Editorial: Shroud of the Avatar
It’s now official.
Following in the footsteps of other industry legends such as Chris Roberts and Brian Fargo, Richard Garriott is spearheading his own Kickstarter campain to accelerate the development of his Ultimate RPG, a spiritual sequel to the Ultima series he created more than 30 years ago.
To say this is exciting news would be the understatement of the year. This is a game many of us have been hoping for, for nearly fifteen years (if not, some would argue, more than twenty). And while I have the utmost respect for the people at Mythic, who are doing their best to uphold the Ultima legacy in their own way, seeing Lord British going back to his roots is a source of excitement that little else could match.
But even as Shroud of the Avatar was announced, there was some confusion and worry over the most obvious aspect: the multiplayer component, which naturally led many hardcore Ultima fans to wonder how this could be a proper spiritual.
The worry is legitimate, although I feel there has been some miscommunication in the sense that Portalriaum and the game’s Kickstarter page are perhaps not stressing enough — at least not until today — what Richard Garriott himself has been saying, first here on the Ultima Codex, and later again on the Portalarium live streams:
Shroud of the Avatar is built first and foremost as a single player, story-driven RPG.
Yes, there are multiplayer elements; there is a persistent world, player housing, PVP, and
other things inherited from Ultima Online, making this as a spiritual successor of sort to Ultima Online as well. But this is a not a MMO, and these are aspect that are completely optional: meaning that if you want to live it as a single player role playing game like the Ultima series was: you’ll be able to.
So let’s pretend for a moment this all works as it should and we get to play Shroud of the Avatar offline, forgetting about the rest of the world. As hardcore Ultima fans, the single player series remains for many of us the core of what Ultima is about (and indeed there are people much more capable than me to tackle the potential design ties to Ultima Online), which is why this column is solely focusing on how to make Shroud of the Avatar a proper “Ultima” game.
Because indeed, this leads to very simple question:
What made Ultima what it was, and what would it take to create a proper spiritual sequel?
Trying to define Ultima concretely is a kind of a no-win situation. The series has greatly evolved over the twenty years that elapsed between its creation and completion, and every fan tends to have his/her own personal definition of what an Ultima is. And while Ultima VII is often cited as the kind of perfect example of the potential of the series, one should also not be so eager to discard all the other episodes and what they bought to the table.
But taking the Britannian era (i.e. post-Ultima IV) as a point of reference and the evolution of the series thereafter, I would argue you can basically describe Ultima as a function of three central components:
- A strong and focused storyline with ethics and philosophical depth
- A living and breathing virtual world.
- An open world with a sense of exploration.
Now over the years and episodes, the means by which the Ultima series has tried to achieve these aims has changed and evolved considerably, sometimes for good and sometimes for bad. But I think these criteria are what most people would agree to define as the “core” of Ultima. You’ll often see people disagreeing about specific gameplay mechanics such as combat or magic, but ask any Ultima fan what he or she would like to find in a new Ultima game: and these are the answers you would get in most cases.
I think there are 3 camps of Ultima fans;
Camp 1. Die hard single player Ultima series fans, despise mmorpgs with a passion (Including UO /especially UO)
Camp 2. Ultima series fans who loved the single player games but recognize the ultimate Ultima must be an evolved ascended game and to be such must be multiplayer, (These fans love mmorpgs and love UO).
Camp 3. The modern day Ultima fan who knows little about the Ultimas except for Ultima Online and maybe Ultima IX, they are younger and are swayed either way.
I’m clearly in camp 2, I would say Ultima VII is much better than UO, but I recognize UO has many aspects that are evolved beyond what any single player game can offer, I do not claim Shroud of the Avatar is evolved or innovative as I have not played it, I hope it is. The future of gaming is online and multiplayer, I would say anyone who would deny this statement would be in denial.
P.S. found these 2 typos;
and these are aspect that are completely optional
* aspects
Because indeed, this leads to very simple question:
*a very simple question
Fourth camp: Die hard UO fans who have either never/barely heard of the single-player side of the series and/or who despise said games with a passion.
