Ultima series

[Anonymous No.5669749]

Discuss the ultima series and similar titles.
What is your favorite entry?

[Anonymous No.5669770]

BETRAYAL!!!
WHAT'S A PALADIN?
XD

[Anonymous No.5669915]

>>5669749
I liked ultima 3 fine. Reminded me of dq9 but not as cute.

[Anonymous No.5669923]

>>5669749
Ultima VI. All the interactivity of Ultima VII, but with a less retarded combat system.

[Anonymous No.5670241]

Is this that bad? Would it at least be an interesting early 3D CRPG (in terms of gameplay) if I've never played an Ultima game before?

[Anonymous No.5670267]

>>5669749

[Anonymous No.5670297]

>>5670241
"What's a Paladin?"

[Anonymous No.5670404]

>>5669923
The ways you could fuck around with people and things in Ultima 6 - even without the cheat code, that had to be some kind of first.

[Anonymous No.5670428]

Do any of the Ultima games work as standalone games or is it absolutely crucial that I go in order from IV? I'd like to play VI or VII because I'm probably too dumb for the interface of the older games.

[Anonymous No.5670535]

What's a Paladin jokes aside, I feel like Ultima 5 is the only one that actually has gameplay that stood the test of time.

[Anonymous No.5670539]

>>5670428
Playing 7 or 8 stand alone is fine. 5 and 6 I dunno. I could never beat 4 5 or 6 either and I've taken two good runs at 4

[pathetic zoomer No.5670585]

1 (Apple II version) was unplayable to me, and 2 wasn't much better. 3 seemed like an actual decent game but it was too complex for my tiny brain.

I thought I got pretty far in 4, taking notes and everything, but then I got stumped. And I didn't even reach any dungeons.

Loved Underworld.

[Anonymous No.5670606]

>>5670241
Just play it and form your own opinion instead of parroting a shitty video.
Play Underworld as well, it's the original 3D RPG.

[Anonymous No.5670610]

>>5670428
Have you tried the interface? There's xu4 and the SMS port to ease access.
5-7 strongly build on the foundation of 4 and are only half the games without it.

Savage Empire, Martian Dreams and Underworld 1 are standalone titles you can start with.

[Anonymous No.5670620]

Are you supposed to be able to operate Ultima VI within a day? Controls seem way too complex and counterintuitive

[Anonymous No.5670635]

>>5670620
Use nuvie, it allows you a bigger viewport, enables drag&drop and you can use pop up containers.

[Anonymous No.5670670]

>>5670241
EA killed Ultima

[Anonymous No.5670787]

>>5669749
>and similar titles

If only...

[Anonymous No.5670820]

>>5670428
Im sorry zoomer, but you have to be at least 30 to play ultima games.

[Anonymous No.5670825]

>>5670820
That's a pathetic answer to a perfectly valid question.

[Anonymous No.5670829]

>>5670241
It crashes like every 5 minutes. Not really worth playing.

[Anonymous No.5670831]

>>5670428
The Sega Master System version of 4 is great and has a much easier to deal with interface.

[Anonymous No.5670834]

>>5670825
when you are old enough you will understand, why you must play all the games in order

[Anonymous No.5670837]

5 source port when?

[Anonymous No.5670838]

>>5670825
>not even denying it
zoom zoom

[Anonymous No.5670840]

6, the 7s, and the Underworlds are clearly the best. 4 is next. 5 would be next if someone would make a fucking source port.

[Anonymous No.5670895]

BETRAYAL

[Anonymous No.5671027]

>>5670428
>Ultima VII
Play the PC version with all the expansion and sequel+expansion
Do not touch the SNES version

[Anonymous No.5671064]

>>5671027
Both 6 and 7 should be played with their source ports.

[Anonymous No.5671187]

>>5670241
It was my first ultima and is still my favorite.

[Anonymous No.5671198]

>>5671187
i take it you don't play any of previous ultima and the spin-offs

[Anonymous No.5671296]

I feel like 1 strikes this good balance of being archaic and obtuse while also being fairly simple to play once you know how it works. The others, while very technically impressive - especially 4 - are a bit of a pain to play because of how complex they are.

