 | | The Producer of Ultima Online answers questions on the game's past, present and future and EA Mythic's role Aaron Cohen is the Producer of Ultima Online. With the announcement of Electronic Arts buying Mythic, the MMO vets have been lending experience to the grand-father of all games, and the young development team at EA is hard at work putting their stamp on this game. We spoke to Cohen about it. | | MMORPG.com: | Ultima Online is approaching a decade old, yet it still seems to be going strong. Can you talk to us a bit about the health of the game over the last few years? | | Aaron Cohen: | Ultima Online is still quite a healthy game with a very passionate community. It's out-lived quite a number of newer MMORPGs, most of which launched with bigger budgets, better graphics, and long lists of world-changing features that never quite changed the world. It is amazing to read emails and old message board archives from six or seven years ago because it seems like almost every year of UO's existence there were predictions of doom. With each new MMORPG, experts tried to set an end date for the Ultima franchise. Yet every time the experts were wrong. And yes, the subscriber base has grown smaller over the past three years, as have many MMORPGs. I am proud to say that UO maintains a spot on the top-10 list in North America and the top-3 list in Japan. I also think that concerns for UO's health will soon become a thing of the past. If the early responses to Kindom Reborn are any measure, I think it's safe to say that 2007 will be a good year for UO. | | | MMORPG.com: | UO was many people's - including my own - first MMO. With so many people being ex-players, what efforts are underway to convince them to return? | | Aaron Cohen: | That effort would be Kingdom Reborn, a complete re-building of Ultima Online with a new graphics engine, a new UI, an overhauled new player experience and some much needed gameplay and balance tweaks. Over time, UO has remained a deep, satisfying RPG, but it has grown more inaccessible with age. Mostly, the graphics began to look more and more dated, and the UI more and more obtuse. Also, veteran players began to lose hope that UO had a future. With newer MMORPGs coming out, and with EA announcing, and then canceling, plans to launch Ultima X: Odyssey, the message to fans may have appeared to be: "UO isn't important to us." The message today should be: "UO is quite important to EA, so much so that we are making a significant investment in it." To the folks who left, and who still remember how much they loved their first MMORPG, I'd ask them to stop by and give UO a try after the kingdom is reborn. |  | | MMORPG.com: | A day does not pass without a thread on our boards about "old-school UO PvP". How does PvP in Ultima Online work today? | | Aaron Cohen: | PvP is still very much a part of UO but it has evolved over the years and offers players several options. On almost all shards (servers) there is a land called Trammel, where there is no PvP, and a land called Felucca, where there is wide open non-consensual PvP. On Felucca, you can take part in a faction war (four sides in conflict over territory), or engage in red vs. blue fighting. Red players are murderers who attack others without provocation, while blue players tend to think of themselves as more noble and will only attack reds. There is also a full guild war system that many players take part in, with wars and alliances beginning and ending all the time. However, for those who miss the good old days of full non-consensual PvP with no safe haven, you can play on Siege Perilous, which has a rule set similar to the original UO. This means you can kill anyone, anywhere, at any time and take their stuff. That style of gameplay isn't for everyone, but for some of our most dedicated players, it's the only way to play. | | MMORPG.com: | In Kingdom Reborn, UO is making a high profile return to the market. What are some of the high level goals of this expansion? | | Aaron Cohen: | Ultima Online represents nine years of features and content. There have been seven expansion packs and dozens of updates that have been added to the game. There is simply a massive amount of things to do and see in UO. We'll call that "the good stuff." Players new and old have a hard time getting to "the good stuff" because of two big barriers: the aging UI and the dated graphics. The first two goals of Kindom Reborn are to eliminate those barriers while keeping everything the makes UO fun. If we can get players to the good stuff faster, it makes for a better game play experience for all. By creating eye-pleasing graphics and a new UI you can easily navigate within seconds of logging in, we'll have achieved those goals. The third goal of Kindom Reborn is to make the new player experience much more friendly and fun. UO today presents new players with so many options that it can be confusing. If you don't have a friend showing you how to play and what your options are, you probably aren't going to be with us for very long. The revamped experience is designed to ease new players into UO thereby decreasing the learning curve so you are getting to the good stuff in the game before you know it. | | MMORPG.com: | Since your company Electronic Arts purchased Mythic, the way MMOs are run at EA has changed. Can you talk about the new command structure and what that changes about the development of Ultima Online? How has Mythic been to work with? | | Aaron Cohen: | The UO team is now part of the EA Mythic studio and working with them has been nothing short of awesome. It's great to work with a team that gets the genre, that understands the importance of bringing new people into the game and keeping existing players happy (and how the two are very closely tied to each other), and that understands the need for quality customer service