Ultima IV: First steps

 

A few technical notes on emulating Ultima IV before I start -

As with all of Garriott's games up to this point, Ultima IV's lead platform was the Apple II. I am playing a copy from the Woz-a-day collection, of which I have some confidence that their images are accurately dumped and unmodified, as opposed to the cracked DSK images which are often unreliable pirate copies.

With this copy, I found AppleWin should be configured to emulate an Apple ][+, not an //e, or else it may not boot correctly.

Ultima IV is one of only a few Apple games that supports dual Mockingboards for true stereo music, but this must be configured ingame as well as in the emulator. The ingame configuration can be accessed from the main menu; to align with AppleWin's expectations, you'll need to set both devices to Mockingboard A/C, with the first in Slot #4 and the second in Slot #5.

We also have the option to use dual floppy disk drives, which eases the pain of disk swapping a bit. The game came with two disks originally, but had to be manually flipped to access the reverse sides.

• Disk 1
• Side A - Boot
• Side B - Town & castle data
• Disk 2
• Side C - Overworld data & saves
• Side D - Dungeons & underworld data
  

Because Apple II emulators lack a "disk flip" function, this setup is emulated as four single-sided floppy disks, and you'll still need to swap A/B in drive 1, and C/D in drive 2. But since side C+D are physically on the same disk, the game did not expect it to be possible to have both sides inserted at the same time, and saving your game while in a dungeon is not possible.

 

I started a new game.

 

Rather than opening with a character creation sheet, Ultima IV opens with an illustrated prologue - and unlike Wizardry III, it doesn't merely recap the events of the manual, but follows them. Lord British has sent out a call to adventure through time and space, and you, an ordinary person from 20th century earth, have answered the phone. While going for a walk in the woods to distract yourself from the stresses of modern life, a moongate briefly appears within a mysterious circle of stones, and splurts out a gift - a silver ankh amulet, cloth map, and books. The same ankh, map, and books found in the game's packaging.

A subtle reminder to RTFM.

A renaissance fair beyond the hills, somehow unnoticed until now, catches your attention, and a strange compulsion draws you to a fortune teller's wagon, where Ultima's famous character creation sequence is seen for the first time.

I mentioned that Ultima IV doesn't really make you engage that much with its virtue system throughout standard gameplay, but here, as commenter Josh Lawrence notes, we're actually presented with a series of ethical dilemmas that have no right or wrong answers, and even though the questions are hypothetical, your choices will have tangible consequences - namely, your class and starting stats. It's just too bad that the themes presented here don't really hold up once the game starts in earnest. We'll see this system return in later Ultimas; disappointingly, the questions do not change.

In the spirit of roleplaying, I really should answer the questions as I would, but I did that the first time I played and already know what's going on here. I want to play as a Mage this time, and to do that, you must choose Honesty above all others.

I have to break character for this one.

The final card is cast.

And with that, I'm magically whisked away to another world.

Well, no better place to start searching for answers than the nearby town, which turns out to be Moonglow.

The mage "Calabrini"greets all newcomers to Moonglow

The town greeter advised me of Moonglow's noted inn and healer, and that I would perhaps be interested in visiting a shrine on an island to the north.

I mapped out the town using some new techniques - forgive the visual artifacts, as I'm still working out the system.

In a zig-zag pattern, top left to bottom-right:

• Mariah stands over a chest. Taking it wouldn't be very virtuous, would it? She yearns for adventure, but can't join me - one mage is the limit.
• Dekker the Jester doesn't know any jokes.
• Cromwell the paladin hangs out at the inn's lobby, preaching the virtues of honesty, and from him I learn that the mantra of honesty is AHM.
• Rogues try to rob me at the inn. I teach them a lesson in honesty as I crack my staff over their heads, and then a lesson in compassion as I let them run.
  
  
  
• South of the inn, the mage Tyrone searches for a blue stone in the dungeon of Deceit.
  
• The alchemist on the same street advises me that sleep spells require only one part of spider silk - contrary to the spellbook which states we need two.
• A kid enjoys a peanut butter and jelly sandwich at the deli, and offers me a bite.
• North of the apothecary, a strange old man rambles about the sun and moons and the end of time.
• The apothecary's goods are a bit expensive for me right now. The shopkeep is blind and can be short-changed, but you really don't want to do that.
• Outside the healer's, a man claims to be Shakespeare, and writes "tales of honesty" for a living.
• Also outside the healer's, a fortune teller reads my palm and prophecies that I will seek the Codex in the Abyss.
• Inside the healer's, a wounded wizard tells me to seek Nigel at the Lycaeum.
  

A few leads here, but I need my bearings. I map out my surrounding area and determine that I am on Verity Isle, far to the east. In the course of exploring, though, I discover the Lycaeum, and take a detour inside.

The guards aren't much for conversation.

 

And I mapped out as much as I could.

 

A lot of people to talk to here!

• A nameless pilgrim by the entrance seeks "truth" and advises, "MEDITATE AT EACH SHRINE FOR 1, 2, AND 3 MINUTES, THEN SHALT THOU KNOW THE PATHS OF GOODNESS!" Quite a few of the NPCs within follow the same script.
  
• A guard, Catriona, mentions treasures that are her duty to guard.
• Father Antos, up north outside the observatory, claims to hold great knowledge, but demands I be more specific when I ask him about it, and pleads ignorance on all topics I can think to inquire on.
• The observatory's telescope isn't for peering at stars, but for peering at maps! 16 settings on the knob give different maps, and one corresponds to the Lycaeum itself.
  
  
  
  
• The throne room guards are both named Jon. And they both follow the same script. They explain that the eight virtues are derived from three principals, and correspond to the eight cities.
• Scatu the advisor recommends I visit the seer often.
• Baron Rob and Lady Beth are chatty but dispense little useful information.
• Wounded fighters at the healer tell me that the dungeons' altar rooms connect to each other.
  

I think that what I want to do next is to seek out Lord British, and the cloth map tells me that his castle is on the north bank of Britannia Bay. The easiest way off this island is by moongate - Britannia has two moons, whose phase are always visible onscreen, and which determine where the moongates come and go. The left moon's phase determines when and where the moongate appears, the right moon's phase determines where it takes you. And one possible destination is right next to British's castle!

I approach the peninsula marked with a new moon on the map, and as both lunar discs fade, the moongate opens.

 

The moment the secondary moon shifts phases, I step inside.

A little to the west...

My map so far: