Originally posted by Aethaeryn

EA doesnt seem to make "new" games. . only "build" on the success of current fumulae and franchises.  They tend to take a studio that has developed something unique and amazing that sells well and then continue to resell that same product.

cancel UO2 and focus on UO,  The sims franchise (Sims Meieval?), etc etc.

 

Making UO2 now would be a risk and EA does not take risks.  They will wait for someone else to develope a sandbox that works and sells well and then buy it and prduce the sequal in a watered down more "accessible" version for the general public.  This is not hate. . just the trend I noticed.

THIS.

Yeah that bascially what corporations do , and EA is even more bolder with it than others. (Activision is preety close thou).

I am not expecting anything innovative out of EA and neither should anybody imo.

EA trying to make a UO 2 would be like Slayer trying to top Reign in Blood. It's a waste of time for both the artists and the audience.

Originally posted by Gorilla

Simply because there are other IP's that have much greater portential for making $'s for EA. A good example would be Star Wars. EA are in it for the money (of course) however they seem to have little interest in the products they sell (beyond how to squeeze cash out of them) and a flagrant diseregard for there customers.

 

I agree.   It seems fairly easy to see that they only seem to care about how to get money out of their customers.   These games are top-down, designed by marketers and suits, and executed by over-worked, under-paid programmers and artists without regard to their input.

They have all the classic earmarks of 'bad movies hidden behind special effects."      Battlefield Earth, Spiderman 3, Superman IV, Highlander 2, Batman and Robin...   Bigger CGI.  More explosions.   More flash!    Crappier movies...

Originally posted by ShakyMo
Try wakfu, yes it looks cartoony, has homm style combat and is plain weird, but.... it borrows a lot of good ideas from uo imo

My daughter and most of my friends play that.   I sub, too.   But I only play a couple of days a week.    I like it, don't get me wrong.  But it's early in the game and the idiot-brigade is out in full force...    So I'm biding my time...

Originally posted by deziwright

if you fail to recreate the first it might tarnish reputation even further? I dont know. Just food for thought. It would be a tough IP to swallow, that's for sure.

I don't think anything would tarnish UO brand's reputation more than Ultimat 9 did LOL.  But it is odd they let the brand die.  I don't think some newer players realize how deep and storied that brand is.  Ultima 1 was so long ago (early 1980's I think) and such a collectors item even just a few years ago (had cloth map, other stuff in the box) I actually sold my old copy of the game on ebay for a couple hundred bucks a few years back to a collector in London.

Originally posted by gainesvilleg

Originally posted by deziwright

if you fail to recreate the first it might tarnish reputation even further? I dont know. Just food for thought. It would be a tough IP to swallow, that's for sure.

I don't think anything would tarnish UO brand's reputation more than Ultimat 9 did LOL.  But it is odd they let the brand die.  I don't think some newer players realize how deep and storied that brand is.  Ultima 1 was so long ago (early 1980's I think) and such a collectors item even just a few years ago (had cloth map, other stuff in the box) I actually sold my old copy of the game on ebay for a couple hundred bucks a few years back to a collector in London.

Did he wonder why there was a map in the box of the only game in the series that didn't come with one? ;)

Originally posted by Loktofeit

Originally posted by gainesvilleg

Originally posted by deziwright

if you fail to recreate the first it might tarnish reputation even further? I dont know. Just food for thought. It would be a tough IP to swallow, that's for sure.

I don't think anything would tarnish UO brand's reputation more than Ultimat 9 did LOL.  But it is odd they let the brand die.  I don't think some newer players realize how deep and storied that brand is.  Ultima 1 was so long ago (early 1980's I think) and such a collectors item even just a few years ago (had cloth map, other stuff in the box) I actually sold my old copy of the game on ebay for a couple hundred bucks a few years back to a collector in London.

Did he wonder why there was a map in the box of the only game in the series that didn't come with one? ;)

I'm pretty certain there was.  Maybe it was Ultima 2 then.  The game I sold definately had it.  I can probably scour my old ebay records to confirm.  BRB...

Originally posted by gainesvilleg

Originally posted by Loktofeit

Originally posted by gainesvilleg

Originally posted by deziwright

if you fail to recreate the first it might tarnish reputation even further? I dont know. Just food for thought. It would be a tough IP to swallow, that's for sure.

I don't think anything would tarnish UO brand's reputation more than Ultimat 9 did LOL.  But it is odd they let the brand die.  I don't think some newer players realize how deep and storied that brand is.  Ultima 1 was so long ago (early 1980's I think) and such a collectors item even just a few years ago (had cloth map, other stuff in the box) I actually sold my old copy of the game on ebay for a couple hundred bucks a few years back to a collector in London.

