Why this blog?

Why this blog?


The first time my brother and I played Ultima IV in the mid '80s, we had only the floppy disks. No manual, no map, no reference (pre-internet). We did have experience completing Ultima III (without a manual) so I had some sense of how the gameplay. We did not know anything about the Quest of the Avatar; heck, I did not even know what the word "avatar" meant. Everything was learned through trial and error, which meant that the game took much longer to complete. I don't remember how long but it was a blast to play and it probably ranks as one of my favorite Apple II games of all time!

At a family reunion last week, I was reminiscing about the good old days of classic computer games. I stopped playing computer games around 1990 with the exception of a month of Sid Meier's Civilization, another month of Tetris, and a week of Doom. I had lost interest in newer computer games and preferred to spend my leisure time away from the computer screen. The new games with their advanced graphics and iconography seemed bewildering after a while. It was unlikely I would ever return to them.

I had been thinking about starting a blog years ago but could never come up with a project I wanted to blog about. Until this past weekend when it hit me that I could replay Ultima IV! I didn't just want to get through the game as quickly as possible, I wanted to relive the nostalgia. Therefore I am going to attempt to slowly replay Ultima IV, pretending I don't know anything at the beginning except what I will read in the manual that should have come with the original game. (Thank you, internet!) I will take copious notes of all the townspeople I talk to and will only act on information once I have received it. In the meantime I hope to indulge in the nostalgia of rediscovery and reflect on the excitement going on this quest for the first time.

I will be playing the GOG version on my Mac and will try to include screenshots where relevant.  It is nice to actually have color, given that I played this on a monochrome screen. I wonder if that will make any impact on game-play.

And now, on to the action!