Ultima Online - One Year Later Last updated September 14, 1998

In my alternate life (away from work and family) I have acted the role of Rakhier, a hero of the world of Sosaria. Starting out with not much more than the clothing on my back and no skills worth speaking of I gradually became a grandmaster swordsman and a mighty wizard. I have traveled all throughout the world, sailed the seas of Sosaria, explored the deepest dungeons, fought dragons, demons, and countless hords of evil creatures. I also helped create a guild of like-minded warriors and wizards which has outlived hundreds of other guilds.

All this and more I accomplished in the game Ultima Online (created by Origin Systems and released to the public in late September 1997). I have been playing Ultima Online for just about one year now. This is longer than all but one other game I have ever played. This has also been the most expensive game I have ever played with costs of $170 to date (and rising by $10 a month). My alter-ego has been active continuously since October 1997 (one of the older characters in the Baja Shard, partly by virtue of the fact that I started the character shortly after the Baja shard was started).

I am now prepared to make a very considered judgement on the game.

Ultima Online - Worth the Time?
On some level, Ultima Online is one of the most interesting games I have ever played. Without question it is a game that will go down in history as the first game to ever marry a highly graphical interface with the shared world of the the MUDs (text-based multi-user dungeons). Certainly Ultima Online is an evolution, from Diablo (the first multi-user high-graphics role playing game) to Meridian 59 (a much smaller game than Ultima Online with very poor graphics and one of the worst names ever given to a computer game).

Given the work that is being done by a host of game companies ( EverQuest by Sony Interactive, Asheron's Call, supported by Microsoft, Middle Earth supported by Sierra Online, and many more) it takes no effort to predict that games like Ultima Online will be very common in the industry within 10 years. But Ultima Online was the first and those of us who have played it will not forget it.

Despite the time I have spent on the game and the good times I've had, the game has serious flaws that make it unlikely to survive into the near future.

Problems? What Problems?
Managing the game over time: This is the most critical problem. Without a doubt Ultima Online was fun while our characters were growing and improving. However, once we reached the maximum skill level (and for me this happened about four months after I started the game), the game lost a great deal of point. The problem is not just in character development, it has to do with the whole world.

One year into the game, I walked from one large city to the other (Vesper to Britain). During my trip I encountered three monsters, a small number of harmless animals, about 500 houses, castles, and tents, and exactly one other person (who ran from me, doubtless fearing I was a dangerous killer on the loose).

The same trip early in the game was a very different experiance, many fewer houses, many more people, more monsters, less animals. The world in the game as of one year is completely filled with houses, most of which are stuffed with loot that is being horded for no reason other than it can be horded.

Also, because all the characters in the game are old and experianced, everyone can cast spells that allow instant travel. This has the effect of making the land nearly empty as people travel via. spell from their personal houses, to towns, to dungeons to kill monsters. There is much less personal interaction now.

The combination of factors (1) you can reach maximum character advancement in a fairly short time (2) houses cover the whole landscape (3) instant travel spells are fairly easy to learn and used by everyone all conspire to make the game uninteresting for experianced players.

More to come -- Colin

Here are some of my other Ultima Online comments. Here is my guild's web page: The Noble Lions.