BioWare Mythic’s newly announced Ultima Forever: Quest for the Avatar has been profiled and commented upon in a few more industry publications. Here’s a brief round-up of what’s being said about the upcoming game.

1UP: Will Ultima Finally Get the Update It Deserves?

Beneath its flavor-of-the-moment presentation style, Quest for the Avatar serves as a remake-cum-sequel to the seminal classic Ultima IV: Quest of the Avatar. We once named Ultima IV one of gaming’s most important games, and the very existence of BioWare would seem to reinforce that notion. Quest of the Avatar took RPGs away from the standard epic battle versus a great evil in favor of something more nuanced: The player’s goal wasn’t to save the land of Britannia by demolishing a terrible foe or conquering an invading army, but rather by becoming the embodiment of the Virtues — a moral paragon to inspire the people. From there, you can draw a very short and very precise line to BioWare’s tradition of morality meters and dialogue choices.

Of course, BioWare’s moral systems tend to be fairly black-and-white (or blue-and-red, as it were), whereas Ultima IV’s took a more nuanced approach. Players ascended to the role of Avatar not by making selections from a dialogue tree but by playing accordingly. Want to net some cash? Fine, but don’t do it by looting the homes of NPCs. [Lead Designer Kate] Flack’s immediate example for the new game’s morality system involved the decision to save the life of either a warrior or mage encountered in a dungeon. All well and good, I asked, but the original game’s choices weren’t so binary. Will Ultima Forever offer anything more than cut-and-dried decisions?

Joystiq: Can Ultima Forever be a worthy entry in the legendary series?

Rowan Kaiser wonders if it can:

…when I first heard about Ultima Forever, I was cautiously optimistic. Perhaps a respectful remake could maintain the core of the story while appealing to a much wider audience. Of course what that “core” is may be different things to different people. For me, the core of Ultima IV is the combination of open-world mechanics, conversational freedom, and its rigid morality system. These aspects of the game work together to make Ultima IV an exploration of the world, its inhabitants, and one’s self — which, at the time, also meant an examination of the player’s relationship with computer games as a whole. Yes, it really was that special.

…

But my alarm bells started ringing when I saw that only two classes were available in the game: Fighter and Mage. Character class in the middle Ultima games (IV, V, VI) was intrinsically tied to its Virtue system, which was equally connected to the game’s geography, as well as individuals. Eight classes, eight virtues, eight towns, eight dungeons, eight recruitable characters. For example, a Bard was associated with Compassion and the town of Cove, with Iolo joining your bard.

To which GameBanshee answered:

“probably not”

MMORPG.com: Ultima Forever: Quest for the Avatar Previews: Britannia Reborn for a New Era

NOT FOR THE BOOK OF FACE

One thing you all should know right off the bat…this isn’t going to be like Lord of Ultima, and it’s not going to be like The Sims Social. Paul [Barnett] told me rather matter-of-factly that Ultima Forever (U4E) is aiming to be quite literally a re-imagining of Ultima IV, hellbent on bringing the Ultima series to a new era, for a new audience, while retaining its roots and pleasing its legions of hardcore fans. It’ll have all the story, progression, emotional investment, and focus on adventure you’ve come to expect from a BioWare RPG. It’ll also be both a solo and a co-op adventure, with a strong focus on online persistent multiplayer for you and your friends (but not an MMO like UO). And one of the craziest parts? It’ll both be a PC client download, and an iPad App Store download (Android was not mentioned, and neither was the iPhone). You’ll be able to move freely between the two, and players on one can play with players on the other, just as you can start playing on your iPad at work and move to your PC when you get home.

Maclife: Ultima Forever Developed Specifically for the iPad, Will Incorporate BioWare-Style Storytelling

The game is single player and will feature eight different quests to master. Like the original games, Ultima Forever relies heavily on ethics, and will have players dealing with highly sophisticated elements, such as spirituality. “It’s a game all about who you are–like a personality quiz,” says Flack. “You’ll find yourself in situations where you’re asked if you’d rather be kind or fair. It’s challenging you to think about who you are and what you really believe in.” Ultima Forever will also incorporate storytelling tactics similiar to ts sister games, Dragon Age and Mass Effect.

Ultima Forever will enable tap-to-control game mechanics on the iPad and play time will be limited to 15-minute increments. To make the game size efficient, it will also implement backgrounds that are hand-painted and tile-based so that they are looped rather than constantly generated. Texture sizes and sound packs are also built to fit the iPad, so 16GB iPad owners will be able to enjoy the game in its full capacity without worrying about it taking up precious gigabyte space. “We built it specifically with the iPad in mind,” adds Flack.

And, of course, don’t forget to check out the Ultima Codex’s Ultima Forever portal, complete with forums!