Ultima 1: The First Age of Darkness

I love Good Old Games, it allows me to pay a small amount of money to play a butt ton of old games hassle free.  One of these old games that I played through quite recently was Ultima 1: The First Age of Darkness.

For those that don't know, Ultima is a really REALLY old series of RPGs that ran from 1981 until 1999 and is technically still going with Ultima Online although the popularity of that once gigantically popular MMORPG has died down quite a bit since its inception.

Anyway, Ultima 1 was where it all started on the Apple II, coded in basic by a dude called Richard Garriott who also likes to go by the name of "Lord British".  The game follows the adventures of a nameless player character who must travel across the lands of Sosaria and figure out a way to kill Mondain, some evil dude causing all sorts of trouble.

The game features a large over world with lots of randomly generated dungeons that contain all sorts of funny looking monsters made up of nothing more than straight lines.  As you go around you'll get quests from the various kings of the lands to locate a landmark or slay a monster or something and when you clear the quest you get stats or a gem.

What's funny about Ultima 1 is that despite it being a sword and sorcery game by the end of the game you are geared out with a blaster rifle and power armour like something out of Star Wars.  Also the last major quest of the game involves going into space in a shuttle bought from the town market and shooting down a bunch of tie fighters to become a space ace.

So yeah, Ultima 1 is a little different to your every day fantasy PC RPG, but it's those little strange things about it that make it so interesting.  It's not a long game so you can blast through it in an afternoon but I guarantee that the first time you fire it up you may have a bit of trouble figuring out what the fuck your supposed to do or where anything is.

Still, if you're looking to get a bit of your game history then Ultima 1 is one of the big grandaddies of RPGs that is worth experiencing at least once.  Also if you buy it off Good Old Games then you get Ultima 2 and 3 with it too!  Then if you find you really like this Ultima stuff, you can play U4 for absolutely free off the same website. 

So put down all that HD stuff for an afternoon and give Ultima 1 a go.  Despite its age it's a surprisingly fun game with a lot of charm that will keep you entertained just long enough for you to beat it.