[Anonymous No.5671321]

>>5671198
I played 1,2,4,5,8 and uw1 (and by played I mean beaten)
2 and 8 are much worse games than 9
1 is great in its simplicity
4 is a boring grindfest, regardless of its revolutional ideas at the time
5 and UW1 are both very enjoyable games
...still 9 has its special place in my heart. I am most certainly wearing nostalgia goggles, still it's a walking proof the game can be very much enjoyed under the right circumstances

[Anonymous No.5671434]

>>5671321
not playing 6 & 7
those are the best ultima

[Anonymous No.5671631]

The Apple II versions are the only versions you should play. The rest are inferior mockeries

[Anonymous No.5671726]

>>5670787
Ultima has a lot of clones, at least the early titles.

[Anonymous No.5671786]

>>5670241
I started with VII and IX is still my favorite. Less rpg, more action adventure.

[Anonymous No.5671941]

Which ones are the best in terms of pure gameplay? I hate to bring up the Spoony reviews but I thought it was odd how little he talked about the gameplay and whether or not he found them fun to play.

[Anonymous No.5671998]

>>5671941
it's hard to say because the gameplay actually changed a lot between games

Ultima 3 has the old dungeon crawling feeling to it with it's full custom character party.

Ultima 4 is quite unique even today, but in terms of gameplay, it's outdone by both Ultima 3 and 5.

Ultima 5 is generally considered to have the best combat in the series, although it's also quite difficult so not everyone enjoys that.

Ultima 6 has a good balance between old-school dungeon crawling Ultima and new-school story and puzzle Ultima design, but it has an annoying UI (worse in some ways than the previous games', looting enemies can take a long time)

Ultima 7 is simple to pick up and seems to have the biggest following, but its combat system is a clusterfuck. It also started a lot of bad trends for the series, as it started to become more of a story-focused game. Serpent Isle is generally agreed to have the best story in the series.

The Ultima Underworlds are groundbreaking and worth playing, but they are action RPG's and thus they play quite differently from the rest of the series.

[Anonymous No.5672018]

I really want to get into ultima, maybe even make a hack. How is the modding community.?

[Anonymous No.5672028]

>>5671941
>Which ones are the best in terms of pure gameplay?

Underworld 1 and 2. It's really not even close.

6 and the 7s have the best worlds though, and the most interactivity, which is a huge part of the series' appeal.

[Anonymous No.5672029]

>>5672018
What modding community?

[Anonymous No.5672034]

>>5672029
There isnt one? I thought ultima was popular enough to warrant a community like for the NES

[Anonymous No.5672041]

>>5672018
>>5672034
exult has a couple of mods made for it. ultima underworld has a level editor, and I think that's about it.

[Anonymous No.5672050]

>>5672041
Well there still assembly hacking

[Anonymous No.5672052]

>>5672034
You don't seem to understand how old these games are. The first Ultima is the better part of 4 decades old. The fanbase is -- no bullshit -- mostly over 40. And these are the people who discovered it as kids. The OG fans are literally senior citizens now. It's the same reason there's no modding community for Pong. At that age ain't nobody got time for that shit. Doom's longevity is an anomaly that will probably never be seen again.

[Princess Sevenleaf !IT2uZpX.Ic No.5672594]

>>5670267
awww damn, was that needlepoint?

[Anonymous No.5672724]

I'm still mad the series didn't die with a proper swan song.
Not like I want to see a new game either, considering who has the rights rn.

[Anonymous No.5672916]

>>5672724
And the worst part is that even the original creators can't be trusted with the license considering the dumpster fire they've made of their recent projects and business. 90% of what they achieved was due to the efforts of developers that are clearly not the ones that got their due subsequent fame.

[Anonymous No.5672951]

Anyone want to buy a CIB copy of Ultima V? Found it at a Half Price Books for $3.00, it's in really good shape

[Anonymous No.5672952]

>>5672916
What's your beef with Warren Spector?

[Anonymous No.5673160]

>>5672594
KYS tranny

[Anonymous No.5673510]

>>5673160
reported

[Anonymous No.5673514]

>>5672052
Please take your boomer energy drink man maymays elsewhere.

[Anonymous No.5673516]

>>5672018
>modding community
It's a freaking 8-bit game written in 6502 assembly language!

[Anonymous No.5673523]

>>5672052
There's been some work. U4, 6, 7, 8 and Underworld have playable engine recreations.
U9 has a bunch of patches and changed content.
U5 and 6 have remakes in Dungeon Siege.
Even decades ago you had patches for the IBM versions which added music or improved the graphics.

[Anonymous No.5673526]

>>5673514
Well, yeah but really it's more that these games are so stupidly primitive and obtuse that nobody would be willing to play them today. It's not like console RPGs on an NES which are from the same era, but vastly more accessible and easy to play.

