Oh, sorry, I actually wasn’t referring to any commentary made in the article, just expressing my own opinion on the game. The word I want to use it is “flawed” but that kinda undersells how clunky and crappy a lot of it is. I liked it despite all that, though.
I think it’s more like making sure the game survives when the company gets liquidated. Portalarium sounds like it’s done.
That wouldn’t work - it would be a Fraudulent Conveyance (transferring assets when insolvent, which is broadly defined) that would be reversed.
They never struck me as all that bright, on the business side. Anyway the story will come out sooner or later.
My guess would be that Portalarium is kaput but Spears still wanted to continue working on the game, so they sold it to him for pennies (that’s about all it’s worth, I’d imagine).
They have a core population purchasing houses and other cosmetics, so it must be worth something, but clearly not a whole heck of a lot.
This is my take - Chris Spears wanted to keep going and probably gets enough income to keep working on it as a one man show plus some contractors, while Lord British and Starr Long were ready to get out. Whether they wasn’t enough likelihood of enough profit for those two, they were just tired of it, or want to move to a new entity to limit future legal issues (doubtful if any would happen, but who knows), only time will tell.
The announcement says Richard will still be involved, but Spears has contorted himself a bit in his forum posts and twitch streams to “not say anything that my attorneys haven’t cleared”, but has said Richard and Starr are not employees of the new company. So like, maybe they show up in game for events once in a while, but Richard seems to be officially out from an ownership and employment perspective.
Oh, and the day after this announcement, the company announced that a key missing kickstarter reward, a signed copy of a SotA book written by Tracy Hickman and Richard, will not be fulfilled. Backers will get a lame in game item instead. Portalarium had been dodging commenting on the status of the book for well over a year; awfully convenient to be able to come to a resolution only a day after SotA was sold; no legal CYA at all here folks, nope :)
That’s just wrong.
That’s just unfair! Maybe the book was so atrociously bad they did it as one last mercy to their fanbase? :)
In all honesty, I don’t recall any lore from Shroud of the Avatar. Humans hate elves or something, maybe? That’s about it. I have no idea how you’d make a book out of it.
Ha! The book was released by Tor as “The Sword of Midras”, so it actually exists. The culling of the KS reward announcement says Portalarium “couldn’t reach an agreement with the publisher”. In other words, Tor probably was going to make them pay full price for each copy of the book (around 4,000 people are owed them). Add that in to logistics to get them all signed by Tracy and Garriott, plus shipping (that mentioned up thread, Port is really bad at), and likely it is a case of “this will cost us $50,000-$100,000, so just back out of it. The people still playing won’t care if so long as they get an in game shiny, and really, who cares about keeping our word to all of the other backers who left us? Oh, and transfer the assets of the company to a new entity before disclosing this…”
This reward, you had to be above the $200 pledge level to get, btw.
File my experience on this one as “never dive into something coming from a childhood hero” - should have kept those fond Ultima memories pure, as Richard Garriott’s activity (or lack of it) in this one are pretty awful.
Hah, I didn’t realize the book existed. Jokes aside, that really is pretty shitty. Probably didn’t have a choice at this point, but still.
Hot off the press! The CRPG Addict has finished Ultima VII – and he rates it lower than any Ultima since III!
To be fair, he addresses this unexpected result at length in his writeup.
That gives us a final score of . . . ooh. Okay, let’s just think about this for a second. I just spent four months playing this game, cranking out more entries than almost any prior game, acting like I was having an awful lot of fun while doing so. Am I really going to suggest, with a straight face, that it not only fails to beat Ultima V and Ultima VI , but that it doesn’t even beat Ultima III ? That it’s on the same level of quality as Treasures of the Savage Frontier ? The truth is, I overrated some of the games, in some categories, during the first two years, and I should probably make some adjustments. But that only partly helps us here.
Before I reveal the score, let me ask this: Ultima VII is a great game , sure, but is it a great RPG? Does it have what you typically look for in RPG mechanics? Or do you agree (again) with the words of Jimmy Maher:
If you see a CRPG as a game in the most traditional sense of the word–as an intricate system of rules to learn and to manipulate to your advantage–you’ll hate, hate, hate Ultima VII for its careless mechanics. One might say that it’s at its worst when it actively tries to be a CRPG, at its best when it’s content to be a sort of Britannian walking simulator.
Again, I think Maher says it perfectly. Almost everything I enjoyed about the game was separate from its RPG mechanics–the same things I enjoy about, say, Red Dead Redemption . Ultima VII is the earliest game I can think of where you’ll be walking through a forest, stumble upon a ruined building, and feel an inscrutable exhortation to figure out what’s it’s about . Or you’re flying your magic carpet and happen to see a guy standing alone on an island. You can’t rest until you know what his story is. That’s where the game’s strengths lie, not in the numbers and dice.
(I have still, to my embarrassment, not properly played U7. I intend to get to it after I do the two Worlds of Ultima games, since my current headspace is still with the U6 engine.)
I skimmed the summary and I think I agree with everything. It was a terrific game but terrible RPG. I barely used any spells and combat was pretty much an auto (and chaotic) affair. IMHO Ultima VI and Savage Empire were the best Ultimas.
Thanks for reminding me of this site, should sit down with a coffee one of these days and indulge in the nostalgia.
It’s a fantastic blog.
We must be twins. I just reinstalled Savage Empire.
Savage Empire is actually my ‘current’ RPG except that I got detoured into Gold Box land for a spell, and have to come back to it. I’ve always assumed it was something of a curiosity, so I’m glad to see some people loved it.
Ha, I was contemplating reinstalling VI and Savage Empire after I posted.
But I see Remnants just finished downloading from Epic, so maybe after that :)
Also I got an Exult installation of VII going a good many years back, but never did play through with it. I wonder if it improves the mechanics much.
He’s absolutely correct, its RPG mechanics can largely be ignored and combat resolves itself. Still remains my favorite game of all time.
How in the world are we talking about the best Ultima games here, including Savage Empire, and not talking about Martian Dreams???
Well, in my case it’s because I haven’t played it yet! But it’s on the short list. Is your avatar from that game?