and constant QA. UO is a very different beast from the other games EA creates and we think about gaming in a different way. EA Mythic gets MMOs, and I really appreciate that. They have helped to raise the profile of the game within EA because they believe that a nine year old game can still play an important part in shaping the future of the company. |  | | MMORPG.com: | The 9th Anniversary Edition of Ultima Online can be found in stores. Can you talk a bit about what you were trying to accomplish with it and how it has been received on your servers? | | Aaron Cohen: | Our anniversary products are meant to do two things: 1) Keep UO on store shelves so new players can easily get into the game, and 2) Give existing UO fans a commemorative edition with lots of in-game value, but which isn't a "mandatory to play" purchase like an expansion pack. So far, the response has been great. We've seen trial subs go up and players who bought the pack seem very happy with the more than 50 gift items they could choose from. | | MMORPG.com: | As they age, many MMOs get cheaper to play. UO has not done that. Are there any plans for a reevaluation of UO's subscription fees? | | Aaron Cohen: | Not in the near future. There is nine years of outstanding content in the game for players to experience, and it's about to get a nice "shot in the arm" with the release of Kingdom Reborn. Plus, we are constantly adding new content, new storylines, and new in-game events to keep the game fresh. We believe players are having as rich and rewarding an experience in our game as offered by any of the current MMORPGs. Thus, a sub fee change is not in the plan. | | MMORPG.com: | Over nine years of release and many more of production, it's safe to say there has been a lot of staff turnover on Ultima Online. Are any original developers still on the project and what is it like to be a custodian of such a storied game, especially if you did not work on its earlier incarnations? | | Aaron Cohen: | We do actually have one programmer who worked on the UO launch, and that guy is worth his weight in gold. We are dealing with nine years of code, and he's the one guy who knows pretty much where the land mines have been buried. We also have a programmer who has been around for eight years, and he's also worth his weight in some precious metal. Silver maybe. As for me, it's an honor to work on this game. When I started working on UO as the marketing manager about four years ago, I'll admit I wasn't crazy about it. I kept running into those barriers I mentioned earlier, the graphics and the UI. And then I had some kind of epiphany. Suddenly I couldn't stop playing. Somehow, the graphics began to look better and I realized that the interface, while not initially intuitive, was supremely flexible and surprisingly powerful. Since then, I've been on a UO crusade. If I could become a convert (and I played every MMORPG worth mentioning and many that weren't), then surely there were others out there who were ready to discover UO. It was just a matter of getting them to "the good stuff" faster. This led to the idea of Kingdom Reborn, and now here we are, actually working on it, with me as the producer. Crazy how this industry works! | | MMORPG.com: | For someone who has never heard of UO, how would you compare it to the current crop of MMORPGs? | | Aaron Cohen: | A lot of other MMORPGs are theme parks, with clear lines you need to stand in and clear rules you need to follow in order to have a good time. They are lots of fun, but after a while, you might feel a limited in what you can actually do. UO is meant to be much more like a "real" living world with lots of options, lots of things to do, lots of ways to build you character and a real chance to put your mark on the world. We have a robust, customizable housing system that is arguably the best outside of Second Life. We have more than 55 different skills to build, letting you choose between many combat styles, crafting specialties, taming, barding, thieving, treasure hunting and more. All that choice and all that complexity might seem a little intimidating and frustrating at first, but once you find your place in the world, it's tough to leave. Just ask the people you have been playing for nine years now. |  | | MMORPG.com: | Ultima started as a single-player RPG franchise, any plans to go back to that route with a new Ultima game? What about Ultima Online 2? | | Aaron Cohen: | Right now, our focus is on Kingdom Reborn. We plan to keep UO going with new features and content that will thrill fans for the next nine years. | |
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I don't know what to say. I left UO in 2000 after I got sick of Trammel being added a later on that expansion with the customizable housing. I forget which expansion exactly because it was long ago, but I basically got sick of the game and its changes.
The only way (speaking as a veteran from 1998) I'll return to UO is if you create new servers with just the Felucca ruleset (of course with the new graphics :) circa 1999. Otherwise its not worth my time and effort.
I wish UO well and i'm glad its still going strong but the community I interacted with back then is completely gone. It will never be like I remember, hence I'd probably return for a month and realize my mistake and soon quit again.
Thats all I have to say.
It's been there all along, it's called Siege Perilous...there's no trammel there!
I wanted to play this game for some time. The '2D' graphics remind me of the MSX RPG times
But before I am going to spend any money I want to trial first. And while I can with this game it needs a creditcard to activate. I just aint going to enter a creditcard number in order to play a free trial. If they really want new players they have to lift the creditcard need for the trial so more people will try it out.
