this post was submitted on 17 Aug 2024
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Oldest game I've actually played this year would probably be a bit of Ultima IV: Quest for the Avatar, 1985.
I found that game borderline impossible. Tried my little ass off but could only get one rune or whatever it was. If you got poisoned without being able to deal with it you were done
Yeah it absolutely does not hold your hand at all. It really helps to have the supplemental stuff that originally came with it like the big cloth map. They’re included digitally with things like gog but not everyone knows that. It definitely doesn’t have some of the quality of life we’ve gotten used to in the years since release. It was also intentionally unique in how it was presenting the story in that just killing things that attack you isn’t always the right answer in combat.
I can totally see how a lot of people would bounce off of it. I am sure some of it for me is nostalgia, though if you get into it there’s a lot there.
If the story of it interests you and you just wanna watch a retrospective about it there’s a great series majuular is doing on youtube. https://youtu.be/hkfBiIyJd7E
Please don't misunderstand- I still have the magic book that came with it (I lost the Kyle the Younger book), and when my mom passed away a few years ago and I had to clean out her house, I sold the cloth map on ebay (I got like 60€ I think). I was annoyed I couldn't find that little ankh that came w/ the game..
I used to read the magic spells book over and over. I was probably 9 or 10. Y(up) and Z(down) .. god those dungeons were tricky. I was always scared to drink from fountains (blech, poisoned?) Its been a while.
So I know all about it, the mantras.. those portals w/ the phases of the moon.. anyway, I was young. I think I got one of the virtues, but I felt like to get the Valor one you had to kill like 20 guards and it was never gonna happen. I did show every friend who came over the tarot card scene at the beginning to choose your character class, though.
I tried to see if I could finally make it about 5 years ago and downloaded some kinda emulator, but I think I had trouble "changing discs" and lost progress and gave up.
What emulator are you using? i played it on Apple IIc, and I'd want to use that same exact everything if I was to give it a go.
Oh I didn't mean it to sound derogatory. I played it back on commodore64 back when it first came out in that same age range... so yeah I get it.. it's obtuse game for sure. Great if you get into it, tons of content, but definitely a lot.
Last time I tried it was on the pc version, which is free fwiw. https://www.gog.com/en/game/ultima_4
I've never tried it on apple II so I couldn't really say for emulation on that one.
Side note, if you want to play something that was heavily inspired by the classic Ultima games check out Moonring. It was made by one of the original devs of Fable and he outright says Ultima inspired it and the game wears that lineage on it's sleeve. It's got a lot of nice modern QoL and it was released for free and is still in active development. It's just a passion project for him.
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2373630/Moonring/
thanks for the shout, I'll look into that
I'll look at that version of ultima IV, for me, its kind of unfinished business.. gotta get on that druid shit