Best Game evar

[Caligula]

</delurk>
So, yeah. Ultima 5: Warriors of Destiny.

I first played it on the Atari ST when I was about 8 years old and I loved it. The whole 'find your own way' feel was unlike anything I'd ever played before. I was a bit young to appreciate its subtleties so I was defeated. I still came back to it many times over the next few years because it was so compelling, and every time I found something else to love. The dialogue system was ingenious and the battles were simple yet intuitive.

I still have a huge wad of A4 paper on which I took notes from conversations in each city, quest notes, mantras and codex revelations.

Any game that takes me a decade to finally beat wins top marks for both value for money and replayability in my book. Here's to the greatest game ever made - we shall never see its like again.

 

[FrancoTAU]

Did you play the U5 remake Lazarus yet?

 

[LlamaGod]

Ultima 4 was better than 5, but 5 was still pretty cool. Best thing about 5 was it's plot, Ultima had really badass plots that'd make you think.

All the things you've said about 5 exsist in 4, you should try it sometime. You'll probably like it alot, since the entire game, objective and all, is 'find your own way'.

Also, I like how your goal in 4 is just to be the best person ever. Be a rolemodel.

 

[Volourn]

This thread is a lie. Ultima is good; but NWN is best game ever. Deal with it.

Game over.

 

[wendigo]

Ultima 4 was better than 5, but 5 was still pretty cool. Best thing about 5 was it's plot, Ultima had really badass plots that'd make you think.

So... dialogue isn't that important for you?

I only played U4 until I acheived partial avatarhood and kind-of lost interest while dungeon diving. U5 has aged way waay better, IMO. I worry that fans of the series are a bit too quick to recommend it, awesome as it was.

 

[Pseudofool]

NWN is best game over.

You mean evar, don't you?

 

[Volourn]

"You mean evar, don't you?"

Heh. that's what I get for knowing exactly what I was gonna post before even starting.


"So... dialogue isn't that important for you?"

Actually, dialogue is very important to me in CRPGs. Thankfully, NWN has the most dialogue I have ever seen in any game, and its quality (while it varies from crappy to great) is usually in the upper echelon in that regard.

 

[Caligula]

Ultima 4 was better than 5, but 5 was still pretty cool. Best thing about 5 was it's plot, Ultima had really badass plots that'd make you think.

All the things you've said about 5 exsist in 4, you should try it sometime. You'll probably like it alot, since the entire game, objective and all, is 'find your own way'.

Also, I like how your goal in 4 is just to be the best person ever. Be a rolemodel.

4 was too simplistic to my mind. There wasn't much of a plot to discover: become the avatar by being sickeningly good. If you place a high premium on choices and consequences then 4 probably isn't a great example because you always have to do the right thing and a single bad act (like not giving one of your hard-earned gold pieces to a layabout beggar with no legs) can mean you get stripped of a virtue and you have to repeat a mind-numbing quest.

Ultima 5's karma system gave you a great deal more leeway to make some moral choices that serve your own interest. You still got punished but it took a *lot* more bad-assery to do it.

I've finished Ultima 4, 5, 7 (part 1 and 2) and Ultima 8. Ascension made me cry.

 

[Naked_Lunch]

The great thing about the Ultima is that after 4, the games were different from each other in a lot of ways and it's hard to compare one to the other. Each one stands on it's own perfectly (except for maybe 7, mainly because you'd need a lot of background info from the previous games to fully grasp the changes).

4 is one of the best RPGs out there due to the deceptively simple roleplaying in it. It turned the RPG mechanics upside down. Letting monsters run away helped you beat the game? What?!

5 is a lot like 4, but it's also a lot different. You have the karma system, the improved interface, the new characters who now have actual personalities and face (In 4, most NPC were one-liners) plus the famous daily schedules got their start here.

6 brought mouse controls, NPC portraits, more in-depth dialogues and characters, an entirely new race, a kickass storyline, and it began the slide away from the virtue-based playing of the previous games. Also, it was the first ultima to have a continious world map.

7, at least for me, is the pinnacle of all this: All the Ultima games lead up to it and then it just went downhill from there. Every thing that was expanded on, was expanded on. You got nice, crisp graphics; a great mouse-driven interface that was a far-cry from that of 6's archaic interface; you had the virtues, along with a whole new set of rules laid down by the fellowship (not unlike Blackthorne's virtues in 5). The only downside of 7 is it's buginess, and the combat system. But since maybe only 10% of the game is combat, it's no big deal really.

To sum up
4 if you want hardcore roleplaying and a humongous world to explore, but not much else really

5 if you the above, but less roleplaying elements but the world and the gameplay is expanded upon

6 if you enjoyed the gameplay of 4&5 and want a truly living world with a lot of great stuff to do plus one of the best plots in gaming

7 if you want a wide open world with enough shit to do to keep you busy for the next couple of years along with the best dialouges in gaming, a great and robust cast of characters, some really inventive puzzles, and a non-linear open-ended world where, most of the time, if you want to do something you usually can]/i]

I'm not saying one is better than the other. I regard Ultimas 4-7 as all games of equal stature, but each one has it's own strengths and weaknesses that make it more appealing to one gamer than the other, like most any other game series. Difference is, with Ultima they truly innovated with each sequel rather than just pile on more o' the same so there's no point in comparing one against the other when each one had such different design ideas.

 

[Caligula]

Stuff

Excellent summary. I don't think I could agree more on most points. If there's anyone else reading these boards who has never played an Ultima game, pick the one that sounds most appealing from the above list and try it. Whenever I play a new RPG I automatically compare it to Ultima 5 and every dungeon hack I compare to Dungeon Master.