I have nothing against paying them and often have three different game subs on (long time since a signle MMO held my attention), but as a consumer/player it's annoying to have subs defined as "there's lots of entertainment in this game for you. ie you pay full subs". If that was the true definitation then offline singleplayers would enforce subs too :P
Again, I don't mind online game subs more than paying for a movie ticket, but it's sad to see the focus move from "we want to keep full subs so we can support the game with the most possible resources at hand" or its lesser brother: "we need full subs to cover server upkeep, patches and manpower" onto "you get lots to do so pay". The 'lots to do' part is usually covered by buying expansion packs ;)
Ah well. Thumbs up for UO. It proves a good game is ageless.
UO: even in its (for my taste) deranged old age the ONLY game out there with deep and meaningful gameplay, the one and only real sandbox game, a virtual world.
And once more, the hopes go up and I dream of a reunion with old friends and reliving the thrill of old time UO. But deep inside I know, UO is going to break my heart again, as it does every time...
...but as long as it survives I can still hope that someone will have the guts to produce something of a similar gigantic scope. Something new.
I can't help but laugh when someone mentions the "graphics overhaul". Slapping a new coat of paint on the same tired, worn out engine is an "overhaul" to you? This is why EA/Mythic will never have to bring UO up to par with other games as far as graphics/performance: 'cause the fanbois will gladly lick up any bone they are thrown. That is why UO struggles to get, let alone keep, new blood. But that's okay, because the "old schoolers" would rather it just be them playing anyway. Too bad EA/Mythic is about making money, and when their latest overhaul fails to garner the interest and subscriptions they are counting on, they will not do anything more. They will simply let it die to the point it doesn't break even anymore, and they will finish killing it.
Ok Mr.Cohen, lets get back to reality. Your game has been knocked out of the top 3 in japan YEARS ago.
In fact, it wasn't even in the top 3 back in april.
"http://www.gamespot.com/pc/rpg/ragnarokonline/news.html?sid=6147395"
"Japanese Web site RBB Today reports that a recent study found that two of the three most popular online games in Japan--Ragnarok Online and Sukatto Golf Pangya--are Korean in origin. US games--even the blockbuster World of Warcarft--are conspicuously absent from the list, as the third spot went to a domestic effort, Square Enix's Final Fantasy XI."
Ofcourse, that one is currently outdated.
according to this report:
http://www.hanbitsoft.co.kr/down/ir/2006_IR_Book.pdf
the current top 3 MMO's in japan are:
1: Final Fantasy XI
2: Ragnarok Online
3: Granado Espada.
Oh well, so much for Ultima Online in japan then.
Hmmm.... Where are these wonderful improved graphics, I didn't see anything to speak of in those screenshots, they just weren't very immpresive.
I agree that UO has gameplay down. But what I dont see is how this so called 'upgrade' is an upgrade. Unless something changes prior to release ..the graphics they are showing arnt as good as many single player 3/4 over prospective games that have been out for YEARS (diablo 2 for example) .. I dont see how this is gonna do anything other then show this is a game on its last legs .. not only in player base but in develpmental focus. Dont get me wrong... I dont forsee UO sunsetting anytime soon ..but the fanchise is currently so stagnant ..I cant see it ever drawing back a mainstream following again, and DEFINATLY not with a roughshot attempt such as this.
It was good to introduce new classes, new spells, new housing ideas, etc. The thing that killed it was the new magic item system. It is a lot better than the previous version BUT it killed PVP which everyone seems to love about UO. PVP Nowadays is all about money...whoever can afford the most expensive items with the best resists and most/best mods will be victorious. It just flat out got stupid...
Personally, I don't care about PVP...it is all just $h!t talking anyways. But if you want a more balanced PVP ruleset then play on test center or try siege...just quit whining about all the "trammies" and DO WHATEVER MAKES YOU HAPPY. We "trammies" just like to roleplay and enjoy the storyline...it's near impossible to do so in felucca where people kill your crafter for no reason...then start calling YOU a n00b because you didn't fight back...with your pickaxe in hand :-/
As for the graphics update, it may not look like much compared to other big time games such as WoW or whatever but look at the graphics as they are currently...it's one hell of a facelift, a step in the right direction if nothing else. The bottom line is, Mr. Cohen, while the graphics update will be nice it still will not be enough to be "stunning" to the eye. It's gonna take more than that. Put your little graphics engine up against WoW's...it's ok to cry
This is a very solid game for gameplay IF you can look past the graphics which most people have a hard time doing. I have enjoyed little to no PVP for about 6 years now. I've made a few good friends along the way as well. I could keep going but it's getting late...goodnight for now
I quite agree, and a seperate server with the 2d UO for those with limited computer power while a fully 3d version is available on another should not be a problem. And by fully 3d, I mean EQ-type 3d. Like UO2 was before they pulled the plug. There is no reason why the all the gameplay, story, skills, buildings, quests, mobs, npc's, etc. could not be done with a newer graphics engine and servers. Outside of the fact EA/Mythic are a bunch of cheap bastards who want to suck up as much money with the least investment. What is this, the third "graphics upgrade", that is nothing more than some extra color and one or two extra pixels thrown on a very out-of-date isometric engine? Not to mention their server code, from what I understand, is far from optimized and more resembles a patchwork quilt than a steady server?
