Ultima VIII: Pagan

Ultima VIII: Pagan
Studio	Origin Systems
Publisher	Origin Systems
Erstveröffent- lichung	March 15, 1994
platform	PC ( DOS ), PC-98
Game engine	Ultima VIII engine
genre	Computer role playing game
Game mode	Single player
control	Mouse and keyboard
medium	8 × 3½ "floppy disks , CD-ROM , download
language	English, German, French, Spanish, Japanese
Current version	Disk version: v2.12 (February 10, 1995) CD version: v2.13 (November 18, 1995)
Age rating	USK

Ultima VIII: Pagan is a computer role-playing game from the Ultima series by Richard Garriott . It was developed by Origin Systems , a subsidiary of Electronic Arts . It was released for DOS in 1994 .

action

Ultima VIII was the second part of the three parts overall story arc Age of Armageddon developed: After the events in Ultima VII in Britannia banished nemesis of the protagonists , the Guardian, the player character, the Avatar , to the subject of his world Pagan . At the same time he threatens the submission of the two worlds of the Avatar, earth and Britannia. The aim of the avatar is therefore to find a way to leave Pagan again.

In a world that is alien to him, the avatar and his eight virtues are unknown and magic also follows unknown rules, so he is on his own and has to find new ways to magic. The island that Pagan seems to consist of is ruled by four elementary titans, each with its own form of magic that its followers can learn. The avatar faces all titans in the course of the event to gain power himself. This allows the avatar to reconstruct a Blackstone portal that the Guardian originally used to reach Pagan. The portal finally enables the Avatar to leave the exile on Pagan.

Gameplay

In Ultima VIII , the protagonist has to make his way alone (without a group of other game characters) and, unlike Ultima, cannot fall back on his friends from previous parts. The game is played in an isometric perspective with significantly improved movement and combat animations compared to the previous title.

reception

The attempt to attract new groups of buyers failed; at the same time, many fans of the series were disappointed. The reception from players and the trade press was mixed to negative, and the game was not very successful commercially either. The Dragon Magazine still awarded 3 out of 5 stars. In 1996, Computer Gaming World magazine ranked Pagan as the 20th worst game of all time because it ruined a once great franchise.

The frequently mentioned shortcomings include the new game mechanics focus as a platformer game with running, jumping and climbing, the hack-and-slay- like combat mechanics and the smaller, less complex and, compared to its predecessor, much less interactive world. This is why Pagan was jokingly known among Ultima fans as the Super Avatar Brothers , alluding to the multitude of platform-hopping game elements that were reminiscent of the gameplay of the Nintendo classic Super Mario Brothers . It was also criticized that the potential for frustration in the sometimes noticeably poorly implemented skill passages is immense.

Development history

Pagan was planned as the second part of a trilogy beginning with Ultima VII . The first part should take place on the world of Britannia, the second on Pagan and the third part on the home world of the Guardian. In this part of the series Richard Garriott delegated most of the development work to others, EA also had a lot of influence on the development. Garriott later stated, “[...] I sacrificed everything to please shareholders, which was a mistake. We probably delivered it unfinished for three months. "

In retrospect, the game was given a language package (English, French, German) that gave the four titans and the Zaelans a voice. However, it was only moderately well received, since a CD version that already had language files was not too long to come along. The CD version is version 2.13 which, however, is identical in content to the last disk version 2.12.

Patch

Patch 2.12, which was released later, corrected many game bugs and story holes and fixed most of the problems with the skill passages by influencing the jump distance. Also, some moving platforms from the original release have now been brought to a halt.

After the mostly disappointed feedback from fans of the series, Garriott decided to realign the successor Ultima IX in the direction of classic Ultima parts with another return to Britannia. The decision was announced in an accompanying text for patch 2.12. This plan of a return to the original character of the series was ultimately not implemented in Ultima IX.

Expansion pack

For Ultima VIII an expansion called The Lost Vale was produced and completely completed, but then never went on sale due to the disappointing sales of the main game. In October 2005, an original copy of a finished sales box (but empty) from The Lost Vale was sold at auction for $ 1,923. According to one of the designers of the extension at the time, a copy of the data was probably not preserved at Origin due to the lack of backup guidelines at the time. However, design documents have been preserved which, among other things, document the action of the add-on . Low-resolution scans of the box can be found on the web.

