Sergorn Dragon vs. Ultima 9
Confronting Ooli
He’s already made decent progress into the game, as well, completing the opening on Earth (whilst shooting a few comments at the naysayers who poo-pooed the fact that Ultima 9 didn’t open in wherever the Avatar ended up after Ultima 8), completed Stonegate, explored Britain and Paws, conquered Dungeon Despise, and restored the Shrine of Compassion.
All in a weekend.
As a point of personal interest, I was particularly struck by his comments — in his Dungeon Despise article — about the encounter with Ooli, the Wyrmguard guarding the base of the column in Despise. Of course, this particular Wyrmguard is really the Avatar’s former companion Iolo, who was corrupted( as surely as the virtue of Compassion) by the Guardian.
In particular, Sergorn observes, regarding the encounter:
This really came as a shock the first time, and even some puzzlement: I mean was this really Iolo or was he lying to me? But there was something really heart wrenching about seeing him like this (and really: even more after having played all the series in a row before this!) and I let it go, saddened by this turn of event.
The first couple of times I played Ultima 9, I admit that I really didn’t feel all that much of an emotional stir at the thought of Iolo having become the Guardian’s pawn. I’m playing through the game again now (I’m in Hythloth at the moment), and this time…well, this time, I killed Iolo before he had a chance to plead with me. It wasn’t an intentional thing; I just must have landed one too many hits; he crumpled to the ground before his conversation trigger fired off.
And I was…really quite saddened by that. It really hammered home, I think, the sense of what Origin was trying to achieve with Ultima 9, this sense of a very finite end to the saga of Britannia, and of the Avatar.
Anyhow, go thou and read of Sergorn’s blog. It’s good stuff.
Come on Ultima IX closet fans! Do your coming out! 😀
I’ll stand up–I loved Ultima 9! I’ve said it before, it *IS* a true Ultima! Summary of nay-sayer conterpoints:
* “It crashed a lot, and needed patches”–Ultima 6, 7, 7 pt. 2, and 8 all did as well! It didn’t crash a lot for me, because I listened to Origin, and had the right amount of RAM, the right video card, and the right sound card! (U6, U7, and U8 all made me buy more hardware!)
“The Framerate was horribly slow!”–for an FPS, maybe. It’s an RPG–you don’t need to circle-strafe!
* “It was too simple a storyline”–It was deep enough to get my girlfriend to play it with me (and now the girl’s me WIFE!)
* “Richard promised a party system!”–The party system wasn’t missed for this type of ‘semi-first-person’ view.
* “The Guardian looked silly!” Google ‘U7 Intro’–nuff said.
* “It was simply a shrine cleansing excercise!” Ultima 6 not good enough for you either?
* “The voice-acting sucked!”–Some were EXCELLENT! Sarah, Raven, and The Guardian come to mind. Eviticus was a RIOT! The Avatar himself….OK, perhaps this one’s partially valid.
* “Plot-Killer Bugs!”–a few, but they were patched, and all worked fine on my system.
What the nay-sayers never mention:
It’s a BEAUTIFUL world! Watch a sunset!
The music was (and still is) stupendous–I have the music CD in my car!
The plot is deep! I admit I was floored when I found out who/what the Guardian was (full-circle to Ultima 4)
I was enthralled for over a month! Not many games have captured me like that since!
(Is that enough, Sergorn?) 🙂
I agree with most of Sergorn`s article. Ultima 9 is one of my favorite games ever. Good 3D ending for series like Wizardry 8 (and not like Might and Magic 9). Sometimes NPC just staying leaning to the wall, so they have some sort of schedules 🙂 Yeah, somebody can argue, that in 1999 graphics were better in The Wheel of Time, physics – in Trespasser and Septerra Core or Revenant already came in full-speech, but for me technology not a main factor in U9. Atmosphere is charming.It is a kind of beautiful fairy tales without fairies turning to ancient tragedy… Yeah, more like U9 story with some plotholes, than Zelda and King`s Quest: Mirror Mask anyway.
Yeah, it is also very sad that Michael Dorn was fired from the Guardian`s role. 🙂
Oh, I dunno…if he’d kept the role, I’d have been unable to take the Guardian seriously; I’d keep hearing Worf’s voice and wondering what the Klingon Empire had against Britannia.
