Today is the 20th anniversary of the North American release of Ultima Underworld and I couldn’t let that pass without commemorating the occasion in some small way. In a never to be repeated fit of organisation, I’ve several Underworld posts ready to go which will be appearing throughout the day. I’ll be starting slowly with some reminiscing and finishing off with something a little special.

I’ve often described Ultima Underworld as my favourite game of all time. It was the first RPG I ever finished and the game that got me into Ultima all those years back. I expect that any gaming veteran will hold a soft spot for their first completed RPG which may be a large part of its lasting appeal. It was never the most accessible genre, and the game that could entice any unwary youth to spend enough hours to get to the end would need to be something special.

With the amazing 3D engine Underworld clearly had a huge advantage in drawing in the uninitiated but I had to turn most of the textures off to play the game on my PC and it still managed to absorb me completely. The aspect that appealed the most was the world simulation. In fact it was even nominated by the SPA for simulation of the year, eventually losing out to SimLife. You can’t read too much into these award ceremony results. In the same year Ultima 7 along with Star Trek 25th Anniversary and Fate Of Atlantis lost out for best game to Darkseed. I’ll say no more.

Despite losing out for that particular award, Underworld was at its heart a dungeon simulator first and foremost. Everything in the game followed the rules of that world and problems presented to the player often had numerous solutions because of it. I remember that I used to be quite fond of luring creatures to the edge of a cliff, then jumping at them to knock them into the water and drown them. In hindsight this wasn’t the best way to play the game, but it worked.

I’m sure that playing it these days, my appreciation is largely nostalgia but anyone who played this at the time will recall the sheer immersion and oppressive atmosphere which far surpassed anything before it. For me it typifies what Origin games are about, even if it was almost entirely created externally. It took an amazing game engine and added layers of depth, polish, gameplay and story to create something that blew every one of its competitors completely out of the water. A year later, major releases like Lands Of Lore still looked like relics by comparison. Suffice to say, it will always remain one of my all time favourite games although I’ve played it to death over the years.

It’s a game that should have spawned a genre and perhaps in the shape of Elder Scrolls it arguably did. Arena was very clearly influenced by Underworld although massively inferior in my eyes, if more ambitious in scope. While Elder Scrolls would build momentum over the years, this never happened with Underworld itself and the series was all too short-lived. There was a single sequel which was something of a rush job being completed in about 9 months to capitalise on the success of the first. This meant the engine was largely unchanged but at least the rush wasn’t evident in the gameplay and storytelling which improved on the original all round. A further sequel was planned but never made it into development. Origin allegedly saw Underworld as something of a fad and when Underworld 2 sold half as many as the original this confirmed it. Later attempts to revive the series never got too far out of the blocks.

About a decade later, we did get Arx Fatalis which could have been Underworld 3 had the license been acquired. This game is still a spiritual successor but despite that I’ve never got around to playing it myself. If there was ever a time to put that right it has to be now and I’ll be blogging my way through it in the near future.

Less well known is that a sequel to Arx Fatalis was developed but the publishers weren’t keen on the IP and that sequel ended up becoming Might And Magic – Dark Messiah. This is a game I have played although without that bit of knowledge at the time. It didn’t strike me as being Underworld 4 when I wasn’t looking for it but there are certainly similarities and it was even worked on by Looking Glass founder Paul Neurath.

This is another envelope’s worth of content from the Ultima Underworld design documents I acquired last month. I can’t profess to knowing much about the process back in the early 90’s, but it appears that design was still being largely done outside of computers by cutting out images and sticking them on top of each other.

This is a group of such bits and pieces used during the design of the paper map included with the game. My personal favourite is the transparencies of all the creatures. Also of particular interest is a fax of an early layout with a larger map of the overall abyss, and only a small section of Level 1 shown in the top right.

The big news today (at least for me), is that my copy of Caverns of Callisto has arrived safe and sound. I was asked last week if there was any fiction in the documentation. The answer is yes but not very much. The manual is a single folded sheet of card not giving much scope for any lengthy stories but it does set the scene. I’ll scan it all in at some point but I’ll hold off for now. If I just put all the best stuff straight on here, I’d never get anyone to read through weeks of me playing demos.

While I’m working on the site, here is another random document from the collection. This one is probably only of any interest to serious Underworld fans but that certainly includes myself. It’s a series of sample signatures for Corby and Sir Cabirus for the i page of the Ultima Underworld manual. None of these were actually used but it’s easy to pick out aspects that were combined together into the final graphics. Some of the Cabirus’ are either mispelt or the name hadn’t been decided on.

Ultima Underworld is arguably my favourite game of all time and was the game that really introduced me to RPG’s. On this basis, I had to give the demo a try out although it barely varies from the final game from what I saw.

I’m fortunate enough to own a packaged copy of the demo. It’s declared not to be for resale, so I’m assuming this was sent out to stores to put on demo PC’s. The cardboard part of the packaging has ready-made creases in it so that it can be folded up, stapled together and then stood up next the PC the game is being displayed on. The only problem with this is that all the instructions for playing the game are on the inside of the card so any potential customer would either need the controls explained to them, or have to bend the tent display open to look inside.

Had it been properly sealed I’d have been reluctant to open this, but it looked like a rodent had been nibbling away at one corner so I only had to increase the size of the hole slightly to get at the contents. As expected the demo is exactly the same as the one already available at http://www.uo.com/archive/uw1/demoftp.html.

There is no intro, just the title screen, after which it goes straight into a rolling demo with a couple of short tours of the first level of the game. This can be interrupted at any time allowing any potential customer to try it themselves.

The demo gives full access to Level 1, although you are stuck with a pre-created character. I had a run around the level to see if I could spot any changes. The HUD has been changed to display the game’s name at the bottom right which makes sense when you are trying to sell it to people. As for the game itself, saving is disabled and the silver sapling has been removed giving the player no second chances if they are killed off.

Other than that, it appeared to be the first level almost exactly as I remember it. I’m sure there were fewer lurkers and for a while I thought they were missing entirely until I eventually ran into one. About the only other change I spotted was the missing water in the “dangerous privy”.

I decided to jump down here to see what happened. After a long fall, there is a short message saying that level 2 isn’t in included and it’s back to the rolling demo again. I never made it to the NW part of the level and didn’t fancy restarting so that’s as far as I got. As demos go this is a substantial size effectively including 1/8 of the final game, but there wasn’t anything I saw to make in worth playing in addition.