SofA Must capture what the people want inorder to be successful

You can still play it. It hasn't gone anywhere

 

The same argument could be made for simply rebooting Ultima IV with MMO and better graphics. But it wouldn't work either. Not new enough, not novel enough, not cool enough. Or would it?

All still rests on the basics: can Lord British deliver another great story and novel game-play that appeals to Ultima veterans and the Harry Potter generation alike? And will kids today even look up from Minecraft long enough to try something new? And when are people going to start freaking out about the name? Shroud of the Avatar? That's not exactly subtle. Shroud, as in burial shroud, as in Lord British plans to kill off the Avatar, hey, aren't I the Avatar, the player, the hero, the founder, the backer, the cult following making all this possible? Kill off your core audience, LB? Bold move. That's like Sir Arthur Conan Doyle sending Sherlock over the falls or Paul Sheldon killing off Misery Chastain. I guess LB got tired of all of us killing him with glass swords and cannon fire.

I wonder if SOTA has a message problem. What's the elevator pitch? Ultima reboot by LB. That's really it so far. The rest of the argument is either too complicated or not differentiated enough or not backed with enough marketing budget to have rocked the PC gaming world. It has delivered 25,000+ fans and a few million dollars, a success to be sure, but just a beginning. How does Portalarium build on this? I don't think more demos to game conferences will move the needle that far.

Some messaging ideas I'm kicking around --

SOTA is:

a) World of Warcraft with parity for single player play

b) Skyrim with parity for MMO play

c) Kickstarter World of Warcraft

d) The first real new concept in PC RPG in nearly twenty years

e) all of the above

f) none of the above

 

The real UO (origin systems when they were running it) went through PK bunnification over time originally it was litteraly free reign then over time it kept getting changed and then at one point your karma was made bad by PKing and the towns guards would kill on site at a certain bad karma. The more I am thinking back I even think they had a 'wanted' system at one point... been too long.

I did enjoy the thrill of having to survive pkers... it did make it more real... it forced you to travel in groups for example... or make deals with pkers, or their gangs for protection.... was a very unique element that really made it stand out, haven't seen anything like it since and I have played a lot of MMOs.

 

Wow what a depressing story. Technically couldn't this be applied to any mmo? If so I guess why should anyone bother to make another mmo ever again if what you say is true? Also, according to you Vets only stick around for the pvp experience? Just an fyi, i played UO for over 10 years and only pvp'd when I was attacked. Some of the things that kept me with UO long term as apposed to other games were this: such a massive world that I could do a lot of hunting alone, a solo friendly style game, customizable housing and vendors with no central auction house, classes found no where else like provoking, tamer and treasure hunter, and many other things. Sorry but I disagree with you Eldgrim, there was much more magic to UO than just pvp and newness of a server.

 

Hear hear!

UO = 15+ years for me.
DAOC = 3 months for me.
WOW = 6 months for me (played only 2-3 of them, had a game card).
Neverwinter = 2 months for me.
SWTOR = 4 months for me.

 

Even though I hated it, I also loved that if something killed you, it looted your corpse of an item or two. That was wicked crazy and made you consider what you fought before you fought it.

 

You could argue the same thing with UO....I guess I should have said I want an Ultima style rpg back

 

yes you could and the same thing applies. The Ultima games are all out there and available to be played and UO is still online and running. You can play on the official servers and there are TONS of free shards out there. So if you really want Ultima or UO you can have them. Nothing stopping you from still playing those games.

SotA takes inspiration from them and also strikes out in a new direction with the selective multiplayer and other gameplay aspects.

 

Really? I'm pretty sure most of us who backed that know this.

 

Going back to my earlier reply to you, you were posing the question, "What if the people want Ultima back?". In light of that I think my replies should make sense Yes, it should be obvious but it sounded like perhaps you didn't quite get that.

 

Read: freeshards

99% of the vets from the old days of UO that still play/played UO do so/did so via freeshards. 99% of this population was pvp-oriented. Most of these people don't consider the game that EA manages to be *actual* UO past AoS. Some people like the play style you are fond of, but it is not the majority of people. It is also a population that did not continue on with EA but instead bounced from freeshard to freeshard, and even to other games that seemed to have the unrestricted qualities that old-school UO had. ...games like Darkfall.

I should also add I am specifically talking about making an old UO clone. A different game is just that--different.

 

I think that Eldgrim makes a great point. I want Ultima back too, but that is because I remember it from 2001 when I quit. As Eldgrim stated UO was from a different time and many of the things we loved about it won't work in todays gaming world. I believe that this team of developers is going to take the escence of UO and adapt it to todays gaming world. I hope it is as magically as UO was for me when I was a kid.

-DamnNewbie

Siege Perilous outlaw

 

Yep, I went back and played UO and that game is boring, even UOForever and T2A free shards. It was fun for it's time. The feel of the world is still good, but the gameplay just isn't there. What do you really do in that game? hunt treasure? steal? pvp? kill monsters for treasure/fame? It all comes down to gathering items to decorate your house and equip your character. No substance. They added more quests but I didn't see much value in them.

I think people loved the game so much when it was new they forgot about a lot of it's short comings for modern games.

I love the atmosphere of pre-alpha release 1. I think this game will be one of the best RPGs and best multi-player RPGs ever made. It isn't simply UO redone. It's a culmination of everything they've learned over the past 15 years to create an amazing game unlike any other out there.

 

exactly! people that are just looking for a new UO or Ultima game are completely missing the above point. It should be far better than what's come before it.

 

Exactly

 

Better, to be sure, but that doesn't mean that people shouldn't wish for elements of game design they deemed to be particularly successful. New is not always Better.

 

It's a natural reaction. People want more of the same because of what they remembered through rose-tinted glasses. That's cool and all -- I have very fond memories of UO and Ultima. But generally people want the feelings of the past so badly that they can't see the bright future ahead of them. Shroud of the Avatar is going to be a game changer in so many ways.

 

Cheers! I am as well but '99.

Because the people who licensed the game are evil IRL and they suck the living souls from the virtuous designers until they needed to retreat for their rest. Finding rest in space and other places they have once again emerged to make a new game Shrouded by mysteries yet still of the Avatar. Combining the best of all ultima (ultimatum) elements: a story and a sandbox!

Correct... it was/is a full sandbox. But it was lacking of a story so it didn't exactly draw appeal to everyone... some people want storyline

I fully disagree. I think with the success of Ultimas it could survive strictly on namesake and storyline... that being said I do agree that if it is to be "THE NEXT BIG THING" then it will need to have a healthy sandbox feel. I'm fairly sure it will but, to be honest, it's way too early for doom and gloom posts Cheers!

 

That's where taking inspiration from what was good about the past titles comes in. Having said that, they don't need to do something just because it was in UO or Ultima. They need to take inspiration from those and make something better.

 

Ultima Online was a simulator, and it was not intended to be like that. Unintentionally it was the greatest experiment of player interaction. And the results to this day are it was the best MMORPG. What i do not understand is why some people want another release with oppressive filters. What made UO the best was ultimate freedom, nothing in it felt staged. If you were into pvp, rp, crafting, real estate, rares or what ever it was very personal because there was risk and reward. With out one there cant be the other, unless you see rewards as freebees for doing nothing like most games encourage these days.

With the exception of a precious few, no game since UO has attempted treat the sickness that is over filtration of player interaction. Developers treat players like grade schoolers. As if we are all children that need every move monitored. Well its been done and it does not work well. My biggest fear is that this will be just another release that has not learned lessons from the history of these games. But hey the housing will be great right?