Just 2 more quick things that make U9 a great game, even today:
1-What about this?:
“…LOADING…”
You don’t see it–EVER! U9 is a totally seamless world! I defy anyone to name 5 1st/3rd person 3-D titles in the past 11 years that never need to load, in a totally seamless world–all the way around!
2. Just installed and ran U9 on my Win7 system–no configuring–NOTHING! Put in the disk-installed. Put in the play disk, clicked the icon–flawless. Let’s see any other game from 1999 do THAT! 🙂
Joe
To add one more bit to Joe’s comments:
1) U9 loads like *that* on my system (Win7, Core i5, 4 GB RAM), and without splash banners. I just double-click the icon, and there is my last save point, loaded and waiting. No splash banners, no menu…just *boom*, game.
Now, excuse me while I make a cup of (instant, but still) coffee while ME2 loads. You can’t even ESC the EA logo splash!
CAVEAT: books and notifications (“I got the Kiran Shield!”) do seem to lag the game for ~5-10 seconds. I wonder why that is?
*”Game is too linear” hmmm…now this is one I would have to agree with
I got the impression that there were still some plot killer bugs, but I think almost all of these result from going places you aren’t supposed to yet. Be interesting to see where the plot sequences break down when progressing through Honor and Sacrifice at the same time.
Oh yeah, I love the music (well the combat music is a little bleh, but it also usually precedes an annoying respawned rat or thug). Btw, did anybody else enjoy the New Magincia uncleansed theme?
@Iceblade: I love the New Magincia music. Just finished that part…I’d forgotten how beautiful the soundtrack for it was, and how sad.
As to the linearity, eh, there’s definitely a large chunk of the game that progresses in a set sequence, but it offends me no more than do the plot bottlenecks in Serpent Isle or Mass Effect 2.
Actually, I take that back: ME2’s annoy me more than U9’s.
It occurs to me that one reason the books lag on loading is that they are 3D assets. Not sure what reason the (I hope) 2D notification windows have for the delay; yours seems plausible.
Dang, I wish there was an edit button
RE: CAVEAT: The most obvious reason I can think of is that the game is having to load a lot of additional resources – book/notification background (not sure which file this is located in), misctext, books-en, sfx. Most everything else is already loaded at the savegame loading.
And yes, the seamlessness is really awesome. Even when when the game loads a new map, the transition is just a split second jump and slight change in lighting and maybe texture. A feature that won’t be forgotten in Forgotten World.
Yeah there’s linearity and linearity – it’s more like it has chokeholds that prevents going everywhere, but you still has quite a bit of freedom in these areas. I mean the mainland surrounding Britain you explore it for HOURS and not doign anything plot related.
I’ll admit I wouldn’t have mind something less linear since it would have worked with the plot – I mean personally, I think after Moonshade you should just have been able to do the remaining cities as you wish, rather than just having Cove/Yew and THEN Trinsic/Valoria. Actually I am pretty sure you can go and do Destard as soon as you get to Yew without breaking anything, altough this might be a tad too hard for your character’s strength at that point
Regarding the book lagging, try to open your options.ini and increase the “StreamDuration=” value to something like “1000” or “10000”. This is usually the reason that creates some stuterring when opening books and goes much smoother once this is increased.
On a side note I’m actually using higher settings than recommanded for clipping planes (12000 for far planes and 6000 for close) and it seems to be working just fine. Yay!
Oh and yeah the seamless approach is really awesome – except for the Gothics and Risen I can’t think of any game who did it that well.
As for Michael Dorn as the Guardian he would probably have been fine, but I’m really glad they kept Bill Johnson, especially since he is wonderful in this episode. He had come a long way since Ultima VII.
Well…I liked aspects of Ascension. I liked the music, the day/night cycle, it was a pretty game, and ok, seamless too. But none of those things *make* a game for me.
I still hate the story. :/ I don’t agree that the plot is deep at all. I knew who ‘Oloi’ was the moment he said his name backwards in his old-man voice, and literally groaned. Finding out the ‘real origin’ of the Guardian was a ‘huh’ moment, and would have been more believable if it was logical, but there’s too much going against it from previous games and felt like a slap in the face to U4 and U5 lore fans in particular.
