I've recently been playing through Ultima VII for the second time (on XP via the Exult wrapper). Right now I'm about 1/3 of the way through Serpent Isle.

Man, this is a great game.

I've only played Exodus and Avatar on the NES but I really liked them back then.

You ever play ultima 6? That was by far my favorite one in the series.

There was one in 7 or 8 i didnt like but the other I really liked, I cant remember, but those were such great games.

Here's to hoping Ultima X will be a great mmorpg!

Unfortunately, the greatness that the Ultima franchise once had pretty much died after Ultima VII: Serpent Isle and the two Ultima Underworld games.

Ultima VIII just plain sucked, and IX was so damn buggy I didn't even bother finishing...

The Ultima series is my fave CRPG series of all time. It's a shame that it took the direction it did w/ Ultima VIII. Ultima V, VII and VII-2 were my favorites. Also loved the Worlds of Ultima spin-offs. I hope Lord British can one day revisit this series. At least give us some remakes of the original games.

Ultima III: Exodus was one of the defining gaming moments
of my life, played it on the ol' Apple IIe!

It's amazing how much the Japanese RPGs took from this series' early days. And I mean that in a good way.

What does this from the OP mean? :

(on XP via the Exult wrapper).

http://exult.sourceforge.net

What is it?

Ultima 7, an RPG from the early 1990's, still has a huge following. But, being a DOS game with a very non-standard memory manager, it is difficult to run it on the latest computers. Exult is a project to create an Ultima 7 game engine that runs on modern operating systems, capable of using the data and graphics files that come with the game.

Edit: Here's one for Ultima VI and the Underworld games!

http://nuvie.sourceforge.net

What's Nuvie

Nuvie, pronounced 'New-Vee' is an open sourced game engine for playing Origin's games Ultima 6, Martian Dreams and Savage Empire on modern operating systems. Nuvie is currently in the early stages of development. There are still many aspects of the original game engine that need to be figured out. If you have any info on the internal workings of the game engine or any of its data files please let us know.

[It looks like this one is a bit less far along than Exult. Seems like DOSBox is a better solution for now.]

I never played VI. I was wondering if it was worth it.

You probably really liked VII and disliked VIII. I haven't heard a lot of good about VIII. Apparently it really went downhill in IX.

Has anyone played Ultima Online? I heard it sucked, too.

Most people said that both V and VI sucked, iirc...

I played the hell out of 2 and 3 as a kid, and some of 4. I played Ultima 1, too, but you can nail that one in the course of an afternoon!

Ultima Underworld is an excellent game - one of the all-time greats. The sequel wasn't so hot.

- David Stein

VIII wasn't horrible IMO, I actually enjoyed it. Some of the arcade stuff didn't belong (the jumping puzzles were very annoying until the patch came out, and even then were mostly a hassle), and not having a party really sucked, but I still enjoyed the game.

Having said that, it doesn't hold a candle to Ultima VII, which is one of the best, if not the best, CRPG ever.

I could never get IX to run at a decent framerate.

Is there a listing of all Ultima games released and showing the various platforms they were released on?

From what I've played, 4/5/7 (pts 1 + 2) were all great, didn't like 6 much at all, not sure why really. The early implementation of a mouse driven interface was quite weak, that's for sure. I did like savage empire, which uses the same interface, but never got all that far.

The first Ultima I played was 4 on the sega master system and that got me into them. This game would have to be one of the best rpgs ever on the 8bit consoles (including all the NES rpgs). Basically like the pc version but with more colourful graphics, a somewhat decent 8bit soundtrack, and a well designed interface. Well worth a play by any fans of the 8bit era.

Chris

This is from memory...

