The Ultima Series

[Rezzy]

Has anyone here played any of the old Ultima games for PC?  I picked them up on GOG a while back, and finally had a chance to start up Ultima 7, since it seemed like a good starting point.  It's definitely from a different time.  I imagine the manual would have explained quite a bit, but since I got a digital copy, I had to really hunt just to find basic stuff, like keyboard hotkeys.

Now that I've gotten the hang of it, it's quite fun, and it's very nostalgic, even though I've never played this particular series before.

[Reality]

I played U 4 and U 7. You can see a lot of love for these games on CRPG websites but personally I'm leaning neutral on them(don't hate them either). They're more thematic than heavy gameplay compared to some peers.. When I play U 7 I just wanted to play a Goldbox game the whole time. Everything but combat and charather development (in the skills/equipment sense) is better than the CRPGs that I like, but that's the opposite of what I ask for.  U 7 has a kinda cool "towns do their own thing outside of your quest" thing though.

The best Ultima games are the spin off Ultima Underworld and Ultima Underworld 2. The dungeon and puzzle design is brilliant.

As far as I'm concerned the totem pole for someone playing today looking back  is Wizardry>M&M>Bard'sTale>Ultima.... with the emphasis being on overall fun, with some tweaks to the order if depending on if you value puzzles/development/system level combat/difficulty more. I wouldnt' play ANY of them from 1st game and go in order. Always start with (closest to consenus) best game in each series. except for Wizardry because the D.W.Bradley fanboys are blind and vocal to the truth.

Edited May 28, 2019 by Reality