I appreciate they tried to tie in so much of the previous games. It was a nice gesture and it felt like ‘coming back’ in a sense, but it wasn’t Britannia. And it’s even harder for female gamers like me, I think. :/ Much of the marketing left me cold, the Raven storyline felt like an excuse to give the ‘new teen boy players’ something to ogle, and just…bleh.
I know you love it, Sergorn, but I can’t. Sorry. XD
Heh, I gotta say if there is there one complain I never really agreed is the one about the Guardian’s nature and how it supposedely contradicts everything in the past games.
If anything it explains a lot about his behavior in the last episodes as whole.
Now admitedly I would have prefered if they had kept the full version of the Guardian’s origins, with the ties to the Shadowlords, Mondain’s Gem and such (which really would make even more sense considering the content of the game and well… the fact that the Columns are basically the Shadowlords on a world scale basis) – but it doesn’t strikes me as contradicting anything.
If anything I like how it ties with U4-5 lore really. I’ll be the first to admit that Ultima IX’s continuity with the Ultima VIIs (and especially Serpent Isle) can be questionnable but I’ve always felt this episode tied *very* well with the Age of Enlightenment trilogy.
The only real possible inconsistency IMO, is about the Guardian’s role in Silver Seed – but arguably if the Avatar could somehow come back in time, it’s not that much of a stretch to feel that the Guardian could have spread his influence farther in time as well, especially considering how screwed time appear to works between worlds in Ultima.
Oh well…
One thing I can tell though, is that had the Guardian just been han big red interdimensionnal bad guy with nothing special about his origins (which seemed to be the case in the original plot), I think this would just have been very underwhelming.
The original version actually had him tied in with the Shadowlords and Mondain’s gem? I thought that was just my fan fiction! o_O If they’d done *that* (and done it well) I would have been freakin’ stoked.
But my main beef with the Guardian’s nature in Ascension isn’t contradictions with timelines or anything like that. It is this:
Ascension makes it out that U4 stripped the Stranger of all evil when s/he became the Avatar, and that evil became the Guardian. Ultima’s point about the Avatar had always been that it was an ongoing quest and effort to be virtuous, but Ascension scraps that completely and in doing so destroys the (IMO) most crucial element of U4 and U5, the *moral* of the games — that the struggle to be ‘good’, to be a righteous hero, is hard and ongoing. Because, according to Ascension with its Good/Evil twin story, the Avatar could be nothing *but* good once attaining the title in U4 and spawning the Guardian.
Maybe this is small in the scheme of things. Perhaps it is. But it was the concept of the struggle to be a morally ‘good’ hero in times of darkness that made me fall in love with the series in the first place, which is why, to me, taking that away destroyed it for me.
But that’s many years past now. :p Just trying to explain my reasons–or the main one. 🙂
As for the Guardian being an interdimensional bad guy? I dunno. I don’t see why not. I would have preferred that to what we got, truth be told (sorry! XD). I mean, the Guardian has been a nemesis to the Avatar from U7 onwards, and the Avatar has had an *enemy* since the Triad of Evil. I don’t think the Guardian’s history, what he is, was the point of fascination–it was his interest in the Avatar. Right from that intro scene in Ultima VII, he has his eye on you. I was looking forward to finding out why and getting something more interesting than a tired old Evil Twin plot. 🙂
I admit I *did* have a moment of ‘Crap, this is all my fault? :/’ when the Oracle in Ascension said the Avatar was the reason the Guardian kept threatening Britannia. That was awesome! Multiple exclamation marks awesome!!! I remember being appalled and not wanting to acknowledge it yet at the same time knowing it was *right*…but when I found out the reason behind this? It let me down in a big way. >.<
…wow, it's been a long time since I rambled about Ultima. Can you tell? XD
Yeah I’ve heard this point before – the thing is I’ve never seen it as being contradictory with Ultima IV in the sense that just because the Guardian was born from the Avatar’s stripped evil doesn’t mean IMO that the Avatar is suddenly that perfect being incapable of being anything but good.
