Ultima Underworld: The Stygian Abyss - intro & start - Blue Sky / Origin, 1992 - PC / DOS RPG CRPG
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More about Ultima Underworld: The Stygian Abyss (from Wikipedia):
Ultima Underworld: The Stygian Abyss is a first-person role-playing video game developed by Blue Sky Productions (later Looking Glass Studios) and published by Origin Systems. Released in March 1992, the game is set in the fantasy world of the Ultima series. It takes place inside the Great Stygian Abyss: a large cave system that contains the remnants of a failed utopian civilization. The player assumes the role of the Avatar—the Ultima series's protagonist—and attempts to find and rescue a baron's kidnapped daughter.
Ultima Underworld has been cited as the first role-playing game to feature first-person action in a 2.5D environment. Its design combines simulation elements with concepts from earlier role-playing video games, including Wizardry and Dungeon Master, which led the game's designers to call it a "dungeon simulation". As such, the game is non-linear and allows for emergent gameplay.
Ultima Underworld sold nearly 500,000 units, and was placed on numerous hall of fame lists. It influenced game developers such as Bethesda Softworks and Valve, and it was an inspiration behind the games Deus Ex and BioShock. The game had a sequel, Ultima Underworld II: Labyrinth of Worlds (1993), and a new game in the series, Underworld Ascendant, was released in late 2018.
Ultima Underworld is set in Britannia, the fantasy world of the Ultima series. Specifically, the game takes place inside a large, underground dungeon called the Great Stygian Abyss. The dungeon's entrance lies on the Isle of the Avatar, an island ruled by Baron Almric. The Abyss first appeared in Ultima IV: Quest of the Avatar, in which it contains the player's final goal, the Codex of Ultimate Wisdom.
Ultima Underworld is set after the events of Ultima VI: The False Prophet; in the time between the two games, a man named Cabirus attempted to create a utopian colony inside the Abyss. The eight settlements of the Ultima series each embody one of eight virtues, and Cabirus wished to create a ninth that embodied all virtues. To achieve this, he united diverse cultures and races in peaceful co-existence and planned to promote harmony by giving each group one of eight virtue-imbued magical artifacts. However, he died before distributing the artifacts, and left no instructions for doing so. As a result, the colony collapsed into anarchy and war, and the artifacts were lost. At the time of Ultima Underworld, the Abyss contains the remnants of Cabirus's colony, inhabited by fractious groups of humans, goblins, trolls and others.
Ultima Underworld was conceived in 1989 by Origin Systems employee Paul Neurath. He had just completed work on Space Rogue, a hybrid title that features sequences both of 2D tile-based role-playing and of 3D space flight simulation. According to Neurath, Space Rogue "took the first, tentative steps in exploring a blend of RPG and simulation elements, and this seemed to me a promising direction."
I had played lots of D&D. I also read a range of fantasy: Howard, Leiber, Vance, Zelazny, Le Guin, and of course, Tolkien. Tolkien's description of Moria struck me in particular, and it seemed like a fine setting for a game.
—Paul Neurath
Neurath had enjoyed role-playing video games like Wizardry, but found that their simple, abstract visuals were an obstacle to the suspension of disbelief. He believed that Dungeon Master's detailed first-person presentation was a "glimpse into the future", and he sought to create a fantasy role-playing game that built on its example.
Ultima Underworld was not an immediate commercial success; however, its popularity increased via word of mouth in the years following its release. Sales eventually reached nearly 500,000 copies, with praise for its 3D presentation and automapping feature. In 1993 the game won the Origins Award for Best Fantasy or Science Fiction Computer Game of 1992, and was nominated for an award at the Game Developers Conference.
ACE called Ultima Underworld "the next true evolutionary step in the RPG genre", and noted that its simulation-style dungeon was "frighteningly realistic". The magazine thought that the game's sprite character models "detract from the dense atmosphere a bit", but ended the review by stating, "If you've got a PC, then you've got to have Ultima Underworld." Dragon Magazine opined that "to say this is the best dungeon game we've ever played is quite an understatement," and it "will leave you wondering how other game entertainments can ever stack up against the new standards Abyss sets."
Ultima Underworld is considered the first example of an immersive sim, a genre that combines elements from other genres to create a game with strong player agency and emergent gameplay, and has influenced many games since its release.