Did he wonder why there was a map in the box of the only game in the series that didn't come with one? ;)

I'm pretty certain there was.  Maybe it was Ultima 2 then.  The game I sold definately had it.  I can probably scour my old ebay records to confirm.  BRB...

Actually it was Ultima III - Exodus.  Sold for $150 to some shop in West Yorkshire back in 1999 LOL.  Definately had a sweet cloth map.  I remember listing that I wasn't even sure if the disks worked anymore because I didn't have a PC that could read them at the time.  The purchase was definately for the box, map, and other stuff.  It was in near mint condition...

I DID play Utlima I as well I know that.  I guess my copy of that got destroyed though or I would have sold that as well.

Another big seller I used to put on eBay were copies of my old Electronic Games Magazines.  I actually still have a bunch but was selling them one at at ime for around $20-$30 a few years ago as well.  Definately some collectors out there for retro gaming stuff.  Not the games them selves mind you, just the artwork around them...

Originally posted by gainesvilleg

Originally posted by gainesvilleg

Originally posted by Loktofeit

Originally posted by gainesvilleg

Originally posted by deziwright

if you fail to recreate the first it might tarnish reputation even further? I dont know. Just food for thought. It would be a tough IP to swallow, that's for sure.

I don't think anything would tarnish UO brand's reputation more than Ultimat 9 did LOL.  But it is odd they let the brand die.  I don't think some newer players realize how deep and storied that brand is.  Ultima 1 was so long ago (early 1980's I think) and such a collectors item even just a few years ago (had cloth map, other stuff in the box) I actually sold my old copy of the game on ebay for a couple hundred bucks a few years back to a collector in London.

Did he wonder why there was a map in the box of the only game in the series that didn't come with one? ;)

I'm pretty certain there was.  Maybe it was Ultima 2 then.  The game I sold definately had it.  I can probably scour my old ebay records to confirm.  BRB...

Actually it was Ultima III - Exodus.  Sold for $150 to some shop in West Yorkshire back in 1999 LOL.  Definately had a sweet cloth map.  I remember listing that I wasn't even sure if the disks worked anymore because I didn't have a PC that could read them at the time.  The purchase was definately for the box, map, and other stuff.  It was in near mint condition...

I DID play Utlima I as well I know that.  I guess my copy of that got destroyed though or I would have sold that as well.

Another big seller I used to put on eBay were copies of my old Electronic Games Magazines.  I actually still have a bunch but was selling them one at at ime for around $20-$30 a few years ago as well.

yeah the good old times, ultima like ultima underground was good too  and you could see a huge diference from ultima 6 to 7 then 8, its almost like all creativity was in 6 then make a rushed thing on 7(like a filler or prologue) then make a better work on 8 then make that thing with 9....

but the reason for stop the series is the lord british..... he still hold the IP so EA can't do anything other then upgrade UO with expansions, they could like make a new graphic engine, but for that they had to invest in a game who even though it give tehn lots of money for a long time, its considered a big risk to pull of, and you know how big companys like to take risks, reason most progress we get is always from small companys

Originally posted by tvalentine

Serious question here. I think we can all agree that EA is mostly out to make money more so than making good innovative games, but i don't see the reasoning to let the UO name die out. Sure UO still has a population and it is still being supported with updates, but EA has to see the benefits ($$$ wise) of making a succesor to one of the most popular games in the mmorpg genre. UO is out dated and the name alone is worth alot of money, even making a good looking UO2 with good marketing should net them a hefty profit and if they put some actual thought and effort into the game they should be able to retire UO1 for a healthier, newer ultima world. Was wondering what other people's thoughts on this would be as multiple other UO games have been in development before yet they were canceled before release.

It ain´t so easy. First of all you need to hire in Lord British again. he made all the Ultima games and it wouldn´t really beone without him.

Secondly the team both need to look on the old games (not jus UO but all ultima games) together with P&P RPGs and translate that into something new and different. UO never became the game it was because it copied others, all the Ultima games were unique games, not just cheap copies.

The reason that UO 2 was cancelled was that it wasn´t good enough to be a Ultima game. 

Just adding modern graphics to UO would make a cheap knock off. There still are possibilities for a real UO2, even though it is not a huge possibility but the game needs to be done right in that case. The IP deserves that.