'80 Original Ultima (Apple)
'82 Ultima II - The Revenge of the Enchantress (Apple)
'83 Ultima III - Exodus (Apple)
'85 Ultima IV - Quest of the Avatar (Apple)
'86 Remake of Ultima I - The First Age of Darkness (Apple / PC)
'87 Ultima V - Warriors of Destiny (Apple / PC)
'90 Ultima VI - The False Prophet (PC)
'92 Ultima VII - The Black Gate (PC)
'92 Ultima VII - Forge of Virtue (expansion)
'93 Ultima VII - The Serpent Isle, part II (PC)
'94-95 Ultima VIII - Pagan (PC)
'97 Ultima Collection (All Ultima games to date)
'99 Ultima IX - Ascension (PC)
'04 (?) Ultima X

These're only on the platform I've seen or played. I'm sure back in the day Ultima III, IV, and V were probably on Commodore 64, Amiga, and all the systems that were available. Some of these were also ported over to NES and SNES, I believe.


Also related...

'91 Ultima Underworld: The Stygian Abyss
'93 Ultima Underworld II: Labyrinth of Worlds

These two games eventually led Looking Glass to develop the vastly under-appreciated System Shock series.

... you forgot Ultima's predecessor:

Akalabeth

I played (and finished) Ultima 1-5 on my Apple II+ when I was growing up. This has been, and always will be, my favorite series.

I was so ticked when Ultima VI came out only on the PC. I was a sophomore in college and played it on my neighbor's 286 for quite a bit, but never finished. I have played every one of them, but have not finished one since Ultima V. I now have them all for the PC, but have not had a chance to play much.

I turned so many roommates and neighbors onto this series in college. Ultima VI, VII, VIIp2 and VIII all came out while on was in college (all came out within 3 years). I remember 2 instances where I would wake up in the morning, and my roommate would still be playing from the night before.

I am disappointed that Ultima X: Oddyssey will only be Online, as I have not gotten into online games much. ... been trying to stay away since my old boss caught a group of us playing Quake during business hours.

No, I didn't forget it. However, it really bears little resemblence to what Ultima is to become (storywise), so I didn't include it. Akalabeth's only historical significance lies in the fact that it is the first commercial release of Lord British (Richard Garriott). Plus, Lord British didn't make the Ultima Underworld series.

For some historical perspective, Akalabeth was made in 1978 using Basic language. Garriott sold the games in zip-lock plastic bags containing the disc and "manual".

There's also the two Worlds of Ultima titles, though I don't remember the dates they came out. Also, Serpent Isle had an expansion called Silver Seed.

I know Silver Seed was PC only, but the Worlds of Ultima titles may have been Apple/PC.

Ultima VI was the best Ultima to date IMO, followed closely by VII 1 & 2. The Worlds of Ultima games were quite fun as well.

The Worlds of Ultima titles, "Savage Empire" and "Martian Dreams" were based on the U6 engine, so were PC-only. Ultima 5 was the last title to have a multi-platform release (PC, Apple II, C64, etc.)

The middle trilogy, U4, U5, U6 is the best of the bunch. U7 (parts I and II) is a very strong game, but U8 and U9 ended the series on a downnote.

"Ultima X" -- which I read as "Ultima Ex", not "Ultima Ten" -- is a MMORPG that I'm completely ignoring. Garriott has nothing to do with it, and I doubt it picks up where U9 left off and continues the story.

Ultima is finished.

There was also an unreleased expansion for U8. It got cancelled because of poor sales. U8 did have a "Voice Pack" expansion, though.

There was also a Vic-20 spin off, "Ultima: Escape from Mt. Drash" -- though it was related to the series in branding only.

Exactly. My personal favorite remains Ultima IV, for the introduction of some roleplaying ethics, and the novelty of not actually having to kill the "Evil XXX" at the very end of the game.

The voice pack crap for Ultima VIII was just completely wrong, trying to milk a once-proud franchise dry.

I didn't mention these two Worlds of Ultima games for the same reason Akalabeth was not listed at first: They had nothing to do with the Ultima series. These games were based upon the Ultima VI engine and share some of the basic playing mechanics and perhaps some basic ethics philosophy was all. Neither games sold particularly well. I remembered that I tried "Savage Empires", did not particularly enjoy it, and never bothered with the other one.

And no, both Worlds of Ultima games were PC only.

Forgot about Silver Seed though, thanks for listing it.