[Anonymous No.5673528]

>>5673516
So, just like all the NES games with ROM hacks, right?

[Anonymous No.5673532]

>>5673516
Only 2-5 and even they have 16 and 32 bit versions presumably written in C.

[Anonymous No.5673539]

>>5673528
Yeah but that's just one system. Ultima has multiple ports across different machines all of which have nothing in common but the CPU. If you modded the C64 U4, then what about the Apple II version?

[Anonymous No.5673575]

>>5673514
that post doesn't even have any memes in it

[Anonymous No.5673587]

Ultima 7 is unironically one of the best RPGs of all time.

I also have the minority opinion that U7s combats actually fits its main gamplay really well, which was always about exploration. its simple and fast paced and doesn't bring your fucking around in the game world to a grinding halt

[Anonymous No.5673616]

>>5673587
Ultima 7 isn't about exploration and Serpent Isle even less so.
Combat in 3 is simple and fast paced, in 7 you have to watch your party do the stupidest shit with no way for you to interfere.

[Anonymous No.5673621]

>>5673539
Why does that matter? There actually are modded C64 versions like Ultima III Gold, Ultima IV Gold and Ultima IV Remastered.
I'm surprised the Nintendo hacking community hasn't re-translated the SFC version of Savage Empire since that seems to be all they're capable of.

[Anonymous No.5673808]

>>5673621
The C64 version of U4 had a fatal flaw in there being no built-in disk fastloader.

[Anonymous No.5673901]

>>5673616
7 is about just dicking around.

[Anonymous No.5673904]

>>5673621
>re-translated
>since that seems to be all they're capable of

I hate how no one translates untranslated ROMs anymore. Now it's just third world language translations and "retranslations".

[Anonymous No.5673996]

>>5673808
I guess you could just use Epyx Fastload although many games had better built-in ones.

[Anonymous No.5676097]

>>5671321
Why would you even play 8 to completion if you haven't even finished 3, 6 or 7?
The problems of 9 get blown out of proportion. Performance is hardly an issue nowadays and the writing isn't everything in a game. It could have been better with less meddling but it turned out alright given the circumstances.

[Anonymous No.5678294]

>>5676097
>Performance is hardly an issue nowadays

It barely even runs at all, and it crashes so often that it might as well not run to begin with.

[Anonymous No.5678627]

>>5678294
Then you are doing something wrong.

[Anonymous No.5679940]

>>5669749
Hard to say; Each has their own special qualities for me.

Overall, I think that U4 & U7 were the highlights of the Ultima series. Each of the Worlds of Ultima games were great. Each of the Ultima Underworlds was great.

Unfortunately, being owned by Electronic Arts & the advent of Ultima Online brought the series to an end. Would've loved to have seen more Worlds of Ultima &, of course, The Lost Vale.

[Anonymous No.5679974]

>>5671998
>Serpent Isle is generally agreed to have the best story in the series.
That's a negative, Goose. The pattern is full.
Ultima V had an equal or slightly better story.
Both are absolutely amazing, though.

>The entrance to Dungeon Doom looks like a giant eye in the center of the Underworld.
>literally only realized that yesterday

[Anonymous No.5681009]

>>5671998
>Serpent Isle is generally agreed to have the best story in the series.
story was cut
death to most NPCs

[Anonymous No.5681220]

>>5676097
>Why would you even play 8
The story was unrelated, so why not

[Anonymous No.5681290]

>>5681220
Why finish it if you don't like it?
The start in Tenebrae is interesting but it quickly becomes repetitive and annoying.

[Anonymous No.5681332]

>>5681290
That's what I did back then after playing 9 and wanting to explore more. 8 seemed like a natural choice as it was the game I would expect to be the nearest to 9. I played around for a while, got stuck, got disinterested and dropped it. I didn't have a goal of playing all the ultima games then. Then many years later my interest got reignited with UW1, at that point I decided I would someday play through all of them. After finishing 4, 1 and 2 I was kinda "burned out" with the 80s top-down aesthetic, and while wishing for more Ultima, I decided to play something "modern". And since I already had some experience with 8, and knowing I would have to beat it someday anyway just for the sake of completeness, I went for it.

[Anonymous No.5681563]

>>5669749
The only one I played was Exodus on the NES because my grandparents were the ones to buy my video games for me in those days.