Regarding the cut elements about the Guardian’s origin here’s the ghist of it from Richard Garriot’s mouth (source: the Ultima IX Clue Book)
“If you go back to the very beginning, in Ultima I, and the first evil wizard, known as Mondain, you remember that he was in the process of creating a gem of immortality … a way to make his ultimate evil survive forever. The way you stopped that was that you went and shattered that gem. That process had a very profound impact on the history of all Ultimas. The first impact that the player is aware of is that the three major shards ultimate manifest the three Shadow Lords, which affect Blackthorn and the evils that take place in that era. What you also discover in this game is that, in fact, of course, the three shards were first uncovered/discovered between Ultima IV and V. In IV, as you become this person of pure virtue, the fiction we’ve created is that that process of casting out the darker side of yourself, and where that goes and how it happens, also goes back to that gem as well. This gem, from the fact that you’ve had contact with it from way back, is where the dark side of you resonates and maintains itself. So the Shadow Lords really are a part of you, that dark side of yourself. As you banish them in Ultima V, and send them off to some other plane of existence, which you think of as non-existence, they get back together and plot their revenge. It’s that darker aspect of yourself that comes back in Ultima VII. Ultimately you discover that you really can’t wipe that out without wiping out yourself.”
So the basic concept was that the Stranger somehow became tied with the Gem by destroying it and that by becoming the Avatar it resonated within it until spawning the Shadowlords from his “dark side”.
Remember how we were promised that Ultima IX would tie everything back to Ultima I? Well… that was it.
That also explains quite a bit of the final, notably the reason for this focus on corrupting virtues, and why you’re greated by Shadowlords statue when entering Terfin. This might even really give some explanation to why Blackthorn is by his side and so on…
(Also it answers one of the thing that kind of leave me huh: the whole “Would anotehr Avatar spawn another Guardian?” question… which would means no since this was because of the Gem).
The interesting thing about this, is that the way Garriott talks of it – he talks of it as if it is the way the Guardian’s origin *is* in the final game and that these are the elements you discover while playing the play. He definitly *not* mentions this as being some cut plot element.
(I shall stress that this really concerns the final version of the game we’ve got – and not the “Bob White Plot” version of it)
The thing is that the way it is presented in the game is not exactly contradicting the elements here – more like the way it’s presented in the game was overly simpliefied, and this certainly gives credits to the rumors we had heard about the suits of the time wanting the team to diminish ties with earlier game.
Now this do not change that I did love the way it was in the game (I mean I was really left speechless for ten minutes like “OMFG”), but this really leave me with a big interogation: If they could cut something as important as THIS, what else were they forced to be cut?
(This is why as much as all this stuff popping from the Bob White plto is great, I really hope some details about the final version of the game appears some day, because I’m sure there must be a lot of very interesting stuff in this).
Hm…interesting, interesting… thanks. But it leaves me wondering what would have happened had the Stranger never become the Avatar and someone else took up the mantle. *sigh* Somehow it all feels a bit…contrived to fit together, like the Star Wars prequels. XD I suppose leaving a whole lot of explanation out didn’t help.
Curious about the gem as well. According to U5 it was the acts of Captain Johne murdering his friends that caused the Shadowlords to coalesce. I suppose the latent ‘evil’ could have already bee in there thanks to the Stranger/Avatar but…it still feels a bit of a stretch. I don’t understand how becoming the Avatar resonates with the broken gem…convenient plot point, or just me not wanting to accept LB’s vision?
Do I agree with LB’s idea that you can’t wipe out your ‘dark side’ without destroying yourself? To a degree, yes. But where does that moral leave us? When did the Avatar go from *strugging* against their dark side to trying to *destroy* it? IMO they didn’t, and that’s where the trouble is. If the Guardian *wasn’t* the entirety of the Avatar’s darkness, if he was just a manifestation or shadow of it, then destroying him (or taking him back into yourself if you prefer) shouldn’t have required the destruction/disappearance of the Stranger/Avatar, which is what Ascension strongly implied was needed. You couldn’t even harm the Guardian without hurting yourself.
So while I see what RG was trying to pull off, IMO he didn’t *quite* manage to satisfy me, sadly. :/
(Interestingly, this talk about the Guardian’s origins going back to U1 made me recall the ‘Guardian’s Homeworld’ in UW2, with it’s U1-like line-art. I have to wonder. :))
I don’t know if you remember my fanfic from a few years back who delt about this (note that it was inspired by this RG interview) but this is how I see it basically: by shattering the Gem, the Stranger became tied to it and it began to resonate with his action, and being an artefact of evil it basically led to an opposite reaction as while the Avatar grew stronger in good (which really in the end is still the essence of Avatarhood) the Gem grew more powerful in evil powers.
