Did you pledge from experiencing Ultimas of the pasts?

There are many of these kinds of threads on here but I thought it would be good to get a gauge with the recent pre-alpha release and the more attention on the forums to capture a better gauge.

So I am interested in why people pledged.

I pledged from knowing Ultima 7 and being blown away by the vast open world and complex, yet exciting storyline. I mostly pledge for UO. I loved playing with others and I love how the game mechanics operated.

 

My first Ultima was Ultima 4. My buddy and I would play that game for hours although we were very young and didn't really know what we were doing!

 

I played my first Ultima on Commodore 64 and played UO from release until about 5 years ago. Wandered through at least 15 mmo's since and I was ecstatic when I read about SoTA's kickstart and pledged Edelman immediately!

 

The last option would be the one.

 

I'm not actually sure what my first Ultima was. I experienced a couple of them on the C64 when I could barely read and my focus was more on action games (for want of a better genre, impossible mission, last ninja, archon, paradroid, test drive, cops and robbers, ghostbusters, river raid, boulderdash.. Good times). As I got older I was able to appreciate more complex and story driven games but around that time I was focused on Nintendo and Sega. Due to the black background the sprites where overlaid on, along with Knight Games though Ultima was responsible for my brief childhood belief that the dark ages were so named because it was night time all time then.

A little later on I encountered Ultima Underworld on a computer of a family member I was visiting and spent a good part of an afternoon playing it. Couldn't take it home to really get into it but I was intrigued by the level of depth it had. The complexity of the skill/combat and character creation system and inventory management... I could use a torch on corn to make popcorn and tie thread to a poll to make a fishing rod! I needed to eat, I could pick up and drop everything. There was a bug with that install which caused the game to crash every time I tried to talk to someone so I didn't learn much about the plot of the game but the underlying mechanics made a mark on me. Later that year I new kid at school I was becoming friends with described one of his favourite games and after listening to him rant for a while I was like... Hand on... That sounds familiar to something... Anyway long story short he gave me his Ultima 7 disk to take home and try the next day. Ran into the copy protection system so was stuck in Trinsic for the next couple of days it took him to get me his manual... But even so... Mind blown. A virtual world like I had never experienced. I had to move shortly there after and I got his disk back to him before I left, but not his manual. I've been trying to track him down for years. If I could figure out where he was I'd gift him a Collectors pledge for SotA for reintroducing me to the series when I was old enough to appreciate it properly.

I tacked down and bought my own copy of ultima 7 after that. Was the complete edition with serpent isle strike commander. Also just happened to come into possesion f wing commander 3 and bioforge around the same time which kicked off my exploration into the Origin catalogue and to a degree PC gaming in general. After a while Ulitma 8 came out and I also got my hands on fallout and that pretty much solidified PC RPG's as my favourite genre. Meanwhile the having tracked down the rest of the Ultima series it not only set the bar for what I look for in gaming but also taught me a lot lessons in ethics and morality that would define the adult I would eventually grow into. Then Ultima Online happened and consumed me for over half a decade before I could no longer handle how EA was rotting it away. I already hated EA for destroying various other companies, and Ultima 9, that was the straw that broke the camels back. Anyway I was present in Tabula Rasa's brief existence and tried my hand at a couple of the other NCsoft games Richard got his hands into.

When Richard announced he would be returning to his roots I was excited... Then terrified when he talked about his love for social media games and how the ultima successor would tie into them... The Rooster Teeth presentation quelled those fears. A proper PC RPG in the veign of the Ultima games, by Richard Garriott and free of publisher interference? That was more then I needed to hear. Now I've dumped more money on SotA then I have on any other game I ever have before or plan to again.

A successor to the single player Ultima games excites me... A successor to UO excites me... More then either of those things I'm excited to see Richard back and taking a stab at innovating the stale genres again. Even if SotA doesn't turn out to be perfect game I always hoped for, if it shakes things up enough that it raises the bar for other games in the industry to compare too once again that makes it all worth it for me... And you can see that's certainly what they are aiming for.

 

Ultima IV on an Apple ][ was my first RPG and I continued through the rest of the series. Thankfully, they were not on a Apple ][. Ultima Online on dialup was my first MMO. I played for the next decade plus. Thankfully, it was not always on dialup. I pledged early because of both experiences.

