Ultima 7 memories

[agentorangeguy]

What are your funny/interesting memories about this game? I have plenty...

Lets see... I remember after beating the game for the first time, I went back and executed most of the fellowship members that the Cube implicated in the murders and such. I raided all the fellowship halls, killed their leaders, and dumped random garbage around. Sadly, they kept coming into the meetings, even after I barricaded the doors with random objects. I settled for using caltrops outside of the doors.

Of course we all ran into the problem of unruly party members, namely Iolo, while we were purloining things from fellowship halls ,or somtimes objects outside of the town. Iolo left me for eating a random piece of meat somewhere near Yew. I insisted he stop his whining and come back into the fold, but he resisted. This angered me, so I took my heavily armed party to his house, to "persuade" him to come back. No one gets out of my party alive unless I say so. He resisted yet again, so one day he woke up to find Smith the horse butchered in his stall. I think after that he felt I had learned my lesson and rejoined. Hmm.

I got pretty far in one of my games and during a expedition into the Deep Forest, I lost Tseramed. I have no idea where I left him, but I searched that place over but never found him. Spark was always easily lost too. Oh well.. he complained too much anyway.

There was a time i was intent on assassinating Batlin by any means necessary. I tried the glass sword, death scythe, bombing the hall with powder kegs, cannonballs, and finally I learned he could be killed with a death bolt spell, but I think your intelligence had to be a certain level and it had to be after midnight or something strange like that..

[alagner]

>>finally I learned he could be killed with a death bolt spell, but I think your intelligence had to be a certain level and it had to be after midnight or something strange like that..

During Fellowship meeting as I remember.

Well, I remember meeting bandits from Selwyn's hideout at the top LB's castle once. That was hilarious.

And not so long ago I decided to complete the game totally, i.e. penetrating every possible cave and dungeon and finding all the magical treasure that's there... and let's say that there was a real lot of it.

[Scythifuge]

I remember an incident that took place in Jhelom. I had just arrived to recruit Dupre for my anti-Gaurdian death squad. I had a habit of leaving everyone's tactic set to berserk.

While snooping in everyone's barrels and such, without thinking about it, I grabbed an apple from Vokes' barrel, and all hell broke loose. All of Jhelom became hostile, and my party members scattered in all directions, slaughtering everyone in their wake. No one in Jhelom was left alive. There was blood everywhere...

I just stared at the screen for a moment thinking "What just happened!?!?!? Oh yeah...I stole an apple. Time to load a save..."

[TDI]

One of the cool things about U7 is that it's almost as much a "toy" as it is a game. Playing U7 to me was almost like playing computerized Playmobil.

And I used to take playing U7 -very- seriously. My party had to eat and sleep at Inns and I would go as far as sitting the party at a table and putting the food and drink I bought on it before feeding it to the party. (Sometimes I had to hurry it up because other guests or the stewards would eat the food or take it away - bastards).

I used to play my own games alot, unrelated to the storyline, like being a hunter in the forest, a normal citizen in Britain (baking LOTS of bread), a dungeon explorer or a "Viking" raiding party, raiding towns, killing people and bringing all the loot on the ship and back to the hideout. The Viking thing only worked a few times per city though, until everyone was dead.

Once I discovered the cheat-system and hackmover, I went crazy creating my own homes and fortresses, only to freak out at everything disappearing once I moved a little further away.

Man, If I had had Exult and the Studio back then, I would have been in Ultima-heaven.

[agentorangeguy]

Scythifuge, something similar happened to me in Yew once. I had my inventory screen up while I was "tasting" the grapes in the barrells ofthe Abbey. Nothing much happened until I closed the inventory and there were like 50 guards coming at me all at once, Iolo and Dupre left and were trying to kill me as well.. fun times.

Oh, discovering the cheat menu was super awesome. One of my favorite things to do (and if this works in Exult, TRY IT! ITS FUN!) was to turn egg mode on and the hackmover, go into Despise and grab all of the projectile eggs from that Obelisk near Wayne. this makes them shoot rapid fire out of every orifice of the Avatar's body, killing everyone in sight. For added fun, hop on the magic carpet, and air raid Britain! I would make air raids on Britain via the magic carpet, going over the fellowship hall during the sermon and hitting up the tavern in its peak hours, while doors were blowing away, glass would shatter, you could see the pandemonium as people screamed for the guards. Of course the Guardian kept chastising me for ethnically cleansing the Britannian population. After I carpet-bombed most of Britain and lord british's castle, I would drop the eggs somewhere and survey the damage. Usually there would be maybe one or two survivors from the nightly tavern crowd, but it was funny to see bodies piled up or in odd places.

