

But I want to play all these games. Even the ones people hate. Because alot of this hate is based on games not being consistent with plot line, but in the end, there are just games to me.

Ultima 8 lost it's dev team early into development because they were moved onto working on Ultima Online (by EA who had just bought Origin), so it is a flawed product but it still looks fun to me. Although as far as being virtuous goes, you go on a bit of a murderous rampage and do some questionable things but I'm not precious about story.

Ultima 1 and 2 are more curios than full games and have lazers and space travel so are quite off the wall. 3 onwards are decent stories.

The trouble with 4 is, without looking up what you have to do, you've got very little chance of completing it without a seriously concerted effort and a dedicated notebook. You can speed run it in under 3 hours but if you role play it (like Garriot would like) it's hundreds of hours. The only problem is U4 has no diagonal firing in battle and dark graphics. 5 and 6 fix these problems but 4 is the introduction to the modern series and theme of Avatarhood and system of virtues.

The writing in 7 is a bit sillier and it's not as open world as the earlier games but it's still pretty open and I think you can kill chuckles.

I intend to play all these games apart from 0-2 and Underworld 2 (which has balance issues apparently).

@bussinrounds: That is the longest review I've ever seen.

I will always have a soft spot for Ultima 4, not only for the story and gameplay, but also because when I was a kid, it was the first PC game I ever saved up for and bought on my own. I will never forget puzzling out various aspects of the game on pen and paper and trying to figure out what to do next. Sometimes it took awhile, but it always felt rewarding and fun, and I was always motivated to keep playing till the end :)

@lady_aijou:Playing these games now lose a little bit because when you bought Ultima games when they first came out, you got a whole pack of exciting items like Ankh pendants, cloth maps etc. In my case, the SMS version had a history of Britannia as told by Kyle the Younger, a spell book and a paper map. Which just all help to demonstrate the care taken in creating this imaginary world which you couldn't help but appreciate.

@RSM-HQ I can't blame mrbojangles for not wanting to get involved in which version of the game she preferred after a cursory look as you have now made this whole thread about your personality versus mine and if she would dare not to choose the game you have favoured you will be p*ssed off.

And all because I said Armoured Core was a shallow arena shooter from a dumb developer who can't do complicated. You asked for that though because you posted AC was your favourite mech game in a thread which had the title 'Which FASA Mechwarrior game do you prefer?' whilst AC is not FASA game or even a simulation game as such had almost nothing to do with the thread. Also because I found Dragon's Crown shallow and a missed opportunity by a hack developer, Vanillaware. You also dissed Frame Gride by From Software, which I don't think is a bad game despite me not having a whole lot of respect for the developer overall.

I do really miss all the awesome pack-ins in games

Ultima 4 Sega Master System: The definitive Ultima experience.

An 11 minute contemporary look at an old game.

Ludonarrative dissonance is the conflict between a video game's narrative told through the story and the narrative told through the gameplay. Ludonarrative, a compound of ludology and narrative, refers to the intersection in a video game of ludic elements (gameplay) and narrative elements. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ludonarrative_dissonance

Ludonarrative gameplay is the highest state a game can aim for.

That is the telling of a story through gameplay alone. A story you play.

Ultima 4 achieves this is the most complete and successful way more than any game made before or since.

The genuine simple nature of the combination of gameplay elements combine to create the purest gameplay experience which achieves the experience of or feeling of being within the world through action alone. That is, immersion.

The serious nature of its' execution is so pure and direct that it instantly permeates into your life with it's important and serious message of compassion, sacrifice and the real difference in fortunes of people who are all ultimatley the same some. Delivered in such an innocent way. An npc could be in an orphanage and have the sickly character sprite. Ultima 4 was moving on a number of levels and it's emotional reach has never been touched upon since.

Never before in a video game has I seen an npc which as a beggar which you could actually give money to.

But the key point here is that nothing was automated. No cut scenes. Every movement was a direct and an instant key stroke and button press with the message displayed instantly to read.

This gave the game the feel that you were in complete control at all times.

You could flip out any any second any just go nuts killing everyone in town with 4 magic wands. But that wasn't rewarding. So you do it a few times then moved on to finishing the game.

But you can never finish Ultima 4. It was even designed like that. The key word asked of you to complete the game when you conquer the final level of the Sygian Abbys was, apparently left out of a conversation thread.

So you could literally never finish that game unless you translated the symbols from meditating at all the 8 shrines.

Which you can't do unless you have the map and guide on the back to decode the lettering.

So Ultima 4 gave you every chance you want to put yourself back what could be a couple, tens, or hundreds hours of hours of gaming if you decided to ransack every town in sequence for instance. Just for kicks.

You could trap Chuckles in 4 electric fields and pelt him with your sling if you really wanted too.

It's a bit like catholicism though where you can just keep saying hail mary's and visiting Hawkwind the seer and your back on track soon enough.

I built up an armada of about 5 ships, 2 balloons and a couple of horses around the fields of castle Britannia when I was 15 or so. I had a pocket full of blink spells and 99 gems.

The thing is. The dungeons kind of scare me. I prefer staying above ground. You can get stuck in those things under falling rocks going round in circles under falling rocks with your candle going out for hours on end. Mostly going into the same battle as you backtrack to and fro gemming all over the place and trying to find the stone room and eXit.

But it's all doable and within reach and there are no tips or tutorials.

The thing is. This game has a sound track which is almost the equal to the game design itself. Written by Ken Arnold, the litling lutes and harpsichords use simple 5ths and 7ths to create medievil parlour music which is the most fitting of any game ever made and the high point of the series in it's timeless simplicity.

Ultima 4 just goes on forever and people don't like to accept that. That is what a Richard Garriot game is. It just goes on forever in a sort of lego land of interchangeable bits.

The only true Richard Garriot games are Ultima 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 and 6.

When 7 was made the team was into the hundreds and Ultima 7 was the first million dollar game.

Richard Was pushed into the broom closet and they forgot to invite him to their golf game.

What Lord British would like for his players is to have them have a fun time. Challenge and entertain them. But there are rules. But the rules are fair. Because he made them.

Ultima 4 makes sense in a way no other Ultima game does. It's less of a game than a virtue exerciser, you huff and puff and try to buff up your virtue stats and it's tiring.

But you can almost see the point.

You are meditating on yourself.

This game breaks the fourth wall on a number of occasions and talks to you directly and even makes fun of itself at times.

The game is asking you to role play and imagine you are really that person. The concept of The Avatar, is that there is no character. The character is you. He has no name or is referred to as The Stranger. That is at the core of the strength of the idea behind Ultima 4. You are playing yourself. For real.

If you go up to a beggar and murder her for no reason. You are going to have nightmares.

If you do it, you don't do it again. It's kind of like a Catholic school in that way. Strict.

There is no story to Ultima 4. At all. It's all just history and lessons and riddles. The game is a true open world life simulator. You have food which you can buy in different places for different prices. Spells need to be shopped for and you can rip the idiot reagent sellers off as much as you like. They are stupid!

There is no story because Ultima 4 is a mediation simulator. You meditate on yourself. Virtue. The real world and how you relate to it. A person from the Ultima 4 comment section said she tatooed Truth, Love and Courage onto her arm in the runic symbols from Ultima 4. That is love for a game.

Ultima 4 is the most groundbreaking piece of game design in the history of rpg's if not all gaming.

https://www.filfre.net/2014/07/ultima-iv/?unapproved=411431&moderation-hash=66b545509afbd852e41fe144b49220db#comment-411431