I can perfectly imagine the fragments laying there until Johne and his companions found them and gave birth to the Shadowlords (altough personally I do like to consider rather that this created the Guardian and the Shadowlords were mere shadows but that’s not my call to make I guess :P).
I don’t know it fits for me – and I tend to consider this somewhat more canon than the game itself actually and since in the end it was still born from the Avatar’s “dark side” there is some sense to have them merge to end it.
Now granted there is something coincidential about all this – unless you consider all this was somewhat “destiny”. But to be fair I don’t think you can really tie up *everything* without it feeling a tad coincidential in the end. In any case I do think this explanation would have suited more with fans than the simplified version in game.
But in any case Ultima IX’s big issue for me in the end is not conceptually – I do feel the concept behind the game is brillant and could have been handled in a way that would have pleased most. The issue is more the excution of it, and notably – the obvious lack of any kind of exlanation which is probably the game’s main issue. I don’t really blame the developpers for this, we know under which conditions the game was made – but while I would have liked more, I do feel the content as it is, is still very good if somewhat underdevelopped.
This is why actually I’m not one who think that Ultima IX would have been sooooooo much better as it followed the “Bob White Plot” – because the issues of the game comes more from *execution* than the premise.
The very same premise with better writter, more depth and more consistency would probably have satisfied even hardcore fans. Bob White’s premise with the same issues in writing and consistency would probably have lead to the same kind of criticism really (never mind the fact that the original plot does have a lot of controversial content already in any case).
Two small points I can chip in here.
First, as regards the whole issue of the Guardian being the Avatar’s “dark side”, and whether this is contrived/contradictory/a cop out/cheap…in a way, I can draw parallels between the U9-given origin story of the Guardian and at least two of the sacramental acts that characterize the faith I follow, the Catholic faith. In particular, and perhaps because my wife and I were just at a course this weekend preparing for this for our second child due next month, I’m reminded of baptism.
Without getting overly theological, baptism is a casting off of original sin, which the Church identifies with our “fallen human nature”. Obviously, in baptism, it is not as though we cast off that nature — we remain human, and concupiscent — but in baptism we cease to be inexorably bound by it.
And yet, and I stress this point: concupiscence remains. Which is to say: we’re still sinners, and remain so.
In a way, the Avatar’s…er…becoming the Avatar in Ultima 4 is like a somewhat more literal baptism; it isn’t simply that he casts off the shackles of his fallen nature, but that he literally casts off some part of him which is inexorably evil, as though he takes his sin (if you will) out of himself and throws it away, physically. This aspect later goes on to become the Guardian, after a process of amplification and…we’ll get to that in a minute, actually.
Much like in baptism, though, the Avatar’s casting off of this evil from within himself does not mean he is no longer capable of evil. In the Catholic understanding, concupiscence itself is not a sin — only its initial effect and the decision, later in life, to yield to it are sins. In like manner, the Avatar, in casting off whatever part of himself is evil isn’t casting off his own struggle to do good, because that struggle is not, in and of itself, intrinsically evil.
Second, as regards the formation of the Guardian, and the issue of whether one must die to overcome one’s “evil side”, I think it’s important to remember here that while the Avatar is still just a human being like us, he isn’t exactly like us either, and his struggles are not the same as ours. Or, rather, his are worse and more potent.
The Avatar, whether you accept the “Stranger = Avatar” hypothesis or not, has been caught up with the history and, in some ways, origin of Britannia, and especially with the virtues and their power, for a very long time. It isn’t unreasonable to assume that the part of him that was cast off grew at pace grew as the Avatar grew in the virtues and became the champion of the land he was in some way bound to. Indeed, it’s even reasonable to assume that the Guardian at some point surpassed the Avatar in power, since unlike the Avatar the Guardian never went home to Earth, an apparently “magicless” place, every now and again. At some point, the Guardian also began to feed on other worlds, on the evils and destruction wrought therein…which of course the Avatar didn’t do the reciprocal of, for the most part.
