Sold off and letting go.

EA had a much bigger impact on UVIII than that. Richard was playing nice at the time and VIII was pumped out in 1 year in the manner that other EA titles were done at the time.

 

VIII was in pre-production before VII shipped from everything I heard before. And there was a 2 year gap between the VII release and VIII release.

 

As far as I remember Ultima VIII was supposed to have had a party system. Also an underwater city as well as a plotline in which Tenebrea would have been attacked by undead was cut. And of course sitting down.

 

"pre-production" can mean just about anything starting with notes on a napkin (which are not to be taken lightly I might add) to concept art but it does not imply any specific quality or quantity of work. Nor any particular schedule or how much of that actually got used. What I've heard is from Richard speaking about it directly where he described trying to be a "team player" with EA and going with a 1 year development cycle. That doesn't mean from pre-production didn't take place before then. One might even suggest it would be silly if there wasn't.. but how much of that was actually used? I don't care to speculate.. I do know that a lot of stuff was cut from VIII.

 

Material was also cut from Serpent Isle to meet a shipping deadline, right?

 

I haven't heard much about that kind of thing prior to VIII but I think it's safe to say every game has something that gets cut to meet a schedule.. I do vaguely recall that there was something though. That's right.. some of the story regarding when the banes possess the companions were cut. I recall reading somewhat recently that there was a lot more that was going to happen there.. like Shamino ruling over Moonshade.. Never heard the whole story of what happened there though.

 

But it never felt so watered down like Ultima VIII. Ultima VIII was a HUGE step backwards from Ultima VII? No party, no NPC schedules where you could follow NPCs around (they teleported to their destinations), a world that didn't even fit with the map, areas you couldn't explore (the huge doors on the plateau), quests that didn't make sense (finding Moriens' birthplace)...

 

According to the wiki

http://ultima.wikia.com/wiki/Cut_Material_in_Serpent_Isle
"In the process of creating Ultima VII Part Two, Electronic Arts set Origin a deadline which made it virtually impossible to implement all the features of the second half of the game. So the plot was reduced. This lead to numerous plot holes. Many of these cut elements can be found, at least in fragments, in the usecode of the game. Other things are reconstructed from what is found in the game. "

 

I had heard at some point that a lot of hardcore Ultima fans just pretend VIII never happened.

 

EA does it again! Just once.. just once I'd like to have something nice to say about them as a whole.

 

Yea, and you couldn't use every item; although I think that's one of the things that got cut from development.

Personally, I don't think lack of companions and party is a big deal from a role-playing perspective; some stories you just do solo, and that's fine. I don't think a RPG is less for not having a party. Although I got to admit, it was still disappointing, only because it was a big departure from the Ultima formula.

U8 did have a lot of great things about it though that I think critics overlook, just because it was disappointing overall.

 

@Bowen Bloodgood,

Btw, weren't the cube/sphere/tetrahedron generators in U7 also an EA reference?

 

I may have heard that once before. If it were true.. there are just SO many ways to read into it.. considering their purpose in the game.

 

So long as we're on the subject.. EA acquired Origin the same year VII: Black Gate came out. So even with the pre-production of Pagan 2 years prior to its release.. it was still EA. SI came out in '93 and Pagan in '94. Explains quite a few things (for me at least).

 

It's not like EA has a habbit in ruining good companies and IPs. Just look at dragon age 2 and 3 and join me in crying.

 

And every other franchise they got their hands on that didn't have someone fighting for it. What really both irks me and makes me sad is that they actually do have talent. But that company has no love of the art. I truly believe the people who run the company have no real understanding of game development or love for the art. *sigh* It's such a waste.

 

I don't think buying good franchises and then helping run them into the ground is very good business sense, either.

 

• There are two sides to every story
• It takes two to tango
• People believe what they want to believe, and that is enough for most people.

 

No and I keep hearing how poorly EA is doing the past few years. They couldn't even keep their best selling franchise in one piece. Can anyone say Rod Hu.. *ehem* The Sims 3? If only Will Wright was more willing to work on sequels. Will goes off to work on SPORE and they put someone in charge who didn't respect a willing formula. Ok deep breath..

 

But it doesn't take a great dancer to recognize a bad one.