All ULTIMAs on sale on gog.com now!

https://www.gog.com/game/ultima_7_complete
https://www.gog.com/game/ultima_1_2_3
https://www.gog.com/game/ultima_underworld_1_2
https://www.gog.com/game/ultima_456
https://www.gog.com/game/ultima_8_gold_edition
https://www.gog.com/game/ultima_9_ascension

If you only want to play one, play Ultima VII. It's still worth playing today!

 

The Ultima 4+5+6 bundle is only $1.49 (so 5 & 6 are 75c each, seeing how 4 is free!).

Everyone knows Ultima 4 is *the* place to learn about the Virtues.

Ultima 5 is one of my favorite storylines, with the Companions and other good people of Britannia being pushed underground by a toxic governmental regime. This is the last Ultima to feature dual-scale maps, a staple in Shroud of the Avatar, and does it quite well.

Ultima 6 is the first Ultima that I played on PC, and is my favorite of the series. The reversal of the gargoyles from the standard demonic threat to a people on the brink of annihilation was brilliant. The gargish language is interesting, the hunt for the pirate treasure (while long) is fulfilling, and you can literally do anything in this game (the infamous "baking bread" lit test started here!).

Of course, once you get through these wonderful games, move right into Ultima 7 and Underworld, which are staples of the Ultima experience.

 

I made the experience when trying to get people who never played old games like it before into Ultima, Ultima VII is by far the best one to get them into it because the controls still hold up and the graphic style is timeless.

Ultima 1-6, while being amazing games, controls and/or graphics will put newer players off unfortunately. There are exceptions, but that is the general experience.

So I'd go the other way round. VII first, then when you are hooked you have the motivation to do the others despite having to get used to the unique controls and old school graphics.

 

Actually, I tried a few different approaches to get my son to play Ultima.

Ultima 9 and Ultima Underworld were the ones that got him interested, just because of the graphics. It took a while to get Ultima 9 working well, but it was worth it. After he get into that game a bit, we went back to Ultima 7, 6, and 5. He was ok with both 6 & 7, once he got used to the look, but 5 and older were just too dated for him. Hes primarily a mouse-user, so thats probably some of it.

Its funny tho that you say the controls hold up in U7; that was one of the first things he complained about. Moving was fine, but combat was *horrible*, until I showed him how to change each character's control to manual. At the time, auto-combat was poor but servicable, but at higher speeds (even under DOSbox) they are almost impossible to follow. He kept asking why his friends kept yelling and running toward blood smears, until I showed him they were slaughtering something just off screen. lol

 

Ultima 9 is the best one for new players. It believes you have never played an Ultima before and explains things is a basic way. Plus it is 3D.

 

What newer players will feel used to depends. Navigation in say U5 is the same as a portable console game like Pokemon where you use the buttons on thr controller. Y'all talk about it as if there is no close modern analogue to old school DOS games, when there is. Not every game out there even today is a GPU busting real time open world RPG.

For people skittish about trying old school games, I'd suggest U7, too, personally... yea the combat sucked even back in the day. For people willing to try anything, I'd suggest start U5, go to U6, and then U7 in order. U4 gets a lot of praise since it introduced the theme of the virtues, buy IMO the series only finally matured with U5.