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This
game could be called the "Mother of all massively multiplayer
online graphical games." Since its opening three years
ago, this game proved that you can get hundreds of thousands of
people to play online games. The most successful games
previous to this entry into the online gaming world counted success
in the tens of thousands. Even with fierce competition from
EverQuest and Asheron's Call, Ultima Online has continued to grow
and might still be the largest (Verant and Origin both claim their
games are the biggest).
The game
is based on the Ultima world originally created by "Lord
British" when computer games were still dots on the computer
screen. This series of games is known for its innovations and
its for being the best of their genre. By the time UO was
conceived the series was a franchise and had a huge following.
The success of UO was even greater than the Origin folks
expected. In fact some thought the exercise would end up being
a flop.
Well,
the sudden flux of graphical online RPGs can be credited to the
success of UO (as UO can credit its success to the previous
successes of free MUDs, professionally done text based games,
GemStone III, DragonRealms, and last but not least the mother of all
graphical online games, Neverwinter Nights on AOL). They proved
there was lots of money to be had in this market. EverQuest
proved that there was room for another big game and Asheron's Call
is proving that there is room for a third. There are a number
of other games in this genre slated to come out in the next year or
two. It'll be interesting to see how much room is left in the
market for them.
UO by
today's standards is very dated in it's graphics. The view is
from the top down and from a bit of an angle so you see the top of
everything.and one side. The graphics are also all bit-mapped
instead of being true 3D images. Nevertheless the game when it
came out was state-of-the-art and it's proven its ability to survive
in the face of games with better looking graphics.
In UO,
you choose your character (always a human) and develop your
character by doing things. If you want to be the best at
making armor, you make armor. If you want to be the best
fighter, you fight things. This is one of the charms of UO and
it's one of the more annoying aspects of the game. Your
character has a finite amount of overal skill it can learn.
When you learn more in one skill than is allowed overall for your
character, another skill loses experience and drops. Unlike
most MUD style games you can't continue to improve your character
forever.
However,
UO offers things that the other graphical online games don't.
In UO the characters are integrated into the online economy.
Players are able to make most things (bread anyone?) and become the
best at it that your character can be. If you want your
character to become the best at fighting (Got tired of making
bread), you just start concentrating on improving those skills until
you get the be the best at killing things. So, if the idea of
making stuff in the game appeals to you, UO has the best system in
place of any current graphical online game (Arguably some of the
text based games out there do this much better than UO).
Another
unique thing about UO is your ability to buy ships and houses and
shops to build in the game. This is neat but it's also a bit
odd. There's little restriction on placing your house or shop
and you can find them in odd places or you can find that the world
is overrun with buildings, making it difficult to get around.
As far
as what it offers for Christians, the game is typical of most major
RPGs. It's world is generally a fantasy world that's an
expression of the bits and pieces of ideas, religions and cultures
of the designers. Where the designers felt something was cool,
they added it into the game. So, you'll run into things that
aren't particularly Christian and you'll sometimes get the
impression someone is making Christians the target of some secret
(or not so secret) joke. But then you'll find that true for a
number of other philosophies and ideas. This game holds not
dark agenda except to make money by being fun.
Still,
it's not designed to help you build a Christian oriented character
so you'll find your choices along this line very limited. The
presence of magic will bother some Christians. Violence is not
very graphic in the game and occultic innuendo is relatively
non-existent.
Final
Score
Highlights: ?Ability
to make stuff. It's been around for a long time (relatively
speaking) and is a well developed world.
Lowlights:
Very dated graphics. Limited character development. Lack
of other races than human.
Recommendation:
If you really want to play an online RPG and you must have a
top-down viewpoint, this is a classic. It doesn't offer much
for Christian play, however.
Christian
Sense (CS): 2
Game
Engine (GE): 2.5
Game
Play (GP): 3.5
Overall:
2.6 |