I've said it before and I will say it again. UO could and should be at the top of the mmorpg mountain. But without REAL upgrades and commitment from EA/Mythic (an oxymoron, I know), UO will always be what it is: that great game that the vets all fondly remember and the new guys see as "that old, isometric game". I'd just like them to do the game the justice it deserves, for being an original and a basis for countless mmorpg's after it. It desrves it's name in lights again, so to speak.
I agree on the cheating. EA "proudly" announced recently wiping 400 or so accounts....a drop in the bucket.
I just spent a month with them and found the game lacking the NO.1 resource ....people to play with, shards are empty, outside of the Great Lakes shard which is sparse itself others were totally devoid of peeps.
Quality housing is still an issue on nearly all shards and the houses on many shards show dozens and dozens all having the same ownership name....a telling issue in showing how little control EA really has on the game.
So, with many accounts still active but no one playing, the game it seems is now all about making a buck on Ebay. I've also read that peeps are exploiting the free 2 week accounts horribly.
Forget the wonderful gameplay of UO past, its just not going to be there in any large scale form. I was hyped by the nice graphics coming but after this last month with them I see its just a $2000 paint job on a $50 junker.
Ryld
It IS possible to create completely 3d UO that is compatible with the 2d...Bunch of amateurs have done it using normal cheap, hobbyist 3d engines that costs like 30$ (see, Ultima Iris) but EA still claims it's impossible.
You people really could complain over nothing. The graphics are a welcome upgrade, sure it may not get the most out of your new 7950GTs but who cares, this game is accesible to anyone and its a very good game.
Ill be happy to play UO for quite some time aslong as there are plenty of other playing it to.
Garrik
I for one would be glad to see an overhaul and hope that it attracts more people especially those who have yet to experience it.
Hightly doubt it. UO was never ment to be played in 1st person view.
Those days are trully missed , my moneys on this dev team , they really seem to care about making UO better , after all the current producer/ dev team might be the only one that has been able to talk EA into doing this , as long as it doesn't get cancelled..
Hey if it fails , bye bye UO.....
Cohen is more clueless than I thought.
He calls Siege an oldschool shard when it has been corrupted by every single consensual based expansion for the past seven years, including consensual and carebear updates like instanced corpses (you strangely cannot loot a dead body unless you were the one that killed it), sunglasses and flip flops, instant self-loot greatly reducing the penalty and challenge of death, ressurectable pets, blessed items which are not lost when you die, uber weapons and armor not based on the materials they are made of but only on numbers and stats which are displayed when clicking on them, ninjas, elves, giant bugs, pastel dog mounts, florescent weapons and armor, customized borg cube housing that is private, which means it has an invisible forcefield around it - if you even try to run on the steps you are immediately bumped off, bags of sending which allow anyone to quickly teleport items and gold directly into their banks from anywhere in the world - got some good loot, you don't need to adventure back to town, just pop it in a bag, rideable firebeetle forges and all kinds of other carebear crap.
Total crap.
A sub par graphics update is not going to help UO. In order for UO to draw back customers and grow to new heights they are going to need to offer something different, something serious, something innovative and professionally run, something like the amazing virtual world that the industry leading MMOG was founded upon!
I tried to play the game again for about a hour a good 6 months ago and just crindged at the graphics i so used to love, so used to WoW type graphics now days its hard to take a step back in quality. I even checked out ebay to see the state of game currency, and its scarey, like 1 mil for £1 saying to me gold has pretty much no value ingame, even when i left the game a mil was worth £18 on ebay, that was just before the big gold dupel, shows how bad the game econnemy is still to this day.
But all that aside, i'll buy the new box when its out and take a peek at the newer graphics and gameplay, might bump into some old friends doing the same from my 5 years of gaming on Europa
so my point is: is there anyone else like me that has found a game worthy of giving you your fix of mmo gaming? is there any game out there today with a balanced economy and non-fighting characters that support it?
or is this game non existent?
