Behind-The-Scenes Look at the History of Ultima Underworld
In researching information for yesterday's post, I came across an older article about the making of Ultima Underworld that was a lot of fun. I thought I'd pass it on to anyone who might be interested (It'd definitely be on my list of games I found personally the "most influential").

Games that Changed The World: Ultima Underworld

An excerpt:

"I think the most important thing UU did," says Doug (Church), "was the way in which it attempted to show the power and value of a style and type of gameplay." In other words, it had an open-endedness - a freedom - that shaped the way immersive action games would be made in the future. Though as Doug points out, not many games went in that direction until much later.

The article was just fun for me to read as I really enjoyed the first game. The second game, unfortunately, didn't do it so much for me. I still have it laying around, with this foolish belief that one day (using DOSBox), I'll finish it. It had a bit of the "designed by committee" feel to it and lacked the punch (and focus) of the first game. It did have some more interesting and varied scenarios, at least, though it's biggest claim to fame (improved / faster graphics) didn't age well at all.

The interesting thing here I note was about the sales data. Ultima Underworld didn't sell very well at the outset - it was a "slow burn" game. Eventually, both games combined ended up clocking in at a half-million sold, which I think qualifies as a pretty decent success for PC games even in this era (big publishers may claim otherwise, but considering the ROI on the much smaller game budgets of 1990-1992, I don't think they could complain). They had legs and word-of-mouth popularity.

In fact, one of the ideas I bounced around before settling on the Frayed Knights concept was about how to pull off an Ultima Underworld-style game in the modern, downloadable-game space. A mere remake / tribute type game wouldn't cut it, though. We've gone past that, especially now that we have Morrowind and Oblivion fulfulling much of that need. John Olsen and I kicked around a couple of ideas that I think might work... maybe one day.

For another interesting tidbit, many moons ago Jamie Fristrom posted a little story about how he might have been personally responsible for blowing any chances of an Ultima Underworld 3 happening... (geesh, Jamie, thanks a lot! I blame you!!! *grin*).

War Stories: The Screwed-Up Pitch Meeting, 1998


(Vaguely) related fanboi-ishness:
* Game Moments #9: Ultima Underworld
* Big World, Small Dungeon: Does Size Matter in RPGs?
* Can CRPGs Age Gracefully?


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Labels: Biz, retro, Roleplaying Games

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