Forbes: Richard Garriott’s ‘Shroud of the Avatar’ Is An Ultima Game Without The ‘Ultima’ Name
Shroud of the Avatar: Forsaken Virtuesis a handful. After five years in development and early access, SotA was officially released on March 27th. It’s a ridiculously ambitious game that’s simultaneously overwhelming in some respects, underwhelming in others, visionary, and mired in the past. It breaks rules, frustrates expectations and, more than any game in recent memory, trusts its players to not only figure it all out, but make it all work.
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The developers built a rich game world and are letting players do what they wish with it. For example, SotA relies heavily on a player-driven economy. The game has a deep crafting system and the best items in the game are all player crafted. Players can own and operate entire towns in addition to plots of land for housing.
One of the potential problems with the game is that its economy and gameplay are heavily influenced by intrusive real-money transactions. Property costs and daily tax rates are exorbitant which drives people who want to own land and houses to grind unmercifully, join guilds dedicated to land ownership, or spend real money in the cash store. In addition, the servers weren’t wiped when the game officially released which means new players are entering a world where much, if not all, of the prime real estate is already taken.
None of the reviews I’ve seen so far have talked about the story in the game. Maybe that’s because it’s too early for them to have played through the story, but no mention at all seems like a bad sign for those looking for the single-player version of Ultima…
Sadly, SOTA lacks the streamlined system of combat found in Ultima Online. Instead, it wields a clunky and unfriendly abstracted combat more suited to a casual tablet/phone game than a serious PC roleplaying game that a player wants to pour time into. I found Shroud’s combat constantly pulling me out of character- something damning for a roleplaying game where one’s avatar is supposed to be the point of play.
Additionally, there is none of the sense of urgency and realism that ancient old Ultima Online brought to the computer. Monster’s can’t follow you back to town, because, they exist only in the abstracted “instancing” like so many lesser modern games use.
It’s a real shame that Garriott accomplished so much more, so long ago, with so much less to work with.