The Elder Scrolls of its Time.
Ultima Underworld 2 cost me a lot - it is the first first person game I can remember playing that truly gave me the impression of a 3D environment and placed into a fantasy context I was completely unable to back away from it until I beat it.
With the exception of Wing Commander, at the time I hadn't felt this way about a game since Pitfall or Super Mario Brothers.
I actually quit one job because I couldn't stop playing the game and my roommate at the time moved out because he grew tired of the phone bills I ran up yakking about it on one BBS or another. For you kids out there a BBS is what you dialed into if you had no access to the internet backbone, the granddaddy of chat room forums and file sharing and it often cost you long distance fees.
Basically some poor person dedicated a PC and several phone lines to supporting the equivalent of a full features web site usually in ANSI text form. I actually miss the experience; today's Blade Runner-like, corporate infested World Wide Web is like something out of an Orwell story, not like the personal, organic feeling you got from the internet or BBS systems back in the day when you were lucky to have a monitor that could display 256 colors!
But I digress - I did everything possible to give my PC the ability to play this game. I sprung for a CD ROM, RAM and a new monitor. The experience of playing a fantasy adventure in first person was so unique and revolutionary as presented in this game it all seemed like the logical thing to do.
With game play as complex and rewarding as the Elder Scrolls series, Ultima Underworld combined the best of modern gaming with the text based adventures of the eighties - as one reviewer noted you did in fact need to write things down and make careful note of a number of things to complete this game successfully (I still have some of my notes from the day!) up to and including learning how to speak Lizard! LOL
With the exception of Wing Commander, I am hard pressed to think of a contemporary game that gave me as big a feeling of satisfaction to finish as Ultima Underworld 2. It wasn't (and still is not) an easy game to play and if you can stomach the now archaic graphics it WILL challenge you.
It's hard to put it into context for someone who's never played it and you can't go back to 1992 and recreate the feeling but the sentiments you hear from fans of this game are not misplaced - it was a joy to discover, a joy to play and is a joy to remember. I own a lot of games and love a lot of them but Ultima Underworld falls into the same category as Civilization, Wing Commander, X-Com and other classic 80's/90's games that literally changed the way I think of gaming and contributed to my long history of PC upgrades!
It isn't often you run across a game (particularly once you're older than 18) that keeps you from wanting to eat, sleep or speak to your family. This was one such game.
Ah, memories....