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The Gamasutra Quantum Leap Awards:
Role-Playing Games Honorable Mention: The Ultima Series[Whether an unfortunate side-effect of having a decades-long legacy or testament to the parity of each of its volumes, no one entry in the Ultima series was nominated enough to make it to the top five, but likewise no other game in the Awards brought in the same level of meaningful responses. So though it will have to stay in the honorable mention category, it's clear that the series has left a deep and lasting impression on a generation of role-players.] I've played role playing games since the early '80's, and the most innovative role playing game I can remember in all that time is Ultima III (for the Apple IIe). With its real-time animations, soundtrack, gripping storyline, and in-depth game experience, this game formula has been emulated countless times since. Find a role playing game that doesn't borrow from Ultima in any way... I dare you! -Ethan Wilson, New Visions Enterprises
Any genre as nebulous as role-playing games is bound to incite some highly divisive claims when seeking to identify its lineage. The evolution of RPGs is not a straight line, but a tree with a truly bewildering amount of branches: tabletop, LARP, console vs. computer, action-RPGs, tactical RPGs, not to mention all the games from other genres that incorporate RPG elements. How does one classify the "definitive" works in a genre with so many definitions? The only hope is to find a common ancestor. Leaving aside D&D, which everyone knows is a satanic occult ritual and an affront to the civilized world anyway, the game with perhaps the most convincing claim is Ultima. Whether you were weaned on Final Fantasy or Fallout, Lord British's epic series remains the wellspring from which the others sprouted. In the interest of specificity, I'll cast my vote for Ultima IV: Quest of the Avatar. Not only was it a landmark in the often tumultuous marriage of games and stories, it was also the first to introduce the revolutionary notion of ethical simulation that would become a staple of later games. In so doing, it elevated RPGs beyond the level of mere hack-and-slash and became a pinnacle not just of the series, but of the RPG genre and gaming as a whole. -James Stevenson, 1st Playable Productions Ultima IV: Quest of the Avatar. It brought interactive morality into the foreground, where it ought to be. -William Stepp, Eternal Eye Productions
The game I would have to vote for (which also happens to be my all-time favorite game) is Ultima V. I know many other people would probably single out Ultima IV from the series for introducing morality and consequences for your choices, and doing away with the "evil wizard taking over the land" cliche. But Ultima V is the first game I ever remember playing and feeling like it was a living, breathing world. Suddenly the pubs had tables and chairs and plates of food that could be eaten, the residents of each town all had daily schedules and homes with beds and mirrors, people had affiliations with and opinions on the two opposing factions - the Resistance and the Oppression, lit torches could be taken off the walls, your range of vision changed as the sun rose and set, and time held new significance as you were told to meet a member of the Resistance by the old well at midnight or as you discovered when and where to find the Shadowlords by observing the stars in the night sky. I think Ultima V marked a time when all the little details in RPG worlds began to be important - when setting and story started taking its place at the side of combat and other mechanics. -Clarence Simpson, Vicious Cycle Software Ultima V - The Ultima series allowed the player a level of freedom found only in a few games today. Through the origins of the series, the game had fits and starts where some ideas worked and others did not. By V, however, the central core of the game was completely worked out and many games today are 3D versions of this ground breaking title: Elder Scrolls comes to mind. Though other games at the time were similar, Bard's Tale for example, they did not have the scope of story and adventure, nor did they encompass so many technologies of the time. -James Edwards, Microsoft
The Ultima series as a whole has made a number of significant quantum leaps throughout its history. It was probably the first game to moralize a character's actions and create accountability for the player's actions which directly affected the character. Ultima 6 created a world in which the items the player collected were actual physical entities, rather than just elements on a menu which affected numbers. Ultima 7 introduced a persistent, physically changeable world and further refined the Ultima series' non-linear storytelling methods. Ultimately I feel the Ultima games made the largest leap with Ultima 6, creating a world full of side quests, vignettes which had no effect on the plot but were interesting to participate in, the ability to change objects in the world, rather than just collect them, and reunited the graphical subgenre with the textual genre in quality of storytelling and depth of exploration. -Tom Benda, Beefsteak Games For me the game that made the biggest leap has to be Ultima 7 (+ pt 2). What I still find amazing is that, even over 15 years ago, it still managed to effortlessly accomplish what many RPGs are still trying today. It had a feature list that would look impressive in a AAA RPG of today: massive free-form seamless world, interesting characters and storyline, NPC with personality, real time combat, etc. None of this really describes how alive the world felt, though. In my opinion, no game since has gone as far in recreating a living, breathing world that appears to go on with or without the player around. In the game farmers would tend their fields, head to the tavern in the evening, perhaps attend a town meeting and then go home to bed; warriors would train; beggars would beg and then congregate together for warmth in the cold evenings; bakers would bake and mutter to themselves - occasionally opening windows for air and peasants would er... peas? -Anonymous I'm going to hook everyone up with the answer key, clearly the answer is Ultima Online. Yes, there were MUDs and MUSHes but they were weak sauce compared to UO. UO was a pioneering game because it was the first real fantasy RPG MMO (with graphics) that people played and paid for and it introduced a lot of the mechanics that are still in these games today. One could make a case for Everquest as well since EQ's group mechanics form the basis of a lot of the continued success of the genre (witness World of Warcraft). I think that UO is still the true quantum leap and EQ is a mere 'leap' above that. -Anonymous
Ultima Underworld II: Labyrinth of Worlds by Looking Glass Studios, because of the technology, the story, and the graphics. The technology was incredibly well-executed. You could actually jump, swim and look up and down in real-time first person view (in 1993) - which was perfected in UU2 compared to UU1: The Stygian Abyss. The story, where the evil Guardian locks Lord British, and his friends inside a huge sphere of blackrock gem, and where you as the Avatar must venture down through the sewers to find a way to defeat the guardian was excellent and very immersive. The graphics - especially the textures were very very detailed and beautiful for the time, and the music was... gaah! I could go on! -Rasmus Harr, University of Copenhagen |
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