Minax in the hint book, tho

[Anonymous No.5681849]

>>5681563
bewbz

[Anonymous No.5681874]

>>5681332
>the game I would expect to be the nearest to 9
Both are action games but 8 is 2D while 9 is 3D so Underworld is closer to 9.

[Anonymous No.5682425]

I always wanted the isometric Bob White plot Ultima IX

[Anonymous No.5682475]

>>5669749
Ultima V is probably 2nd favorite, tied with Ultima IV

but my number one Ultima game is 2400 AD

[Anonymous No.5683753]

>>5681563
>Exodus on the NES

That's 3, right?

[Anonymous No.5684575]

>>5683753
Yes. They dropped the numbers for the American Nintendo releases.
In Japan the Famicom releases of 3 and 4 were unnumbered but the SFC releases of 6 and 7 kept them.
5 was never released for the Famicom.

[Anonymous No.5684605]

I've tried a few Ultima games, I think mainly the later 90s ones and I just can't get into them because of how clunky moving feels.

[Anonymous No.5685467]

>>5684605
Then you'd really hate the 80s ones.

[Anonymous No.5685640]

Ultima 7 is really fun to play house with but I still really enjoy 6 for its massive interconnected underworld that can take you from Castle British to Buccaneer Isle. It has more "intentional" combat than U7 but I actually prefer how fast paced U7 & SI combat is.

[Anonymous No.5685997]

>>5685467
They are faster depending on your CPU. xu4 also lets you tweak various speed settings.

[Anonymous No.5686183]

>>5671726
Some favorites of mine.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_2RPaKvR3zE Deathlord
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3XSRWO0TnPA Wrath of Denethenor
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mRS-39_xOsE Questron

[Anonymous No.5686554]

>>5686183
Deathlord is one of the hardest RPGs on Earth. Huge overworld with permadeath.

[Anonymous No.5686560]

>>5670820
The zoomer paranoia on this board is almost as bad as the zoomers themselves.

[Anonymous No.5686565]

>>5670820
Really? How come you played them when you were 12?

[Anonymous No.5686739]

What are your opinions on the spin-offs like Runes of Virtue or Worlds of Ultima?

[Anonymous No.5686750]

>>5686565
Speaking of which, it's always been memed that 80s CRPGs are so brutally hard and that console ones made them much easier to play and more kid-friendly, yet I beat U5 on my C128 when I was 11.

[Anonymous No.5687048]

>>5669749
>What is your favorite entry?

[Anonymous No.5687141]

Ultima VII: The Black Gate was the first time I ever heard someone actually speak in a PC game. Scared me shitless at the age of 12 when it came out. - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cpYaZXHyp8g

[Anonymous No.5687150]

>>5686739
Worlds of Ultima is pretty cool. They make the game system of 6 more manageable, add useful things like a questlog and unique settings.
MD is a bit too linear.

[Anonymous No.5687505]

>>5687150
I don't really like them. The fantastic magic system of Ultima VI is neutered in Savage Empire and non-existent in Martian Dreams.

[Anonymous No.5687713]

>>5686560
that's because /vr/ is full of insecure boomers who don't want to feel old.

[Anonymous No.5687718]

>>5669749
VI. People keep telling me VII is better and I don't see it. Combat sucks, is generally kind of a chaotic mess, and it lacks a lot of the fun of exploring the world I found.

Dunno what it is about it but U7 just never does it for me compared to U6...

[Anonymous No.5687754]

>>5687718
i wanted to like U6 but my main problem with 6 is how much of a fucking scavenger hunt the game feels like.

I've been enjoying U7 alot more.

[Anonymous No.5687761]

>>5687754
That's true, it's very "please dig up an entire cave."
I have a file reared up on 7, though. I think I had just gotten that third party program so I could feed my homeboys without menu surfing.

[Anonymous No.5687881]

>>5687718
Ultima VI is great
>put magic armor on the ground
>cast animate on magic armor
>cast clone on magic armor X times
>kill all clones of magic armor
>profit

[Anonymous No.5687902]

>>5687881
i never understood the mentality of "it's great because you can cheese/exploit it" that most people have with WRPGs because most of the time it just gets to the point where you might as well just use cheats.

[Anonymous No.5687937]

>>5687902
I played it before the internet and wikis were commonplace.
So discovering things like that had much greater meaning.
Today it's a mentality of "If I can't figure it out immediately I'm either going to quit or look it up online"