[UO Herald] Ultima Online Review on 1Up

[UO News]

Have you visited1Up.com's website today? They posted an interesting article about Ultima Online.

"It's actually this near-total anarchy that most sets UO apart from what came after. Nobody had done anything quite like this before, and it shows. While today MMOs have become mostly formulaic and carefully manage player progression, interaction, class balancing, and just generally make sure that the entire experience is a known quantity, Ultima Online faced no such constraints. There was no "common sense" when it came to this sort of thing, and while the kitchen-sink approach of providing everything one would expect from a single-player RPG and then letting a few thousand people play with it at once had occasionally disastrous consequences, it also led to the kind of freedom and surprise that one doesn't often encounter in a modern MMO."​

Check out the complete article.

Continue reading...

 

[Nimuaq]

Scott Sharkey was killed by PKs in the middle of writing this article. There was a lot more to it, but it was just fifteen pages of "OoOoOoO OOoOOoo OOOoOoo OOoOooO OOoOOoO OOooooO." Nobody on staff studies spirit speaking, so we just cut it all out. It was probably all swear words, anyway.

 

[puni666]

Have you visited1Up.com's website today? They posted an interesting article about Ultima Online.

"It's actually this near-total anarchy that most sets UO apart from what came after. Nobody had done anything quite like this before, and it shows. While today MMOs have become mostly formulaic and carefully manage player progression, interaction, class balancing, and just generally make sure that the entire experience is a known quantity, Ultima Online faced no such constraints. There was no "common sense" when it came to this sort of thing, and while the kitchen-sink approach of providing everything one would expect from a single-player RPG and then letting a few thousand people play with it at once had occasionally disastrous consequences, it also led to the kind of freedom and surprise that one doesn't often encounter in a modern MMO."​

Check out the complete article.

Continue reading...

Sounds appropriate.

 

[Frarc]

Nothing beats the freedom in UO.

 

[Reth]

Reading articles like this makes me wish I was there for the earlier years of the game.

 

[Samaira]

The about the author made me lol so bad

 

[Petra Fyde]

nice read, genuine 'warts and all' love for the game

 

[Ron Silverbeard]

So true! hahaha

 

[Nine Dark Moons]

"Modern MMOs can trace their lineage straight back to UO, which in retrospect looks like a bizarre prototypical mammal that still lays eggs."

 

[Ludes]

Those were the days though.. *sigh*
I'll never forget the bowel chilling horror I'd feel when I saw someone running up with a deathrobe and a halberd..

 

[SlobberKnocker]

i loved the screenshot of mass killings. i still like the big em events where u see nothing but bodies lying all over. trammies never learn how to cross heal to this day.

 

[Picus at the office]

If you were there back then, IMO, people would understand why some posters get so frustrated with some of the dev choices. It was an amazing time to be a gamer.

 

[MrMightySmith]

those days we had a very flawed game for sure... But man was it a challenging blast.

 

[puni666]

those days we had a very flawed game for sure... But man was it a challenging blast.

Just those days? LOL!

 

[Lady Silverbrook]

Just those days? LOL!

It was flawed back in the day because it was very much the Wild West and the devs had uncharted territory before MMOs were all the rage. And the UO team had to keep up with players taking advantage of that.

It is flawed now because it is an old, aging mess today with very little in the way of resources being given to it in order tp keep it vital and important in today's MMO heavy industry. Not to mention poor decisions made by both EA and several development teams in UO's past and current state.

 

[Frarc]

I hated the game after a few days, really i did. Getting killed almost every day several times. Loosing everything you worked on to get. Until one day when we almost gave up, someone helped us. He gave us a little gold, some bone armor and a nice weapon. He recruited us in his guild AGB (Adventurers Guild of Britain) on Great Lakes . When we ask what he wanted in return he said ,"Nothing, just one day you help others like we helped you". And now 14 years later, thats is still what we do. When people are in need of help, we help them and not want anything in return. Because we know how hard it can be at first and every little help, how small it is, is welcomed!