Hej all, I would like to speak a little about the shard Siege Perilous and reply to some of the quotes in the thread.
That server was created in sep 1999, before you quit. It's named Siege Perilous. We don't have the Trammel facet and all new land added is with Felucca/Siege ruleset. You can be attacked everywhere and there is no Item insurance. We do however have a few problems with some blessed items that need to be removed from the shard, hope DarkScribe will help us with that.
Sadly we need the creditcard part to protect the game again scammers, exploiters and other kind of players who not want to play but want to make RL money from UO without thinking about how much they hurt the game.
Only way I see that part removed is with making a trial island where trial players have to stay until they pay the game. Right now, a trial player can access every part of UO.
This is true and even when Siege is more close to the game I loved 1997-1998, Siege still got hurt of 2 thing.
The changes to items we got from AoS, we got 5 kind of resists and alot mods on the items that made an item hell, the update got called Ages of Stuff. Now with no item insure and need for upper items that was hard to get, Siege got hurt. It become worse when they added the elf stuff and resources for crafting the crafters could not get and most crafters on Siege gave up.
Crafters are the backbone in UO and they need alot of love on Siege so they can make good items, that is not to expensive to get lost easy in PvP.
The second problem is to much land or to few players. It become to hard to find each others and player towns are hard to build because we do have alot of ghost houses owned of old players who refuse to let their houses go. Some may be paying to the game, but they are not playing and their houses take up place from playing customers.
We need alot more active players on Siege and we need to disallow trial players to own/transfer a house and keep it for 3 months before they again need to transfer to a new trial account. DarkScribe, let this houses die if not paid for.
Let new players see Siege Perilous on the shard list with a PvP tag and let them start without it effect their young status on other shards. Siege Perilous need new blood now!
I had played sinse dec 1997, I'm one of the players who love Siege and can't stand the other shards.
I had been on Siege sinse the shard was born in sep 1999, my first shard was Atlantic.
I had made so many friends in UO, but most are gone now, I wish you all back.
FrejaSP
The graphics overhaul was probably the last thing that UO needed. A new GUI would be nice with larger icons and items. But new graphic doesn't make me tingle at all.
I really think that EA has totally destroyed this game and that it is no longer about what everyone liked.
As it stands now, EA shards are loot fests to the biggest degree, and crafting has fallen by the wayside.
If you look into some of the things that the real UO community is doing, it blows the pants off this facelift.
Look to things like UOIris which is attempting to make UO into a true 3-D everquestlike game.
Player run shards have implemented so many more usefull things in one week than EA has done in a few years.
What really needs to happen is for EA to let go of the reigns and allow the real UO community to chime in and show them what players want.
Player run shards are by far the more interesting and fun way to play. Plus they are free.
I think that this new graphics update will turn more vets off as more noobish loot whoring players make their way into this game.
I'm glad to see some work being done on the game. The UI and new graphics are really the minimum I would expect from a game going on for 9 (wow!) years. I played UO on and off for about 4 years, trying out seige perilous after they implemented the felucia.
Although I think the new graphics are a good face lift, what is being done to fix all of the outstanding issues? You need to work HARD to get a single server back to where UO was in it's glory days. I'm talking about resetting a server, taking out of all of the neon/sparkling shit, making houses HARD to get so that every square inch isn't covered by some stupid brick hut. Cut out 3/4 of the map so that when you go to a town, THERE IS ACTUALLY ANOTHER HUMAN THERE. Nothing was more frustrating when I went back to UO after a year hiatus to find that there was 10x more random dungeons all over the map, with absolutely no one inside of them.
I originally quit when the penalties to red characters were implemented, quit again when Trammel/Felucia shit turned the world upside down. I played on several player-made servers and some of them really had good ideas. Maybe these new developers will take a step back and think about what made UO so popular off the bat.
You're probably thinking i'm stuck in the past, but I LOVED some of the stuff they added, so I'm not advocating just turning a server into an old school one. I just wish they would have thought out each of their changes further and decided if it was actually good for the game.
With that said, I do like the look of the new graphics engine and I would be willing to give it a go when it's released.
About the subscription fees, apart from anarchy online (which has a free version) no game that I can think of has ever said awww you guys pay too much, here lets halve your subscription fee. Even Anarchy Online they still pay full sub fees to play the game advert free etc.
Never found anything like it again. I wonder if they are still around.
I check this out when the upgrade comes around.
Europa shard? Yes, they're still around...about hundred members strong or so...you'll find their town from yew crossroads trammel side
There is easy to find a large house spot on Siege and I believe on some of the other shards too.
