It has been a while since we last heard from Linguistic Dragon…at least in terms of his ongoing journey through Britannia and Ultima 6. Indeed, as he may have mentioned in a recent podcast episode, he’s been wrestling with some writer’s block for the last few weeks, which caused a significant delay in the delivery of the next instalment of said playthrough. However, he seems to have found his words again, and so has published another blog entry.

And when he says “getting lost”, in this game’s case he means it:

Okay, okay, so I’m not actually certain whether the game world of Ultima VI, in any sort of measurable terms, is any bigger or smaller than its predecessors, but I’ve played Ultima IV so often that I know its general layout practically like the back of my hand, and Ultima V didn’t shake things up much in that respect, so it made getting around and knowing the relative positions of everything a fairly simple matter. Ultima VI, however… while (almost) everything is in the same general position, the shift from dual-scale to single-scale has meant that my sense of… well, scale, has been somewhat off and I’m finding it fairly easy to get lost when I’m not sticking to the roads. Which, I suppose, is actually reasonably realistic, though it’s making it a bit of a chore to figure out where I am in relation to everything sometimes.

It also means, however, that I have a greater appreciation for Ultima VI’s map, on account of the fact that I’ve had to scrutinize it considerably more than I have for any of the other games up until this point. And to its great credit, it’s remarkably detailed and very well reflective of the game world – and yet it conveys that information in a rather unique style all its own, as well. It complements the game itself very well, and I’m finding myself wishing that I could have played Ultima IV all those years ago when I first went through it with the original map as well.

For this segment of the journey, Linguistic invested a lot of time into finding — and exploring — Serpent’s Hold:

I carefully navigated my way through the islands until I reached the Isle of Deeds – does that archipelago have an official name, incidentally? – and the official grounds of Britannia’s knightly order, Serpent’s Hold. As tends to be typical, I first poked my head into the local tavern, since a fair few types pass through the doors of such establishments, and it’s a good way to meet people and pick up the flavor of the settlement. The first person I spoke to was Koronada, a fortuitous meeting indeed as he turned out to be the guildmaster of the Order of the Silver Serpent. The son of the lighthouse keeper of Greyhaven (or at least, keeper until it was destroyed by an earthquake), he now served as the head of the Order, and took the stories of my previous deeds as evidence enough of my worthiness to join its ranks – though he still wished me to make my own shield before letting me in officially, which Gherick could help with. We said our goodbyes and my attentions turned to a burly man named Seggalion, who, after telling me his story of his arrival from a place called Ashtalarea through a moongate, expressed his desire to join my quest in the hopes of meeting someone who might be able to help him get home, or at the very least assist the people who helped him by aiding in the effort. Moved by his story and its similarities to my own, I agreed.

Having thereby increased our little band to six, we next spoke with Sir Caradon, who originally hailed from Yew. He told us that he had fought the gargoyles near the Shrine of Honesty, speaking of some substance that they ingested that made them fight like living cyclones. His tale spoke of a fierce and harsh battle, of which there were few survivors, though I admittedly found myself wondering just how well the young knight adhered to the virtue of the shrine he fought by. Our last meeting in the tavern was with Shubin the cook, who asked if we could bring him a dragon egg if we came across one – he apparently needs one to cook Magincian Pastry, a recipe he learned from Sandy of Trinsic. We’ll have to see about that one – that would be no small task.

And, leaving that city, he kept to the theme of exploring Britannia’s warrior vanguards, and so turned toward Jhelom:

With this bit of knowledge, our next stop was obvious. We made our way to the Sword and Keg, where Shamino waved to a man wearing a rather distinct, oddly-shaped helm and exchanged a few bits of news. The man was named Stelnar Starhelm, whom Shamino had traveled with before. He introduced himself as a monster-slayer, killing wisps and gargoyles for the past year in Spiritwood. He too wished to go slay Sin’Vraal, with no regard for the part he had played in the rescue of Lord British. He did suggest that he may be found where we last met him, however, so that was another useful piece of information. Stelnar also made a remark that ugliness is only skin deep, just like beauty, which seemed a bit odd coming from him though no less well to keep in mind.

It was Andy the serving girl who seemed the most sensible out of the lot in the tavern, though – which, considering the bluster of most of the fighters in the area, was a bit less surprising than it might have sounded. It was she who actually thought of a way to retrieve the Rune of Valor from the rat hole, having remembered stories of Sherry the Talking Mouse in Lord British’s castle, who might be convinced to help out. Dupre was dubious, but sure enough, a trip to the castle proved fruitful, as Sherry readily agreed to make the trip in exchange for a bit of cheese, and not only did she emerge from the hole in the wall of the Sword and Keg with the Rune, but with a magic ring as well!

Do click on through and read the whole thing; there is (of course) much more that Linguistic has told. The post-article comments are rather more sparse, although Linguistic does note that compared to its predecessors, Ultima 6 throws far fewer random encounters at the player.