Unfortunate

jackie28

I had a moderate degree of interest in this game for reasons of nostalgia, but having played it on my iPad2 for the last 30 minutes am greatly disappointed.  Not only is it nowhere near as open world as anything in the original Ultima series, it whores itself out to players immediately in an attempt to sell gold and silver keys to players for cash in order that they may unlock advanced loot from dungeon chests.  I would have much preferred a graphically enhanced update to the original quest with a multiplayer component, sold for a flat fee through iTunes, than this present mess.  It isn't even clear to me the investment in gold keys will even return to me in gaming enjoyment, and instead offends my sense of fair play and puts me on my anti-pay to win soap box.  I feel like I could be missing content, but its not compelling enough a worry to commit to a $100 mound of keys.  I hope Mythic enjoyed making this game for the sake of practice.  And I haven't even mentioned the fact the app hung and crashed four times exiting a dungeon, which reset upon logging back in.  Or the fact it REALLY wants to associate itself with my Facebook account ( and presumably advertise itself obnoxiously to my friends?  No thanks ).

omimessr

As so limiting into just a weapon based and magic based seems not that a bad idea. The problem, true, starts with the intended strategy like combat style that fails exactly in the strategy options, as being far too simplified. As for the microtransaction area it's fair offer compared with many others. And will not see another Ultima IV too soon. That went to rest with the classics. It belongs to an era when wasn't just go for the money, not that they didn't want to make money, but the fun of the game was also accounted. 
Now back to basics I think the 3.5 rating is fair enough. I considered 4 but had some freezings too so that's the main reason.

jackie28

To be fair I have been giving the game a bit more evaluation.  It improves on the Ultima franchise in terms of eye candy and engine, but falls short in terms of complexity and game play.  In the original series you had party members and turn based combat which lent to a more strategic style of play and required resource management.  There is no currency system in this game other than keys.  I'm curious if Mythic made that design choice to skirt the accusation that they are selling "gold".

Anyway, let me see if I can articulate a point : the difference between old school RPGs and the present generation of MMOs is really the difference between movies and books.  The Ultima series engaged the imagination in the manner of a book, and was about problem solving.  MMOs like WoW are about pomp and flash and visual effects, and this sells to a more ADD crowd who aren't interesting in thinking or IMAGINING.  Ultima Forever fails to capture the imagination and it fails to draw the player into the game world, however crudely represented, in the manner of a compelling book.  Instead we see a tribute to modern fed-ex style questing, and combat reward flashies that would make a slot machine developer proud.

One other criticism I have is that their "open world" has every point of interest level locked.  In the old games, you could get your ass in over your head if you ventured into the wrong places.  U4E doesn't allow you to take your chances.  I would have enjoyed seeing random parties of monsters on the main map but it doesn't even have that.

Karteli

My hype factor was already very low for this game... and that's coming from someone who played / beat all the Ultima's 1-9 + the two Ultima Underworlds, and the Worlds of Ultima spins.

 

The Ultima world was the vision of Richard Garriott who founded Ultima, but sold his company (Origin Systems, Inc) to EA in 1992.  He stayed with the company a bit longer, but finally quit / was fired a few years later.  He lost rights to everything Ultima related, except the title "Lord British", which he was able to fight in court as being associated to him personally, not intellectually.  EA was forced to use Lady British instead, as evidence of this.

 

So new age Ultima's are really just empty souls of games created by completely different people interested in money rather than making the best game ever (EA shenanigans).

 

It will likely hook a bunch of people who don't know what's going on.  They will just see the word Ultima and have memory flashbacks of the fun they had when they were younger... leading to an impulse buy.

 

jackie28

Well its certainly true there is no commercial value to an old school Ultima RPG at this stage, but I often wonder WHY that has to be the case.  Certainly people continue to READ books, and kids still enjoy making forts out of cardboard boxes.  Is it possible that video games are just exempt to the timeless concept of fun, and instead becoming wholly lame simply by virtue of players being born to a certain generation?  My first Ultima was 3, and I played the crap out of it on a Commodore 128 when I was just 14.  It was my first real introduction to fantasy RPG, and I received endless hours of entertainment from the game, oddly, without even the perspective that I was working toward a goal.  I think as an adult, I no longer IMAGINE, and partly as a consequence of my exposure to modern games, that leave nothing to the imagination.  The old rudimentary tile based games were merely symbolic representations of persons, terrain and things, but with that came a bit of mystery and novelty.  It's just the same difference again between movies and books.  Books force you to construct things in your mind.  Movies leave nothing to the imagination, and consequently fail to quietly immerse the way a book does.  I suspect however that immersion isn't truly possible in an MMO because of the existence of other players.  I think in a single player game, the player can relax into his character, read the story and enjoy the game mechanic, but in a multiplayer game, the player exhibits a social awareness that reduces npcs and story to being "not real" distractions.  You worry about ladder rankings, the end game and your relative progress to other players instead of enjoying the moment.  I can say anecdotally that the Internet nearly ruined my satisfaction playing Ultima 9, once it became apparent via forums that other players were completing the game in a fraction of the time I was.  I had no clue until that point that there was a race to get to the end.  Who the hell races each other to read a book?   I guess my point is that the true RPG experience has diminished greatly and quickly due to the introduction of "massively multiplayer", at least, beyond the first generation of these games.

stayBlind

Originally posted by jackie28

To be fair I have been giving the game a bit more evaluation.  It improves on the Ultima franchise in terms of eye candy and engine, but falls short in terms of complexity and game play.  In the original series you had party members and turn based combat which lent to a more strategic style of play and required resource management.  There is no currency system in this game other than keys.  I'm curious if Mythic made that design choice to skirt the accusation that they are selling "gold".

Anyway, let me see if I can articulate a point : the difference between old school RPGs and the present generation of MMOs is really the difference between movies and books.  The Ultima series engaged the imagination in the manner of a book, and was about problem solving.  MMOs like WoW are about pomp and flash and visual effects, and this sells to a more ADD crowd who aren't interesting in thinking or IMAGINING.  Ultima Forever fails to capture the imagination and it fails to draw the player into the game world, however crudely represented, in the manner of a compelling book.  Instead we see a tribute to modern fed-ex style questing, and combat reward flashies that would make a slot machine developer proud.

One other criticism I have is that their "open world" has every point of interest level locked.  In the old games, you could get your ass in over your head if you ventured into the wrong places.  U4E doesn't allow you to take your chances.  I would have enjoyed seeing random parties of monsters on the main map but it doesn't even have that.

Exactly my thoughts on the GW1 > GW2 transition.

It is sad to see that you guys are in the same boat; is this game still worth checking out or should I skip it entirely? (I never played the original.)