A new client will hopeful draw alot old players back to UO and add alot new players. I hope they also will use a little time to fix the balance of Siege, we had far to long been in the shadow of the Trammel shards. All we need is help to our crafters so there again will be demand for their items.
On other shards, items don't get lost, so they made them more expensive and harder to get. That just don't work on Siege where you may lose it in the first fight. Items need to be easy to replace on Siege. EA know that I think but the question is when they will do something to help us with this problem. It have to be soon.
But still, for players who like old UO (1997-1998), Siege is only place worth playing.
I hope some of you will give it a try.
Well Im glad that UO is getting a makeover. I have some great nostalgia from those days in my first MMO. I even went back on several occasions, but it just wasnt the same. I still have friends from my UO days, although we all play different games now, or none at all in one case!! Sad guy!
I am interested in what they will do to revamp its graphics, and the screenies look pretty good. But, I have to say I doubt very much if I'll go back and try it because I just dont like that top down 3rd person view. I have got too used to choosing 1st, 3rd person views and camera angles etc. Just too inflexible for my taste. Although, you never can tell, you might just see me there
I loved crafting and housing back then. Just never managed to get that tower!!!
I also remember lots of late nights camping IDOCS or fighting demons til the server saved..'did we get the xp from that last kill?' lol
Still, I wish them well, and it is only my 1cp worth
First let me say the Graphics Overhaul is cool. Good idea, props to whoever thought of it. It looks good, I'm sure it will draw in a couple suckers. Heck I might even be seduced to try it if they offer a free trial for a bit.
But here's what crucifies Ultima Online:
1. Rampant Hackers! EA has proven for 9 years that they cannot or will not stop hacking. The two most common (meaning performed every day) cheats are Duping and Speed Hacking. EA apparently can do NOTHING about duping as they have said it was fixed multiple times but it happens EVERY DAY, EVERY SINGLE DAY! With Speed Hacking they have put a system in place that does not work and just bans blocks of people who may or may not be guilty. (Like the time they banned a ton of IM users who they thought were hacking...)
2. Lack of Support for Game Bugs and Playability Issues! Back in the day when you paged for a GM, he/she would pop up in front of you and ask you what the problem was, take a look for themselves, and sort things out. Ever since EA Officially took over (EA has always owned UO, but officially took over when the original creator was bought out) the GM Support went right down the tubes! They don't come anymore when you page them, they send you a generic response that directs you to their totally out of date website that doesnt answer anything clearly. Most of the things you would page a GM about (hacking, duping, cheating, banning, game bugs) and answered wishy-washy on the Support Website... i.e. It might be illegal to do a certain action, but not illegal to reap the proffits from that action.
3. The economy is 100% shot to hell for several reasons:
a) To many character slots and allowable skills per character. Basically this allows everyone to have a blacksmith, everyone to have an alchemist, everyone to have a mage. No character professions or skills are in demand at all.
b) Duping... many characters have millions and millions of gold from duping bugs.
c) Scripting... UO is easily the most scriptable MMO on the market. And Scripters take full advantage of this... so they are gone all day but when they get home their script has mined 10,000 ingots or 10,000 wood, or whatever the case may be.
d) No-Breakage and Insurance, the two worst ideas every put into UO. Yes this works with some games but UO was never meant for this type of ruleset. Further adds to the disselusion of professions and interactivety as you dont ever need a blacksmith or any type of crafter because nothing you have ever breaks, gets stolen, or becomes unuseable.
e) ... I could go on but for breavity sake I will stop here.
4. Making UO item based was like serving someone microwaved ice cream. It just wasnt mean to ever be served up that way, period. And putting the rocket-science statisics on every item made the game a hassle rather then a joy to play. Before AoS you could get into the game fast... just put on the armor best for your class... usually plate for Warrior, Leather for Mage, Leather/Mail combo for other classes... it all depended on strength, dexterity, intelligence, wether or not you needed to meditate, etc... it was fun!! Now it's all based around the particular stat average on every single piece you wear. It's gay to the extreme! NOT TO MENTION IT COMPLETELY UNBALANCED THE GAME FOR ABOUT 3 YEARS, and still has a huge impact of existing and new players. -- It is the single biggest obstacle for new players, if Aaron is serious about wanting new players they really need to go back to the old system.
5. Trammel/Felucca was a huge mistake. -- The two rulesets cannot co-exist... and it is proved by the fact that Felucca is dead, dead, dead. The only exception is around specific moongates (portals) where PvP occurs. Other then that nobody uses Felucca except for extra storage space.
I know this list wasnt exactly in order but at least you get the picture of what you will deal with if you join UO right now.
I hate to be so negative but those are some of the major problems in UO. Not to mention the complete unbalanced nature of PvP due to the item-based gameplay.