Later story

The Ultima VIII engine later became the basis for the Crusader game series.

As a DOS game, Ultima VIII is difficult to get to run on newer operating systems such as Windows 98 and later. However, it works reliably with the DOSBox emulator . In contrast to Ultima VII , which used Intel's undocumented " Big real mode ", which was known as Voodoo Memory at Origin, Ultima VIII used a more conventional DOS extender . There is also a fan patch which adjusts the memory management so that Ultima VIII can also be used with later Windows operating systems. There is also an open source project called Pentagram, which aims to get Ultima VIII to run natively on all modern operating systems with a new engine .

In 2003, an anonymous developer offered the game's source code to the Pentagram Project to support it, but the offer was probably not accepted due to legal concerns.

In April 2012 , after years of unavailability , Pagan was re-released in digital distribution via GOG.com . In April 2015, Pagan was also offered as freeware on EA's digital distribution platform Origin .

Web links

• Ultima VIII: Pagan at MobyGames (English)
• Pentagram Project - Open Source Ultima VIII Engine Recreation (English)
• Ultima Codex , active Ultima Community (English), successor page of Ultima Aiera

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Jörg Langer: Ultima 8 - Pagan . In: 5/1994 . PC player . May 1, 1994. Accessed September 10, 2012: " 89% "
2. ↑ Ultima VIII: Pagan ( English ) PCZone. June 1, 1994. Retrieved September 10, 2012: " 78 Score - Without doubt a love / hate relationship for Ultima purists "
3. ^ Petersen, Sandy: Eye of the Monitor . In: Dragon . No. 208, August 1994, pp. 61-66.
4. ↑ CGW 148: 50 Worst Games of All Time: A once-great RPG series reduced to the level of Mario , but with hateful, virtue-less characters.
5. ↑ Ultima VIII nitpicks from Hacki's Ultima Page (English)
6. ↑ The Unofficial Ultima Dragons Internet Chapter Newbie FAQ , accessed July 17, 2011.
7. ↑ The Tracks of His Games - Richard Garriott gets introspective on his past creations ( English ) In: Computer Games Magazine . September 21, 1999. Archived from the original on July 7, 2004. Retrieved September 8, 2012.
8. ^ Ultima VIII, "Ultima Adventures . Sergorn.wordpress.com. Retrieved August 17, 2012.
9. ↑ Richard Garriott : fans.txt ( English , ZIP ; 560 kB) In: fans.txt in the 2.12 Ultima VIII patch . Origin. Retrieved October 22, 2013: “ The design of Ultima IX (which is still in progress) relies heavily on this feedback and has resulted in a dramatic turnaround back toward classic role playing. Even better, it has resulted in a classic Britannian Ultima. "
10. ↑ 20 years and counting - Origin Systems. sherigranerray.com, November 5, 2009. (English) - In the wording: “… Lost Vale, the Ultima VIII add-on not only existed, but was completed and ready to gold mastering. ... "
11. ↑ WTF Dragon / Ultimacodex: The Lost Vale Plot Documents (English). April 19, 2012. Retrieved August 23, 2012
12. ↑ Ultima VIII: The Lost Vale ( Memento of July 13, 2011 in the Internet Archive ) Imagination Overdrive, Inc. Website (English)
13. ↑ Ron Windeyer: Windows Patch 1.14 ( English ) In: Ultima 8 in Windows . September 29, 2001. Retrieved September 13, 2012.
14. ↑ Archive for the 'U8 Patches' Category Ultima 8 in Windows, March 6, 2007 (English)
15. ^ The Pentagram project on SourceForge
16. ↑ RazorBlade: Ultima 8 SourceCode ( English ) exult.sourceforge.net. April 30, 2003. Retrieved January 25, 2014: “ just read that 'Anonymous', who claims to be a developer of U8, still has the full source of it. "
17. ↑ Andre Linken: Ultima 8: Pagan - Gold Edition of the role-playing game at GOG.com for six dollars . In: GameStar . April 20, 2012. Accessed on September 8, 2012: “ The gold edition of the classic role-playing game Ultima 8: Pagan is now available in the GOG.com online shop for six dollars. This also includes the Speech Pack. "
18. ↑ Ultima 8: Pagan is now free on Origin By Samit Sarkar on Apr 28, 2015