Another fun thing to do was to go into Lord British's castle, grab a dirty diaper, toss it in his face and watch him go apes***t with the lightning bolts. If you kept running, he would incinerate everything in sight. I remember one time I did this, there must have been a glitch or something because the guards were attacking HIM and not me. This angered the blue castle guards who then fought the regular guards. I don't know if this was the same incident or not, but I remember being passed out in the nursery, and one of the babies came over to me and slowly killed me after several hits.

Before I discovered the cheat mode, I started a war between the pirates on that island near moonglow and the britannian guard. I did this by parking the carpet in the castle courtyard, hijacking LB and taking him to the island. After doign some fancy footwork, I managed to make a pirate nail him with a dagger, and hilarity ensued. He called the guards who attacke dthe pirates, then attacked me, so I used an invis. ring and walked back and forth, watching more pirates and guards spawn in and endless battle. 4 or 5 pirates could usually take a guard.

And then there was fun with powder kegs, but that is for another post haha.

[Scythifuge]

With the abcd cheat, I would play as an evil avatar, rather a character that was a native Britannian scoundrel who would scavenge and steal to survive, culminating with the conquering of Lord British via the shade blade and collecting with hack mover all of the cool unique objects (such as the Black Gate itself), and setting them up in the castle. I would collect all of those potted green plants, pretend that they were illegal under LB's regime, and store the on the roof, as well as try to collect as much serpent venom possible. My squad all had muskets, and made extensive use of powder kegs.

This post reminds me of the skooma mods for Morrowind, and I'm wondering if something like that would be possible in E.S. I have many firearms drawn for other mods...

[agentorangeguy]

HAHa playing the evil avatar was fun. I executed lord british once, then re-arranged his castle to be this bizzare pleasure palace of excess. i had a room of "smashables" such as glass counter tops and mirrors that I would smash to hear that awesome broken glass sound on the old sound cards. I lined the moat with the bodies of those who suffered my wrath, and had a vault of purloined jewelry, gold coins, magic stuff and gold bars. I even made a nudie bar where myself and companions could enjoy a meal while naked chicks danced Iolo's sadness away.

[Crowley]

The only thing that comes to my mind is a habit I developed long ago and still practice. I like to collect all the gold bars and non-spawned gemstones and store them in one place (ship's hold in BG, Serpent Path in SI). I call it the Avatar Retirement Fund.

[monotremata]

Hey thats a good idea.. My bags are starting to get too full of those damn gold nuggets!!

I just played em straight through. My memories of it are just the shocking change in graphics and gameplay after years of playing 1-6.. When someone on Prodigy at the old dragons club told me how to get into the cheat mode now that was fun..

Oh and that stupid Voodoo memory manager.. Only games I had to make special boot disks just to play back in the day.

[Gruck]

I had just borrowed Ultima VII from a friend because there was something about the box that intrigued me. I remember how impossibly proud I was the first time I escaped Trinsic. I thought Ultima VII was just some short adventure game where i had to solve a murder. I finally escaped out of Trinsic, and then I realized there was actually a huge world for me to explore. I loved playing Ultim VII so much that the next time I visited my friend, I took his copies of ultima III - Ultima VI home with me too. They're still sitting there at home, my original copies of Ultima III to VII in boxes.

[monotremata]

Oh hey you can feel free to send me those copies of III and IV if you want hehehe..

I just scored a mint V and VI for $20 each on ebay last week!!!
Forget my old Ultima Collection CD I got my cloth maps back!!!

[Rocketman]

I used hackmover to drag a lead boulder and the mining machine from the Vesper mines to Britain. I set them up in front of the Royal Mint and started producing lead chunks. Then I used create gold spell on the chunks and turned them into (surprise, surprise) gold nuggets. When I had enough I walked in to the Mint to cash in the gold.

Sadly Britannia didn't offer too many ways to spend your hard earned money. I usually bought every ship and every horse and carriage available. The rest of the money I spent on Buccaneer's Den at the House of Games or at the Baths.

[Gruck]

"Oh hey you can feel free to send me those copies of III and IV if you want hehehe.."

