So I've heard great things about this series and am a fan of Looking Glass's games. As a result, I looked at Ultima Underworld. I heard said game relies on some knowledge of the characters from Ultima VII, so decided to play that first. Of course there's the matter of earlier games (the ride never ends!)... so I ask: should I start with VII? If so, is the story stuff in the manual sufficient to get the most out of VII?

Also, will try Exult. A thread here mentioned missing NPC schedules, sound issues and a non-functioning lighting system in Exult however. Is this true as of the latest development builds?

Yes, I'm sure these questions have been asked before somewhere, but I don't have the time to check the whole forum history. :P

Personally, I think Ultima 7 is overrated. In particular, the combat is horrible. (They took away the turn-based combat of previous entries and replaced it with a real-time system in which you have very little control.)

It might be best to start with Ultima 4 and then play the series in order from there. Ultima 1-3 were primitive, lack much story, and have very little connections to later games (except for some references in Ultima 7's expansion and Ultima 7 part 2).

I agree, 4 is probably the best place to start. It is modern enough with an easier combat system.

Thanks for the replies. Ultima IV looks pretty primitive to me. Could I start with V or VI instead?

Combat doesn't bother me. I'm mainly interested in 7 for the world design and suchlike, which I hear is some of the best ever done.

For the most part, the Ultima games all stand on their own well enough, without the need to have the previous games in the series under your belt. What brief bits you get in the manual of the previous games' stories is quite sufficient - you might miss out on a couple subtle nods or lose a bit of gravity to some reveals in the series, but not so much that you won't know what's going on and/or be able to appreciate the story of any given game for what it is. I wouldn't recommend playing Serpent Isle before Ultima VII, but that's the only real exception I can think of, at least in my own opinion.

That said, there is no one hard-and-fast Ultima that you NEED to start with. Anything from IV to VII is generally a good starting point, depending on what your preferences are and what suits you. If you find IV primitive, you might find V to be much the same - they're rather similar visually and mechanically, although V refines the combat a bit and implements a bit more world interactivity, a day/night system and NPC scheduling.

If it's world design and the like that's your bread and butter, then I would suggest Ultima VI or VII as your starting point, as they're probably the peak of interactivity in the series. Alternatively, there's the two Worlds of Ultima games, Savage Empire and Martian Dreams, which are both based on the Ultima VI engine, if you want a different sort of genre.

The Underworld games are also pretty heavy on the world design and interactivity, although they take the form of first-person dungeon crawlers as opposed to the more hard-and-fast RPGS that comprise the main series. Although related, they're a different beast altogether, and are also a fine starting point, in my opinion. The first Underworld stands on its own quite well, and while Underworld II comes off the events of Ultima VII and features some of the same characters, it's not entirely necessary to have played Ultima VII to enjoy it, either.

You should not have a problem playing Ultima Underworld 1 on its own if you prefer the Looking Glass style of game; its plot is unrelated to other games in the series, as opposed to UW2, which is linked to the Ultima 7 storyline. In neither case would you have trouble due to not playing the games in the main series though; despite the plot connections, UW2 explains the situation well enough in the background provided in the manual and the initial segments of the game itself. You may miss out on some references, but nothing that's particularly important to gameplay.

If you'd rather look at the main series first, I'd recommend starting with Ultima 7 since - despite the change to the combat system - it's technically far more advanced than the earlier games and has generally aged better (especially if you aren't really used to retro graphics and interfaces). If you want to hop back a bit, Ultima 6 is also reasonably playable since it incorporates mouse support (albeit a tad awkwardly) and has much better graphics and world interactivity than 4 or 5 (other than being tile-based, it's similar to U7 in that respect); its engine was also used with Savage Empire and Martian Dreams, two other spinoff games that are only tangentially related to the main series.

The way I see it, when you give a character the order to attack, you are ordering the character to attack for one turn, not for eternity. Hence, it makes sense that you should be prompted to choose an action for the character on that character's next turn. Also, the interface doesn't overly favor making an attack over casting a spell, the way some games do (including Ultima 7).

(Of course, there is still the problem of spells needing reagents, which tends to discourage the use of weaker spells like Magic Missile/Arrow.)

