Ultima: [chat] of the Avatar
Jacobkosh
Gamble a stamp.I can show you how to be a real man!Moderator mod
Gamble a stamp.I can show you how to be a real man!Moderator mod
FORSOOTH TRAVELLERS
I AM PLAYING YON VINTAGE 1980S RPGS WRITTEN IN GLORIOUS KING JAMES BIBLE-ESE
If you like your Fantasies Finalized and your Gates Baldured and your Effects Massed, this is where it began, with a dude - Richard "Lord British" Garriott, who appears as the king in every game - who programmed the first entry in the series in high school...on punch cards. Tile-based graphics, story- and choice-based roleplaying, the zoom into the battle map, customizable(ish) player characters - all these conventions of both WRPGs and JRPGs are a direct outgrowth of what began as a way to do crude D&D dungeon crawls with graphics.
The earlier entries in the series are, in a word, bizarre, and often gleefully incoherent in the way that peering into a teenager's Trapper Keeper might be. Ultima I starts you off in a fantasy kingdom being overrun by a Dark Lord and etc etc, but as you play, time passes in the world and technology advances until you trade in your sword +1 for a laser rifle and power armor, blast off into space, and shoot down TIE Fighters before seizing a time machine so you can go back and kill the overlord before he became all-powerful.
Ultima II takes place on Earth in multiple time periods and has you flying a biplane, sneaking past the KGB, and landing a rocket on the swampy fields of Neptune, where a castle full of jesters awaits. I don't even know. Ultima II is really weird.
But with Ultima IV, Garriott, who was well into his twenties, decided to see if games were capable of more than hack and slash, and created a story that pits the player, not against a great D&D-style evil, but against the challenge of enlightenment. The goal of Ultima IV is to become, essentially, the Jesus or Buddha of a fantasy kingdom, teaching people by example how to live a better life - healing the sick, bringing hope to the destitute, pondering ethical riddles. This does also still involve throwing magic axes at demons occasionally, but this fits my own personal definition of "a better life" quite nicely, so...
Subsequent games deepen and broaden the world, turning it from a teenager's D&D kingdom into a charming, quirky place with its own identity, style, and traditions. The codified system of Eight Virtues became a cornerstone of the series, as did a conversation parser that let players "speak" directly to NPCs rather than choosing prewritten lines of dialogue. The gameplay features turn-based tactical combat, but with Ultima IV and subsequent entries, combat is deemphasized in favor of conversation and puzzle-solving. The world becomes less of a shooting gallery and more of a lived-in place where the point of the game is to talk to poeple and try to comport oneself ethically while navigating a series of mysteries.
The series hit its high point with the darker turn taken by Ultima VII, which helped usher in the beginnings of what we might consider the modern age of computer RPGs - the first Fallout and the first Elder Scrolls were only a couple of years away. Sadly, the two sequels to VII kind of dropped the ball in various ways and the series was thoroughly EA'd out of existence, though Garriott is working on a spiritual successor.
I finished IV last week and have been working through V; they're still pretty great games! You can pick them up on GOG for, like, two nickels and some pocket lint. If you want to earn some real xxhardcorexx cred, give them a try - you might be surprised by how much fun you have.
I AM PLAYING YON VINTAGE 1980S RPGS WRITTEN IN GLORIOUS KING JAMES BIBLE-ESE
Ultima is a series of open world fantasy role-playing video games from Origin Systems, Inc. Ultima was created by Richard Garriott, a.k.a. Lord British. Several games of the series are considered seminal entries in their genre. Electronic Arts currently own the brand.
The main Ultima series consists of nine installments (the seventh title is further divided into two parts) grouped into three trilogies, or "Ages": The Age of Darkness (Ultima I-III), The Age of Enlightenment (Ultima IV-VI), and The Age of Armageddon (Ultima VII-IX). The last is also sometimes referred to as "The Guardian Saga" after its chief antagonist. The first trilogy is set in a fantasy world named Sosaria, but during the cataclysmic events of The Age of Darkness, it is sundered and three quarters of it vanish. What is left becomes known as Britannia, a realm ruled by the benevolent Lord British, and is where the later games mostly take place. The protagonist in all the games is a canonically male resident of Earth who is called upon by Lord British to protect Sosaria and, later, Britannia from a number of dangers. Originally, the player character was referred to as "the Stranger", but by the end of Ultima IV he becomes universally known as the Avatar.
If you like your Fantasies Finalized and your Gates Baldured and your Effects Massed, this is where it began, with a dude - Richard "Lord British" Garriott, who appears as the king in every game - who programmed the first entry in the series in high school...on punch cards. Tile-based graphics, story- and choice-based roleplaying, the zoom into the battle map, customizable(ish) player characters - all these conventions of both WRPGs and JRPGs are a direct outgrowth of what began as a way to do crude D&D dungeon crawls with graphics.