Over the years I've extended my collection well beyond that. Ultima VII inspired me so much, that I eventually tracked down all the games, so I could play them all the way they were meant to be played. You should see some of the weird goodies I picked up while I was living in Japan for 2 years. A weekend scouring akihabara for goodies can yield some of the weirdest experiences of a man's life. In more ways than one.

[alagner]

>>I just scored a mint V and VI for $20 each on ebay last week!!!
Forget my old Ultima Collection CD I got my cloth maps back!!!

Man, I wish shipping was cheaper

[monotremata]

One of em wasnt from you was it??

The guy I won V from had this MASSIVE collection of old games of all sorts.
He had everything from III all the way up to Pagan (I cant remember looking for Ascension) and they were all mint, down to the maps and trinkets minus a little box wear.. All the hint books, FoV, SS, etc..

Got outbid on IV cause I wasnt quick enough at the last second, it went for $46. I couldnt believe both of the 7's went for over $50. I think his Forge of Virtue alone went for over $50. Got outbid on VI at $43 so I scored a Buy It Now for $20 that, get this, comes with a first edition of The Official Book of Ultima. No map or moonstone but getting that book with it all for $20 was like a dream come true.. The guy that was selling the collection had all the hint books and The Official Book went for like $60 something I think. Found a perfect map I got for $15 anyways a couple days ago.


Funny the guy I bought the map from goes by the username Nystul hehe.

I think I just missed a couple bids for III and IV that ended this morning now that I think about it... EEEK!

[agentorangeguy]

-"Sadly Britannia didn't offer too many ways to spend your hard earned money. I usually bought every ship and every horse and carriage available. The rest of the money I spent on Buccaneer's Den at the House of Games or at the Baths."-

Yeah, it would have been nice to have more stuff to blow money on. I tried to buy the ship that Owen was *supposed* to build, thinking i'd actually see it. After the thousand gold wasted when he never built it, I had to go back and kill him over and over again for retribution.

-"The only thing that comes to my mind is a habit I developed long ago and still practice. I like to collect all the gold bars and non-spawned gemstones and store them in one place (ship's hold in BG, Serpent Path in SI). I call it the Avatar Retirement Fund."-

In BG I turned that abandoned castle in Yew into my Avatar fortress, and running that damn wisp out. I kept it stocked with all the potions, magical weapons and armor, arrows and bolts and various things I collected alogn the way, along with quest items I didn't need at the time. sometimes I'd have a safehouse in each town, usually from the homes of people I had to kill such as Owen from Minoc, or abandoned houses.

In SI, when I first played the game I set up a headquarters in the inn where you had to kill Simon. I had to find a new headquarters when I realized Monitor had been sacked by the Goblins, which was an interesting turn of events. The Serpent Path was usually a good spot to store loot.

[Andrea B Previtera]

There are so many memories about U7 and many things I did that I find mirrored in things other people did too, here.

But THE memory about U7 still is firing it up for the very first time. The gaming amazement is still to be beaten for me, and given I was 15 back then, it's probably going to stay unbeaten.

U7.exe ... a couple minutes of my 386 hissing and cranking (what wonderful "material" sounds it made, compared to the constant VGA/CPU FOOOOOOOSH of today's machines)... and I was presented with this FULL SCREEN brightly coloured world, reacting at my mouse click.

It was a sequence of moments of disbelief: I can really do this? Oh god, I can! Can I really use this item? Oh yes! Is that NPC really eating? I'll be damned...

[TDI]

>"But THE memory about U7 still is firing it up for the very first time"

Yeah, you're absolutely right. I wish I could get a brainwipe to experience Ultima 7 again like that magical first time.

Wow, that sounds like I'm talking about something else.

[monotremata]

Oh man I remember Serpent Isle was like the limit of what my 386 SX/25 IBM could handle.. All the Ultimas were pretty much the benchmark of my gaming history.

I made my parents get my first Apple II because a kid brought in the Ultima II box to summer school one day.. Just reading the manual, I remember grabbing all his maps and notes in the box and making copies cause I knew one day I would get this game. Too bad I never found one in a store to buy until Ultima V came out! After that Ultima was what all the other games were compared to. I played Bards Tale, Wizardrys, Kings Quest, etc.. Even the other Origin stuff (anyone remember the annoying Autoduel?)..
But the Ultimas were the games I took notes on, stayed up til midnight trying to hide from my parents to find some damn mantra I needed..

They were a great time in gaming history.. Long before the advent of the NES and Sega SMS.. Sure we had Atari, but those games were crap compared to any Ultima game..