Most of us don’t need to die to cast off our “evil side”, but most of us don’t have an evil side that grows larger than us, becomes sapient in its own rights, consumes countless worlds, and then makes its personal mission and goal the destruction of the land and people we hold most dear.
Then again, most of us also don’t get to be the founding heroes of medieval lands in alternative timescapes, nor do we get to be the constant, time-and-time-again saviour of that land, nor do we get to draw upon the powerful magical forces that underpin its system of virtues.
Me? I can overcome my “evil side” with conscious will and regular confession. But then again, my “evil side” isn’t a big, red, malevolent “destroyer of worlds” that walks into the confessional and starts hammering me with lightning bolts.
The only thing that kept me from buying U9 at the time was the buggyness and steep system requirements. At that time getting a new game was a really big deal that only happened two or three times a year, so I had to make sure that what I was getting was really worth it (or even ran on my machine).
Once I did get my hands on it (many years later) I quite enjoyed it. I can’t say that it felt like it really did anything particularly special, which may be kind of a shame for an Ultima title, but it was fun enough.
Joystiq’s review of Fallout New Vegas is actually a relevant read for those who take issue with Ultima 9 on technical/bug-related grounds.
In reference to Joystiq’s review of New Vegas, I think buggyness today means something different than buggy 10+ years ago. An occasional lock up, or slight memory leak, or scripts failing to fire are all the big bad bugs we deal with anymore.
When I heard U9 was buggy back then what came to mind were the total showstopping bugs and crashes that used to pop up in some bad releases here and there. And after glancing over some of the patch notes, I don’t think that assessment was far off.
When I bought a game back then I was pretty well counting on crashing here or there, but if a reviewer went out of their way to call a game buggy it meant it was nearly unplayable.
Did you read the review, Handshakes? The bugs in New Vegas don’t appear to be minor, and the game is evidently the next thing to a technical monstrosity. Although, admittedly, none of the listed ones appear to be showstoppers. Though really, very few of Ascension’s bugs are absolute showstoppers; there are workarounds for the vast majority of them.
WTF_Dragon – All of that…makes sense (Christian here, btw, so I dig the explanation in Part The First).
Hm. If that’s how it’s meant to be, then I can be happier with the overall premise, I think, and wishful that it could have been explained like this in the game, too. I am still not entirely keen on the idea that becoming the Avatar had some odd mystical connection with the shards, it feels too coincidental for my tastes, but that’s me :p I am over 30 and getting set in my disgruntled ways. XD
So here is my question! Does the Avatar’s death automatically result in the Guardian’s death? Vice versa? The reason I ask is that in the U7:BG finale, you clearly hear the Guardian call for his lackeys to kill you. This would suggest either can be killed without affecting the other, yes? Or is the Guardian unaware of who exactly the Avatar is at that point (which could work)?
(or should I take this sort of speculation elsewhere…?)
They way I see it personally, it that while the Avatar can’t hurt or kill the Guardian without hurting/killing himself, it does not work the other way around.
Basically: while the Guardian is a part of the Avatar, the Avatar is not a part of the Guardian per se, hence why he would be able to destroy him should he wishes (altough his plans seems to be that by aborbing the Avatar he would become more powerful, which makes sense to me).
It’s kind of like the movie Dragonheart if you see what i mean.
Yeah, that works for me, Sergorn. 🙂
Yeah, the bugs are visiting card of Obsidian as developer. All their games are bugged from the beginning.I hope that all bugs are already patched in NWN2 preventing the developing of Return to slow down 🙂
Heh don’t worry about NWN2 – the release version was kind of a mess (notably terrible in term of performances) but it’s been a while since the release of the game and things were fine already by the time the addons were released. Considering we’re not exactly trying to push things farther than the NWN2 engine already offers graphically (hell we’d need 3D artists to do that anyway :P) Return should run very smoothly on any up to date computer.
Thankfully Atari allows Obsidian to actually patch their games unlike Sega and LucasArts 😛
Regarding Fallout New Vegas, I’m willing to bet these issues are mostly limited to the console versions (indeeds report are the PC version is really stable). As I recall Fallout 3 already had issues on consoles, and they clearly have issues with these kind of huge quasi seamless engines.