^ These, are going to be a constant issue now, through, and after release. We better get use to hearing from them.
Camp 2a (5?). Ultima series fans who loved the single player games, the Runes of Virtue games on the Nintendo Game Boy (casual multiplayer action Ultima), and enjoyed some parts of Ultima Online but hated Everquest, World of Warcraft, and other MMORPGs that revolved around killing X number of critters to complete “quests”.
It’s only the future because gaming corporations see the largest profits to be made there. Micro-transactions/Hamster-wheel grinds/Time-sink tactics/Recycling of old content. No thank you. I support creative independent publishers who have the goal of making art first and profits second. I want to see something interesting. Maybe Shroud will be it. If not, I’ll keep looking. There’s always gardening (the actual outside kind), at least it’s still single player. And more enjoyable than most games I’ve played lately.
Hoe about, the Ultima fan that’s in their mid 20’s that has played a minimal amount of uo and has no interest in uo or mmorpgs. Yet loves the ultima single player games and plays quite a bit of online multiplier games with strangers.
What camp does that fit into bro.
Camp 3 – and I believe that we are the majority! Am I wrong?
You are correct. Ultima Online sold more than “all of the previous Ultima games combined and then some” (by a factor of 10 or something, see Richard Garriott’s comments on the three ages of games), meaning that the number of players who bought and played only Ultima Online outnumbered players who bought and played the eariler Ultima games.
Probably not the majority here at the Codex though. At least based on the people who comment regularly. . .
At this point the debate is amongst us alone, as the market has moved on. Whoever shouts the name “Ultima” the loudest and makes the most money will define what an Ultima is. That’s why I do what I do, although I’m terribly excited (despite myself) about Garriott’s new project. To me, it’s about as official as it gets.
I also agree with WtF’s original general assessment of what an Ultima is, including the observation that really pinning it down is a rabbit’s hole. One of its beauties I suppose.
Great editorial !
I think that when they abandoned the dual-scale maps the worlds kept getting “smaller”, not in tile number but in “feel”.
Anyhow I’m really excited by this new -solo- game !
Thanks for your contribution Sergorn. I think you really hit the nail on the head. I also think the others hit the UO quandary on the head too and that the multiplaying elements in this will go a long way to satisfy them. Maybe what LB has in mind, really, is a kind of better, evolved fusion of what the split communities experienced with Origin.
Assuming that a certain audience may glance over the comments of your editorial – a piece I can agree with and which was enjoyable to read – I wrote up a little something too. I’ll just queue it up right here if you don’t mind Sergorn (and other codexians). Ultima are my favorite games too you know! I chopped it up same as your editorial’s conclusion so it will fit right in I hope. Knowing ultima fans I’m sure there has to be a bigger wall of text comment somewhere on this site.
• A true single-player offline mode: I’m not sure this is so much the core of older experience. You were definitely alone, but that was a limitation. The flipside of it is you could just as well end up with a gimped coop mode, right? Interest points added dynamically on the map tailored especially for coop experience could be great fun. The interest points could even switch according to how many buddies you’re playing with. If you have this offline/online duality, you can’t gimp either. As a general rule if you include something it shouldn’t be gimped! Agree that I don’t want a UO style game and that I couldn’t get into UO exactly because of the reasons mentioned in this editorial. For references sake I’ll say that I never play any mmo.
• A strong storyline with ethics and philosophical depth: I wouldn’t say there is little doubt. There’s plenty of doubt on this side of my keyboard. The editorial’s conclusion on this topic refers to something called real issues and leaves it at that. I would like to add involving moral issues in a direct way tend to undermine the story experience in my view. Also there are timeless human/moral/ethical issues that can be played around with, but if they’re just a part of some quest giving auto-system then it’s just cheap. There’s a lot of ways to mess this up really. Otherwise everyone would be doing it right. There are many ways to construct story arcs, if they end up being constrained inside their point of interest bubbles for example, then the experience is weakened. Being able to predict if a quest will remain inside its bubble or not could be called unsatisfactory. Storyline is really one of the few aspects of gaming, where as soon as the mechanics of it become apparent, suspense of disbelief is undermined. The older ultimas invented new and fun(ny) ways to deal with engine restrictions to remove mechanical constrains of story arcs. Things like the balloon, or the cage over Horrance, etc. As I was working towards completing the balloon quest in u6, I expected some kind of a cop-out since I didn’t think a flying balloon would actually materialize. But they did it: they beat my expectations! Many times: building a panpipe and then playing it, the whistling cube defense to be conquered with special helmets, the skara brae ferry, the Frankenstein monster rebuilding with body parts, the Frigidazzi (sp?) naked dance, the black sword, the silver serpent horns that called actual serpents, robbing the museum at night (the audacity!), the whistle for the dog, the goblin king, the penguin eggs, the cute bigfootpeople who accepted they would die, heck the entire intro of serpent isle with the disappearing equipment that you could look forward to recovering, and the lightning colors having meaning … there were so many ways the games knocked down my expectations.
• Interactivity: the red glow during combat along with the hit points showing are a huge turnoff for me. Let me humbly insist to only show at the utmost a much shortened glow when a hit occurs. A strong hit could be correlated with a slightly stronger glow. It could even turn a bit green when poisoned. It would be very subtle, you wouldn’t even be sure from the get-go whether it went green or not. Only a trained I should spot the difference. This behavior would somewhat mimic the way hits were shown in previous ultimas (u6, u7, can’t remember in 8). Please make it much more subtle and in name of the uncorrupted virtues: hide the numbers from us! Please! This is what I very much disliked from what I’ve seen so far in the video’s and I really hope you minimize this. One more thing, I strongly agree with the point in the middle of page 3 which praises the lack of menus to interact in the world and promotes the crafting inside the game world, since it’s so much more fun. Had I been in Sergorn shoes I would have added an underlining to the conclusion of that paragraph: Nobody likes menus so don’t do them!
• NPC and Dialogue Depth: one of the video’s bugged me a little I must admit. I think it was the one with Iolo (though nothing bad about that man, I really enjoyed listening to him). It was the scene where RG saves a small settlement but doesn’t accept the wedding ring because they are so poor. Then the settlement is ambushed and he gets a key to a chest full of goodies, goodies he gladly takes as a reward. There were two problems with this: He refuses the ring in one instance and then the next minute he accepts their precious chest full of treasure. It doesn’t make sense! They are so poor! Don’t accept their stuff! Compassion! But it doesn’t matter, because listen to this: they are not broke at all, they have this treasure chest! Actually he should have ended the scene by approaching that earlier lady and demanded the ring he had refused before, which probably wasn’t no wedding ring in the first place! These people must be liars! You could back that particular encounter with the option to inquire why they were masquerading as the poor, and make it a nice side story full of moral ambiguity. Are they avoiding taxes? Does the chest belong to someone else? Are they spies? Why are they there in the wild? Are others npc’s worried about their presence? Is it because they pretend to be someone they’re not? Was the ambush about that chest? The way it was presented these npc’s seemed a bit generic when I think of older ultima titles. It felt a bit like a gimmick, although obviously we weren’t shown the entire quest and I may be deducing wrong.
• NPC Schedules and Activities: in the videos I noticed travelling carts on the road in overworld view. Do they ever stay in a town? If a travelling cart stops in a town, is there a salesman selling his wares on the market now where there was none before? The overworld seems to me to have a lot of potential if it’s done right. Make it a fun place to be, with different schedules and different activities according to the situation. If you see an npc stop in a town you could have to run there too. Make us suspicious. Give us things we can see but can’t reach (yet). Evil-esque guards behind an uncrossable cliff that come out of the fog of war just to go back in. At night some other mystery could come out but stay just out of reach, outrunning the player and then suddenly disappear. Of course there’d be a special way to catch it but it’d be only revealed when the time was right.
• Companions: I belong to that group that really enjoys the companions. Please find a way to have them!
