Lord of Ultima officially released
As noted by the guys at WCCIC, Electronic Arts has announced that Lord of Ultima has been officially released.
REDWOOD SHORES, Calif.–(BUSSINES WIRE)–Phenomic™, an Electronic Arts Inc. (NASDAQ:ERTS) studio, announced today Lord of Ultima™, a new browser-based online strategy game, is available worldwide for free* starting today. Lord of Ultima immerses players in a brand-new, deeply-rich strategy game set within the Ultima universe. The game introduces innovative social features, such as advanced trading, alliance creation, online chat and community forums, which make for an endlessly entertaining experience.
“Lord of Ultima was designed to ensure that everyone, from strategy newcomers to diehard fans, can make it to the top of the leader board,” said Volker Wertich, Creative Director at Phenomic. “Phenomic is committed to building dynamic communities that delight players as they interact with the game, each other and the legendary world of Ultima.”
To become the Lord of Ultima, players will master the arts of diplomacy and trade, as well as the military activities of spying, plundering, and the takeover of enemy cities. Set in the new world of Caledonia, players start the game as eager conquerors in the early stages of raising an empire, and then move from developing a humble village and evolving it into a prosperous, highly customized capital. Players can flourish as peaceful merchants by trading resources over land or sea and using diplomacy. They can also become feared conquerors, by creating mighty armies of knights and mages to crush enemies.
Lord of Ultima is a free-to-play MTX browser-based game. No download or installation is needed and players do not need to register to play. Lord of Ultima is available in English and German and is playable now by visiting www.lordofultima.com.
And this differs how from Evony, Kingory and all the other similar microtransaction scams where you can only really ‘win’ by showeling in real money to gain various advantages over your non paying peers?
No difference… it just has the name Ultima on it, and a few things here and there that reference Ultima (Trinsic Temple, Moonglow Tower, Gargoyles, Moonstones….)…
The story has nothing to do with it either, it just mentions Sosaria that is now called Caledonia or something like that….
But if it brgins people to the franchise… maybe it could work as a way to check the market for a future game….
I have to ask: knowing that the only Ultima EA has been interested in is the cash cow Ultima online, does this development surprise anyone?
Well, EA has tried before to ressurrect Ultima when they tried making Ultima X.
The problem they had back then is that they thought that UXO would steal players from UO and were not interested in that. With Lord of Ultima they have 2 completely different kind of players.
So in the end this is what I expeceted from EA, another cash cow for them 🙂
On the other hand, lately in UO the developers have been using more and more Ultima lore in a good way. The use of characters like Geoffrey, sherry, the slasher of veils or the shadowlords, or the addition of the land of the gargoyles and the Stygian abyss (even getting their maps straight from Ultima VI and Ultima Underworld).
So maybe I’m wrong and they are more interested in Ultima right now and are just trying to check how good the franchise can do.
If this was the case, then yes, that would be a surprise.
Either way, I don’t think they can hurt the franchise much more with this Lord of Ultima.