 

I never played any of the Ultima games other than UO, so my expectations and hopes are based upon my UO experience.

 

I have played every Ultima game released. I'm hoping to the return of a great story and a living world.

 

I definitely pledged based on my fond memories of playing Ultima I-IX. Sure, the graphics paled in comparison to what's available today, but you could always count on an engrossing story line, which is key to an excellent RPG. They kind of dropped the ball with Ultima IX, but for me, Ultima IV and VII (Parts I & II) were definitely the high points of the series! Shroud of the Avatar looks to be just as promising

 

My first Ultima was Ultima 2, though I later got the re-release of Ultima I. I have played every Ultima(including the Worlds of Ultima and Underworld). I beta-tested UO, but quit soon after release. I came back after the intro of Trammel and played it on and off until Age of Shadows(which I played for about a year).

I pledged based on my experiences with the Ultima series, RG's Ultimate RPG mission statement on the Portalarium website, some Q&A sessions at Dragoncon prior to the SotA Kickstarter about his ideas for creating a new game, the SotA website info, the KS website info, and a few of the early KS interviews.

 

I started with Ultima 3. I played and finished U1 and U2 before I finished U3, but technically I consider it my first. This was on a C64 with 2 floppy drives, so as the Ultima's went on I was lucky to not have to switch between the World and other discs. Man that sped things up.

I pretty much played everything else in order and on release. U6 was my first on PC. These are the dates I could find online and seems to match how I remember them.

• Ultima 4 - 09/16/1985
• Ultima 5 - 10/05/1988
• Savage Empire - 08/20/1990
• Ultima 6 - 12/31/1990
• Martian Dreams - 04/04/1991
• Ultima 7 - 04/16/1992
• Ultima Underworld - 03/01/1992
• Ultima Underworld 2 - 01/02/1993
• Ultima 7 p2 - 03/25/1993
• Ultima 8 - 03/15/1994
• Ultima 9 - 11/24/1999

Then I was in the Ultima Online Alpha and Beta. Never went far beyond that. I was really digging some of the concepts for Ultima 10 until EA finally landed the axe on Origin.

Yeah, I am in it for the Ultimas.

 

I have played Ultima games since Ultima 5 on my Atari ST back in the day. This includes Ultima Online and the Underworld games. I pledged because I love the games that Richard Garriot creates, and I want to be a part of creating this one. Here's to the ultimate single/multiplayer RPG!

 

Ultima III through VI. I dabbled in the underworld ones a bit. I never played UO.

 

I pledged due to Experiencing Ultima's 1 - 9 and the underworlds when they were first released. I never got involved with UO.

I started out on an Apple II+ moved to a IIe and then a IIGS....after that I moved to Windows Based Computers as JOBS had screwed over all the Apple II people.

 

Yes

 

Sounds familiar.

 

I'd only really seen Ultima from over the shoulder of some cute guy (boyfriend/adorable little cousin/classmate/etc.) So my memories of it are pretty fond. I also met Richard at a wedding and thought he was putting me on about being the guy who made the Ultima games until I saw him on a TV show. When I saw the Kickstarter I immediately went for the Guilt Pledge but got enticed by the idea of being a knight.

I never really got to play Ultima in any form so I'm not quite sure what to expect but I am an avid RPG gamer and have high hopes for this project.

 

Ultima 6-9 were my motivation for backing this game. I beta tested UO, but didn't care for the PKers set on wasting my time.

 

• The option I would have voted: I pledged for my experience in the Ultimas and Ultima Online.

**Edit: I'm #296 in pledging, according to my account. I suppose that's what you mean by 'an early adopter'.

 

I pledged due to my experience in Ultima games since Exodus Ultima on the Nintendo, ever since that game I have been enjoyed the series. Ultima IV made me fall in love with the idea of the need to not only beat a game but have to remain virtuous, The False Prophet added to that by having the interesting thought of not looking at something you might just call a monster as evil. I still play and love Ultima Online and it was from the UO FB page I found out about SotA. If this wasn't a Richard Garriott Ultima-esque game I would have never pledged, I would have waited until its release to consider trying it no matter what they might have offered with the pledges.