Review Overview!

Well, first some notes. I haven't posted in about a month. My original plan was to make a post about a curious surprise that a certain Lord British mentioned he'd send after I did as suggested by comments and informed him of my feat! However, he may have forgotten about it since nothing arrived, and if I wait too long to make a new post, it's possible no one will be reading, lol. So my plan is to make a few posts. One today will wrap up some responses to comments.

Then I'll write some summary posts going over each group of games. I figure overall they can be divided into several groups. The first is the earliest games, which were more experiments in programming and not anywhere near as cohesive (or worth playing) as the later games. The second is the sequence Ultima III, Ultima IV, and Ultima V, which to my mind seem like very similar games, although the late rone is far more sophisticated. I mean they seem to be evolving in one direction. I think there's a bit of a change in focus in VI, VII and Serpent Isle, as the style of gameplay changes significantly between V and VI and then massively between VI in VII. I'll also slide in three other discussions of the place of the spin-off games. I'll talk about how the Worlds of Ultima games in some ways were better than Ultima VI, the immersing gameplay of the Underworlds, and...um...I guess I'll talk about the Runes of Virtue games at some point. I'll wrap things up on a sour note by talking about why I think VIII and IX were failures.

The more I think about it, the more it seems to me my best Ultima experiences were in VI, Serpent Isle, and Underworld II. There are moments throughout the series that I think are highlights or just interesting to think about, and these three games had more than their fair share. Thinking about Underworld II also leads reminds me of how unrelentingly depressing that game is.

But some comments! First, I probably won't review any remakes. I've never been a big fan of remakes unless they are intended as ports or something sort of like ports (eg, Exult). To me, Ultima V isn't just a story about a kidnapped king, but it's also a spellcasting system and a combat system and a collection of tile graphics and some music, etc. That's not to say remakes aren't cool, but only that I probably won't feel the urge to play them as a part of this blog.

I was also asked about blogging other games...Probably not, lol. The most ridiculous thing about me blogging a year of video games is that I'm not actually much of a video game fan. I play Ultima. I also sometimes play Age of Empires online with a friend. That's pretty much it for me and games, besides the occasional NES jaunt (love that Solstice and Battle of Olympus). My next blog is most likely going to be on some other form of entertainment, e.g. a TV show, or maybe literature (but so many people know so much more than me about the latter). I've also contemplated going to every restaurant (alphabetically, via the phone book) in Lexington and discussing my thoughts on each of them. But for that I'd need a date or, possibly for some places, a bodyguard.

We'll see. But I'll make a note here on the off chance anyone is interested.