1. Ip is too old most mmo players dont know what it is.

2. ArcheAge = UO2

Originally posted by alkarionlog

Originally posted by gainesvilleg

Originally posted by gainesvilleg

Originally posted by Loktofeit

Originally posted by gainesvilleg

Originally posted by deziwright

if you fail to recreate the first it might tarnish reputation even further? I dont know. Just food for thought. It would be a tough IP to swallow, that's for sure.

I don't think anything would tarnish UO brand's reputation more than Ultimat 9 did LOL.  But it is odd they let the brand die.  I don't think some newer players realize how deep and storied that brand is.  Ultima 1 was so long ago (early 1980's I think) and such a collectors item even just a few years ago (had cloth map, other stuff in the box) I actually sold my old copy of the game on ebay for a couple hundred bucks a few years back to a collector in London.

Did he wonder why there was a map in the box of the only game in the series that didn't come with one? ;)

I'm pretty certain there was.  Maybe it was Ultima 2 then.  The game I sold definately had it.  I can probably scour my old ebay records to confirm.  BRB...

Actually it was Ultima III - Exodus.  Sold for $150 to some shop in West Yorkshire back in 1999 LOL.  Definately had a sweet cloth map.  I remember listing that I wasn't even sure if the disks worked anymore because I didn't have a PC that could read them at the time.  The purchase was definately for the box, map, and other stuff.  It was in near mint condition...

I DID play Utlima I as well I know that.  I guess my copy of that got destroyed though or I would have sold that as well.

Another big seller I used to put on eBay were copies of my old Electronic Games Magazines.  I actually still have a bunch but was selling them one at at ime for around $20-$30 a few years ago as well.

yeah the good old times, ultima like ultima underground was good too  and you could see a huge diference from ultima 6 to 7 then 8, its almost like all creativity was in 6 then make a rushed thing on 7(like a filler or prologue) then make a better work on 8 then make that thing with 9....

 

but the reason for stop the series is the lord british..... he still hold the IP so EA can't do anything other then upgrade UO with expansions, they could like make a new graphic engine, but for that they had to invest in a game who even though it give tehn lots of money for a long time, its considered a big risk to pull of, and you know how big companys like to take risks, reason most progress we get is always from small companys

Yeah I remember reading some interviews with him, but don't recall why he decided not to cash in on the brand more.  I think he is into some sort of casual gaming push now or something.  Those middle Ultima single player games (4-6) were groundbreaking, and yeah the later ones were TERRIBAD.  Like playing Kings Quest or something.

I hate to say it, but the brand is not getting more valuable with time.  Lots of younger gamers wouldn't give a crap about that IP although the older gamers would definately at least check it out.

There was one in the works and it was killed, it was called UWO - Ultima World Origins.

Originally posted by Games888

1. Ip is too old most mmo players dont know what it is.

2. ArcheAge = UO2

No it is not. It have nothing to do with Ultima at all.

Archeage = Archeage. That does not mean I think it will be a bad game and it might share  some things with UO but it just ain't Ultima. Anyone who played the old Ultima games know what I mean (my first was Ultima 5).

The easiest way to explain why there isn't a UO2 is to simply ask "what was the essence of the original UO" and watch the fireworks and flamewars.

Utima has lost its brand value LONG LONG TIME ago. The Ultima series peaked at U7. U8 is meh.

U9 is a miserable failure with poor sales and panned by critics.

UO started the genre but lost the market leader position once EQ is out. In fact, EQ has a lot more influence on later MMOs than UO.

UO2 was being developed two separate times and both were cancelled. I think the general feeling was that they did not believe they could compete with World of Warcraft as it was peaking at the time.

It also didn't look like either of those games were going to be sandbox like the original UO was, so I doubt many people on this site would have appreciated them had they come to fruition. It looked like both of them were following the WoW themepark model... Probably a good thing UO2 never came out if it was going to be so different from what made the original great.

Originally posted by Yamota

Simply put, because of EA. Richard Garriot made the biggest misstake in his professional career when he decided to sell out to EA. He made money sure, but at what cost?

His entire Ultima legacy was flushed down the toilet.

Richard Garriot was long gone from Origin when they sold UO to EA. He had absolutely nothing to do with it.

But your point is still valid.

Originally posted by nariusseldon

Utima has lost its brand value LONG LONG TIME ago. The Ultima series peaked at U7. U8 is meh.

U9 is a miserable failure with poor sales and panned by critics.

UO started the genre but lost the market leader position once EQ is out. In fact, EQ has a lot more influence on later MMOs than UO.

When looking at the direction of the various MMOs at the time, one could almost say that not only did it influence the direction of the genre, it pretty much defined it.