Here are a few things they need to do in order fix UO:
1. No Insurance.
2. Bring back breakage in a big way... not only to armor but to craftables, make houses start to crumble after time, make kegs start to leak, make weapons break after a time of use (including artifacts which will discourage there wide spread use and make a more even playing field and a "funner" experience for everyone).
3. DO MORE TO PREVENT HACKING, CHEATING, SCIRPTING, DUPING, ETC!
4. Bring back GM Support so that they actually show up when you page them and dont send you canned responses.
5. Bring back Counselors! Why? Because EA SUCKS at content and roleplaying and events and helping new players! The counselors were one of the best things UO had going for it.
6. Get rid of Trammel. Bring back the forced interactivity and bring back the community. Stop fragmenting society and localize it on each server so that people need to interact, so that they need each other. That was the original magic of UO. You could play within a circle of friends, or be a big time merchant. MMO's were NOT mean to be played solo, stop cattering to solo players.
7. Please for gods sake get rid of moongates and just upgrade the server equipment. Jeeesus. Talk about hybrid-instancing taken to the extreme. Theres no need for it, it just serves to fragment society even more.
8. Get rid of the Powerup Program.... that is the lamest crap ever! It only takes 2 days of serious playing to GM your character anyway, stop letting people cheat!
9. Only allow people to buy items that do not unbalance the game.. like house decorations.
10. Police Ebay and other trading sites, get your lawyers on it or something!
11. Bring back corpse looting and stealing... the sense of loss/risk made the game playable on so many more levels.
Some changes were good like more secure housing, massive house customization, dark fathers, quests, etc.
I'd love to see UO brought back to glory, but I just dont think new graphics (which arent even up to par by todays standards and are only about as good as Lineage I) are going to bring back players or rekindle interest. Especially since I can play WoW or GW or EVE or EQ2 etc etc for the same or very near the same price per month.
There really isnt anything close to the complexity of UO in the market atm...well, Eve might come close but outside the item stats and ship tweaking it's complexity is about the same as of pea shooters.
kids these days wants instant gratification with developers leading them by their hands to content.
Right now, our focus is on Kingdom Reborn. We plan to keep UO going with new features and content that will thrill fans for the next nine years.
:'(
Can't wait till they change their mind and create a UO2.
With that said, I have not played Official UO since maybe six months or so after the release of AoS. And as for Aaron Cohen, I understand that you are were the Marketing guy so its your job to hype us all up.... Well I will say this... It worked. I think I might dabble about in Kingdom Reborn for a month or so and see if I can get rehooked. I think the winning factor for me will be the RP community which I intend on putting the majority of my efforts into rebuilding from what Old UO was like.
I wonder what Richard Garriot thinks of his baby in the hands of EA Mythic. Lepidus, maybe that would be an interview worth getting :) Well with whatever Richard Garriot feels about Ultima's current course, I wish him the best of luck with his future endeavors with PlayNC and Tabula Rasa.
Also Aaron, you kind of tiptoed around the idea of launching another single player Ultima product, would definately be interested in hearing what you would have to say about any future plans for one.
After reading some of the responses here, I find myself in agreement with Ultima’s supporters. I do not think a better MMORPG has yet been made. With all its flaws it still far surpasses any other game in terms of game-play. I also think that during the course of the last few years this same game play has taken a few sharp turns (and some that merely meandered) for the worst. I played in 1997-1998, took a break because it was far too addictive, and then tried playing on and off every few years. There is definitely something missing, the old excitement is gone. I trace UO’s original strengths to a number of different areas:
1. The skill-based system is possibly UO‘s strongest asset. I have not played many online games (WoW, Horizons briefly, a couple others), but it seems that nearly all, if not all, games currently on the market or in development are level based or a combination of levels and skills. In my opinion, a wholly skill based system is far less restrictive, allowing for a more open ended game, and more freedom of choice. It resulted in characters who were not pigeonholed into one stereotype or another, who were not mere cookie-cutter images of every other character out there. It is my opinion that this system could easily be expanded to include any number of skills, thus adding a near infinite number of combinations. The upcoming Hero's Journey may recapture some of this, not sure yet.
2. Harsh penalties for death, and a fully open PvP environment. These elements added a certain adrenalin-based element that is missing entirely from newer player-friendly games such as WoW. Without strict penalties and open looting the game loses that sense of adventure and excitement, the thrill of narrowly escaping danger, a real feeling of accomplishment in PvP. Note: I am not a huge PvPer, definitely not a PK, more of a role-player, but I still like the feeling of danger at every turn.