• A living landscape: it could be interesting to add a day/night cycle that is a bit unusual. I also remember the volcano blasts from u6 to make the avatar isle extra terrifying. These are just thoughts, really. I don’t have anything else on that point.
• Open world and exploration: if 3D combat and conversations can be considered as mini games when in that mode, what are the mini games in the overworld? There should be some fun mechanics to it. In older games it consisted of hoping to carefully avoid the monsters. I hope exploration means more than finding interest points only, which sounds fun, don’t get me wrong, but it may not be enough to make it really stand on its own. There should be hesitancy for the player to go forward. What actions can be performed in the overworld that are unavailable in 3D mode? Are there some kinds of mini games? Is it fun? Or are we just crossing filler between points of interest?
Sergorn, thanks for taking the time for your editorial. It’s awesome that the spirit of the games has been able to live on through sites such as this one. Let’s hope the guys at Portalarium take notice of what you wrote, well done.
PS: I’ve been waiting for a new Ultima for so long… best games ever!
These three points really sums it up, I hope it’s a focus for LB and his team.
A strong and focused storyline with ethics and philosophical depth
A living and breathing virtual world.
An open world with a sense of exploration.
LB has mentioned they will be making combat better and more complex. That’s fine but I hope these three points are not left behind. As mentioned U7 is most people’s favourite, yet combat is so unimportant in the game. It’s these three points which is what made the game so great.
Great job on the article by the way.
There isn’t a whole lot of meat in the higher tiers, but I find in interesting the really high tiers sold well early. I suspect that Richard Garriot is so well respected by other game developers, that many professionals were pledging high dollar amounts to support him.
I backed the project and I want it to do well.
I am a little worried that we know next to nothing about the setting, story, etc.
Seeing a developer say that they changed a scripted encounter to a small family of gypsies tells me they didn’t have great direction on the story from the beginning. It seems like they are just throwing individual concepts together.
Ultima IV, V and VI in particular started from a high idea, with the game exploring that concept.
If I knew that SotA had a similar concept it was built around, I’d feel better.
I agree with you, T.J. – but don’t forget that Ultima started just like that. He was throwing concepts together and it was only after the first trilogy that Richard really started to build a world. I don’t believe that the first episode of 5 will be a hit, but I expect that the 3rd and on to be the real deal.
They have a strong background of lessons learned. Richard came back to stay, so this new world is going to take a while to be built. Let’s wait, play and have fun.
These three points actually sum up what I think is missing from RG’s proposal for Shroud of the Avatar.
> A strong and focused storyline with ethics and philosophical depth
What I have heard about the story so far has left me unimpressed. I’m very skeptical. There doesn’t seem to be any depth to this world as yet. I expect a lot more at this stage because they’re basically pitching the game to us as investors and trying to impress us to get us to believe in their vision.
Instead, the focus has been on tech and game mechanics, which are both pretty sub-par in this day and age. Even if you’re comparing only to past Ultimas, this game doesn’t quite live up to the legacy in my opinion.
> A living and breathing virtual world.
Nothing about an instanced world is living and breathing. How can there be any meaning to anything that happens when there are infinite copies of the same space available to anyone in a shared persistent world where the only people you run into are the ones you choose to run into?
I have doubts they’ll be able to reconcile the differences between single-player and multiplayer without compromising on both fronts such that we end up with both being mediocre. This game will essentially become like Diablo but with a map to walk around on instead of a lobby.
Since the game will have a linear story (which implies a beginning and an end), the persistent elements of the game (which will obviously be minimal) will be forced to co-exist with elements designed for the single-player or co-op experience and there won’t be a lot of reason to play the game after you’ve seen all the content.
> An open world with a sense of exploration.
There can be no sense of exploration when you have a dual-scale map. Immersion is also practically impossible in that case. How can you suspend your disbelief when you’re forced to look at an unnatural view of the world and click on an icon to leave or enter an area? Every time you do this, you’re reminded that the world is a loosely connected set of nodes or instances rather than a living, breathing, virtual world.