The earlier entries in the series are, in a word, bizarre, and often gleefully incoherent in the way that peering into a teenager's Trapper Keeper might be. Ultima I starts you off in a fantasy kingdom being overrun by a Dark Lord and etc etc, but as you play, time passes in the world and technology advances until you trade in your sword +1 for a laser rifle and power armor, blast off into space, and shoot down TIE Fighters before seizing a time machine so you can go back and kill the overlord before he became all-powerful.
Ultima II takes place on Earth in multiple time periods and has you flying a biplane, sneaking past the KGB, and landing a rocket on the swampy fields of Neptune, where a castle full of jesters awaits. I don't even know. Ultima II is really weird.
But with Ultima IV, Garriott, who was well into his twenties, decided to see if games were capable of more than hack and slash, and created a story that pits the player, not against a great D&D-style evil, but against the challenge of enlightenment. The goal of Ultima IV is to become, essentially, the Jesus or Buddha of a fantasy kingdom, teaching people by example how to live a better life - healing the sick, bringing hope to the destitute, pondering ethical riddles. This does also still involve throwing magic axes at demons occasionally, but this fits my own personal definition of "a better life" quite nicely, so...
Subsequent games deepen and broaden the world, turning it from a teenager's D&D kingdom into a charming, quirky place with its own identity, style, and traditions. The codified system of Eight Virtues became a cornerstone of the series, as did a conversation parser that let players "speak" directly to NPCs rather than choosing prewritten lines of dialogue. The gameplay features turn-based tactical combat, but with Ultima IV and subsequent entries, combat is deemphasized in favor of conversation and puzzle-solving. The world becomes less of a shooting gallery and more of a lived-in place where the point of the game is to talk to poeple and try to comport oneself ethically while navigating a series of mysteries.
The series hit its high point with the darker turn taken by Ultima VII, which helped usher in the beginnings of what we might consider the modern age of computer RPGs - the first Fallout and the first Elder Scrolls were only a couple of years away. Sadly, the two sequels to VII kind of dropped the ball in various ways and the series was thoroughly EA'd out of existence, though Garriott is working on a spiritual successor.
I finished IV last week and have been working through V; they're still pretty great games! You can pick them up on GOG for, like, two nickels and some pocket lint. If you want to earn some real xxhardcorexx cred, give them a try - you might be surprised by how much fun you have.
Jacobkosh on
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Posts
-Indiana Solo, runner of blades
well,
<--- This
That's not how the revolution works!
That's not how any of this works!
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
They made a cartoon out of the original movie?
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He subverted the revolution. It happens.
-Indiana Solo, runner of blades
Now now, just humor grandpa, he likes to talk about his old timey games
Signed,
an Ultima Dragon, and proud(ish)* of it
*Of course it still hurts that they named the Collector's Edition of Ultima IX after us dragons, and look how that game turned out...
"Nothing is gonna save us forever but a lot of things can save us today." - Night in the Woods
Yes.
-Indiana Solo, runner of blades
What about the blue people?
What did they do to with blue people?
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
They got on antidepressants
-Indiana Solo, runner of blades
I guess we should be used to the racism of political correctness by now. When will my people be free?
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When you boot the Windsors out of that drafty old barn they call a palace.
-Indiana Solo, runner of blades
The Bogarts shall rule fairly and strictly, first Harry Potter must be bought to them to appease Lord Voldemort.
I was - well still am I've been distracted - watching Dr Strange
when he gets mugged in kathmandu for some reason it's three americans
not like sent by someone it's just regular ass american muggers, for some reason hanging out in kathmandu.
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I know that's my favorite way to spend my vacation
welp
They were given 2 options:
1- Form a drum group
2- Dabedi Debeda
Cameron lives for fucking ham
-Indiana Solo, runner of blades
I was awake at 6am and I do not feel human
Montrose & Westheimer is one of the most important intersections in Houston. It is the intersection of the two main commercial streets which form the heart of our most vibrant urban neighborhood, with the largest concentration of culture, entertainment, nightlife, and fine dining. One of the only places in Houston dense enough where it's actually worth walking to get around instead of driving. This is where I would tell people to go if they wanted to experience what Houston has to offer.
It looks like this.
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This fucking city
this changes my perception of PETA... in no way whatsoever they've always been silly as shit
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Into the nutrient vats.
-Indiana Solo, runner of blades
Trump got you a present!
Looks really tacky
huzzah!
Yeah, that horn is loud
I was on the bridge when it sounded
this hotel ad keeps popping up on youtube
I don't quite understand what they wish me to do in their rooms