3. The open-ended feeling of the world. As there were no leveled areas, from the first few moments of the game there was nowhere you could not go. The whole world was accessible to you, if you but had the guts to brave the PK’s and creatures. This made for a far more immersive experience. Also, it was not nearly so user friendly as most games are becoming. You were simply plopped into the world without much of an idea as to what you were supposed to do. It is hard to recapture that magical time (days in my case) spent learning the ropes, exploring the world, and not (as is the case with so many games now) being lead around by the nose from one quest to the next identical quest. Basically you do not follow some scripted story, you make your own. Also, a seamless world is a must, and one to which the rules apply equally throughout. No mystical other “safe” lands that can be teleported to for example (if this is done at all it should be done on different servers and not different aspects of one server). But by all means make the world bigger, and with today’s technology it could be enormous and varied. Houses could defnitely be made more difficult to come by, as they tended to flood the world. And please, please, get rid of the riding beetles and the giant chicken creatures and all the other silly stuff that has been added.
4. The notoriety system. Slightly flawed perhaps, but loads of fun as well.
I do think the new graphics are quite excellent and a welcome improvement. Of course it was never really about the graphics so much as the game play, and I feel that this should only serve as a starting place. UO could be amazing again with a simple return to the elements that made it so wonderful and addictive in the first place (and more of them). One thing that always rather bothered me, as a player of the original Ultima series, was that more was not done with the virtues system, there was a lot of potential there as well.
I might give UO another chance, but I have the same trepidation others have expressed. It is much the same feeling I get when I consider playing Vanguard (though I will likely try it anyway), I really want it to live up to its potential, but the actual experience is so often less than inspiring. I will need much more to encourage me than nice graphics.
I can see the need for a graphics update if they want to bring in new players as opposed to bringing old UO players back.
I checked mmogchart.com and he's correct that UO is in the top ten western MMORPGs as at Jun 06. So thats pretty good. Or pretty bad for all the other recent MMORPG's that dont make it into the top ten.
So I got interested in UO again based on this interview, and decided to go check out the UOStratics forums. It seems based on these forums that the UO servers are an even bigger cesspool then they ever have been. Rampant cheating and duping have been problems for years. So much duping has been going on that you have to be careful about who you buy stuff from, because you might be banned for buying duped items. There is aparently going to be Punkbuster (used to prevent cheating in counterstrike) installed to help curb hacking problems.
On top of this, I swung by the UO auction site, and it looks like gold is being freely traded for real life cash (1 million gold = $1 USD) and some of the sets of armor are going for 100 million UO gold...
There is no friggin way I would subject myself to this crap again. The only forseeable way i'd even consider rejoining this crap is if they installed an effective cheating solution and they opened a new server with an economy that isn't completely bungled.
Ehrm, I dont know about EQII, but I do know about EvE and EvE is def. not a complex game, heck I'll even go as far as saying that non player content wise it's pretty shallow. DAOC has far more depth to it then EvE imo.
For the record: I'm playing EvE atm simply because I didnt want to play another fantasy mmorpg, I allready played the best one (DAOC).
Edit: on the article great read and actually makes me want to try it. About time EA was going to do something good for it's mmorpg community.
I might give it a shot when the xpac comes out. I still have my 2 main accounts from 7 years ago.
They will never be able to combine servers because people have all of the landmass covered in houses. How would they merge something like that?
Edit: Reactivated one of my accounts to see some stuff but I forgot my toon is an outcast with 85 short term and long term kills...140 days of being online to get back to blue...I forgot that even in felucca where the ruleset it made for pvp...you STILL get penalized for killing. Stat loss when you res with more than 5 kills...so no way in hell I'm playing again with that horrible rule set. I totally forgot about that.
If they want to make fellucca pvp, then make it unpenalized. It's like in WoW losing a tier 3 peice everytime you die and rez after 5 kills. Just stupid IMO.
I was a huge fan of Nox myself. I have said many times I would LOVE to see a sequel to Nox. Glad to hear someone else give it the props it deserves.
Marcus
Thast my opinoin too waht Aaron said that new grafics is needed and uo needs to atract new young player wiht help quest.Some point is to help young play is for instance to make guildes(player) wich help youngs.But the first is UO:KR the new grafics to atract young and olds,Then Sa,pvp and and.some asked why uo dont have first person look.After UK:KR and Sa E/Mystic has notnig to loose to make 3D first look graics for uo wich work together wiht UO:KR.That means you can choose as player UO:KR3D isometrik grafics from the top and the 3D first look grafics.My opinion is after UO:KR young need quest and storyline wich show thhm all dungeons and the land of uo.I like the micromanagement in uo with thousends of items and posibilities.