Also, in my experience, other creatures taking turns outside of combat doesn't really slow down the game unless actual combat is taking place. Plus, that issue is really only for Ultima 6; in 3 through 5, you normally don't have this happen, except for the rare creature that can attack outside of combat.

Underworld 1 doesn't rely on U7. Check out the manual, and that should be all of the backstory you really need to enjoy the game.

UU 2 does include a number of the characters from U7, though you can still enjoy the game without having played 7 (I enjoyed UU2, but I haven't played U7 yet).

Both UU's are a rather different experience from the numbered Ultima's. Roaringlion covered the differences pretty well, I think.

This has been really useful, thanks.

I've started with Ultima Underworld and am really enjoying it. Makes me realise how Arx Fatalis copied it in almost every aspect :P Might play U6 and 7 later; eventually UW2. I'll look into Savage Empire and Martian Dreams too, although I'm not sure I find the settings as appealing.

For 5 I could just use the Dungeon Siege mod. I hear it's as good, if not better than the original game, but correct me if I'm horribly wrong on that count.

Turn based systems are best when you have a lot of options and tactical approaches to combat. There are many ways they could have improved on a turn based system, but since they chose to do none of these, they were right to eliminate it entirely. There's simply no good reason why anyone should have to micromanage every swing of Geoffrey's sword or every step he took on the way over to the enemy.

I can't recall ever having a lack of reagents, except back when mandrake root and nightshade had to be harvested. They've always been cheap and available in bulk. Ultimas 6 and 7 throw so much gold at you anyway that you'd be more likely to run out of mana before reagents.

It wasn't noticeable in the earliest games because you controlled one character (at least on the map) and spawn rates were low. When Ultima 6 and its spinoffs upped the number of spawns considerably, it became a real issue. It had nothing to do with actual attacks, but rather the fact that everything had to take its turn just to move, even if it was peaceful or couldn't see you. Merely being nearby slowed down the gameplay for no legitimate reason. If U7 had continued to run on that same turn based engine it would have been an objectively worse game for it.

The Dungeon Siege mod, I would argue, isn't really the same game. It may share plot elements, but the gameplay is real time, rather than the turn based gameplay of the original Ultima 5.

Actually, there are tactical options. In particular, there are spells you can cast during combat (for example, to attack or to heal), and there are items you can use as well. Also, why is Geoffrey using a sword rather than a bow or a morningstar? (Geoffrey actually isn't the best example; consider Mariah, who has a lot of spells to choose from, or the Avatar, who is the only good spellcaster in 6 (why isn't Jaana a mage?) and the only spellcaster period in 7.)

Also, real-time combat is less accessible than turn based combat. People with bad reflexes, or those that do not have full use of their hands, have far more trouble with real-time combat than turn-based combat.

The reagent issue comes from the fact that:

1. You have to go out of your way to purchase reagents, especially with no shop selling them all. Also, enemies don't drop them, so you can't just accumulate reagents without going out of your way.
2. Using spells uses up a consumable. It doesn't matter how common the consumable items are; there is a psychological effect that makes many players (like myself) rather hesitant to use them, which goes against the fact that players should be given more tactical options.

The games would be better if:
1. All reagents except mandrake root were removed from the game entirely.
2. Any spell requiring mandrake still requires it, while all other spells require no reagents.

That way, there would be less micro-management of reagents needed, and mandrake could still serve as a limiting factor for spells that are strong enough to warrant it. Meanwhile, using a spell like Magic Missile/Arrow as a character's main attack becomes a viable option, with spells like Explosion and Mass Death being saved for special occasions.

Note that this is looking something like the Might and Magic approach, where some spells require gems to cast.

But the best part of ultimas 6-8 was searching through the bags of bags of your party members to find a key to open a door.........................................(Extending game time ftw!)

In Ultima 6, no reason to do that. Just cast Magic Lock on the door to magically lock it, then Unlock Magic to unlock it. It diesn't matter what sort of lock the door originally had, this combination of spells *will* unlock it. (Only works on doors, not on gates or other things, unfotunately.)

This trick works in Ultima 5, but is less useful there because there are no locks that require specific keys and there is a spell to unlock doors that aren't magically locked.