Ultima VI

Ultima VI: The False Prophet , is a roleplay on computer published by Origin Systems in 1990. The play is the sixth of the series of roleplays Ultima created by Richard Garriott.

Presentation

Ultima VI closes the trilogy known as of the “Age of light”, begun with Ultima IV , and also marks the end of certain techniques. In the preceding plays, several graphic scales were employed: on the chart of the world, the cities, castles, undergrounds were indicated by symbols and were represented by more detailed under-charts when the player penetrated there. In Ultima VI , all the places are on the same scale. The undergrounds are also drawn for top, with the third nobody, and not in subjective sight according to the method popularized by Dungeon Master. The play uses a pseudo isometric sight more coloured largely than its predecessors. The characters managed by the computer have their own portrait, drawn when the player speaks to them.

Technically, Ultima VI was one of very first the video games to being thought in very first place for PC provided with a chart VGA 256 colors and with a mouse, in a time when the market of the video game turned rather around the Amiga. The play also used the sound charts for the music, which was then rather rare. The other sound effects on the other hand were always carried out via the internal loudspeaker.

Ultima VI is notable for the richness of its dialogs and the depth of its universe: the characters, the objects, the interactions between those, are more designed with for goal to immerse the player in a complete and credible world that only in optics to follow an established scenario; what few of other plays, out of the Ultima series, did.

The engine of play used by Ultima VI will be used, thereafter, by the two plays of the series Worlds off Ultima: Savage Worsens and Martian Dreams .

Scenario

The action of Ultima VI proceeds a few years after the return of Lord British on the throne following the events of Ultima V . At the beginning of Ultima VI , the player - incarnating the Misadventure traditionally - is convened on Britannia by the appearance of a Moon Door ( Moongate ), of red color, in his garden. Captured as of its arrival, it is glossy with being sacrificed on a furnace bridge by creatures to the red skin resembling demons, the waste-gas mains. The Warriors of the Destiny (the team joined together at the time of the preceding adventure) appear then, save the Misadventure and capture a text crowned in possession of the priest of the waste-gas mains. With the castle of Britannia, the Misadventure learns that the temples of the virtues were captured by the waste-gas mains and engages in a search aiming at releasing the world of the invaders.

The mission of the Misadventure has two goals then: first of all, to reconquer the eight temples held by the forces Waste-gas mains in spite of the attempts of the Britanniens soldiers them to dislodge, but also, to succeed in about it carrying out the translation of the Book of Prophecies flown to the priest. During its search, the Misadventure is brought to explore the underground world, reverse of Britannia and kingdom of the Waste-gas mains (contrary to the other episodes of the series, the world of Ultima VI is a ground punt, which seems provided with two faces). This one is threatened of destruction since the disappearance of the Codex of Ultimate Wisdom, brought back to Britannia by the Misadventure during the preceding episode. The reverse of Britannia appears with the Misadventure like the other side of the coin; placed vis-a-vis its reponsabilities with respect to its actions passed, that which is known, on a side, like a hero, is seen the different one like the False prophet who brought the destruction of a world (from where the title of the play). Constrained to repair its errors, it must undertake an initiatory search aiming at rendering comprehensible to him the fundamental values of the Gargouille company.

The scenario of this episode takes into account various problems, like the cultural differences, racism and xenophobia.

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