| Ultima Underworld II: Labyrinth of Worlds | |
|---|---|
| Developer(s) | Looking Glass Technologies |
| Publisher(s) | Origin Systems |
| Composer(s) | Dan Schmidt, Seamus Blackley |
| Platform(s) | DOS |
| Release date(s) | January 1993 |
| Genre(s) | First-person role-playing video game |
| Mode(s) | Single player |
| Media/distribution | Floppy disks, CD-ROM |
Ultima Underworld II: Labyrinth of Worlds is a 1993 first-person role-playing video game developed by Looking Glass Technologies and published by Origin Systems. It is the sequel to Ultima Underworld: The Stygian Abyss. Set in the Ultima fantasy universe, the game puts the player in control of the Avatar, the protagonist of the Ultima series. The player adventures through multiple dimensions in order to prevent the evil Guardian from achieving world domination.
Ultima Underworld II began development in April 1992, and was created in nine months. Looking Glass' goal was to improve upon the foundation laid by the game's predecessor. The game's size and number of interactive elements were increased, the graphics technology was enhanced, and tweaks were made to the role-playing systems. During development, the team experienced problems insufficient staffing and extensive playtesting; the latter caused the game to miss its planned Christmas 1992 release.
Ultima Underworld II received mostly positive reviews from critics, who praised its graphics, size, design and non-linearity. However, one reviewer found the game to be too long, and considered it dull. Following the game's completion, Looking Glass decided to alter its design approach, and began work on System Shock. A sequel to Ultima Underworld II was pitched multiple times, but Origin Systems rejected the idea; this later led Arkane Studios to create a spiritual successor called Arx Fatalis.
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Ultima Underworld II is a role-playing video game that takes place from a first-person perspective in a three-dimensional (3D) environment. As with its predecessor Ultima Underworld: The Stygian Abyss, the player's goal is to adventure through large in-door areas. A freely movable mouse cursor is used to interact with the game's world and heads-up display (HUD) interface. Icons on the HUD let the player examine objects closely, speak to non-player characters (NPCs) or ready the player character's weapon. The game's worlds are accessed from the hub world of Lord British's castle. Environments are added to the game's automap when explored.
The player begins the game by creating a character. Selectable traits include gender, character class and skills; the latter ranges from diplomacy and bartering to weapon proficiency and blacksmithing. By fighting, completing quests and exploring, the character accumulates experience points. When a certain number of experience points is earned, the character levels up and gains hit points and mana. Levelling up also allows the player character to receive training from NPCs, which increases proficiency in certain skills.
The game was designed to be "non-linear", in that players are required to "visit and revisit" areas as the character gains abilities and becomes more powerful.[1] The game's eight worlds may be visited at any time after they become accessible. In each world, the player must find a "blackrock" gem that grants access to the next world.
One year after the Black Gate incident, the Avatar is invited to a feast at Lord British's castle to celebrate a year of rebuilding in Britannia. In the early morning afterwards, a great dome of blackrock crystal forms over the castle; everyone within, including the Avatar, is trapped. The blackrock was created by Mayor Patterson, on behalf of the Guardian, who intends to invade Britannia, now cut off from its greatest defenders. Searching down through the sewers under the castle, a smaller crystal, a 'reverberation' created by the sheer power of the Guardian's spell, is discovered. The Avatar has to use this crystal to travel to other worlds under the Guardian's control in order to free the castle from the spell. These worlds include:
Looking Glass Technologies began development of Ultima Underworld II in April 1992.[2] The team's goal was to build upon the foundation laid by the game's predecessor, Ultima Underworld: The Stygian Abyss.[3] For example, they sought to include a better and more complex plot, as well as superior simulation elements and "play value".[3] According to project leader Doug Church, the team's "biggest advantage" was the presence of four dedicated designers; in contrast, each member of the original game's team had assumed multiple roles.[1][3] This allowed the Ultima Underworld II team to make "multiple editing passes on the layout of each level", with the goal of creating "interesting stuff" for players to see and do each time they explored an area. Designer and lead writer Austin Grossman played a large role in designing the game's tomb dimension, which was based on the Dungeons & Dragons module Tomb of Horrors.[4] The team tried to balance the different types of characters players could create, such as by making the game's skills more useful and lowering the strength requirement for carrying items.[3] More puzzles and interactive elements were added to the game than had appeared in its predecessor, and the overall size of the game world was increased to "3 or 4 times" that of Ultima Underworld, according to Church.[3] However, he later stated his belief that the team lost their focus and overreached in creating the game's world, and was not able to polish it as thoroughly as they had hoped.[5]
Like its predecessor, Ultima Underworld II was produced by Warren Spector, who was Looking Glass' main link to publisher Origin Systems.[6][3] Church later praised Spector's advice during the game's development, noting that he was able to help him refocus creatively during their weekly phone conversations and monthly meetings.[6] During development, the team was unable to create enough art for the game. According to Church, Spector "was able to co-opt several Origin artists" to help the team, which he believed was critical to the game being released on schedule.[3] Church later said that most of the game's artists were independent contractors, which resulted in him "calling nine different area codes every couple days to check up on things". He noted the difficulty of describing the game's enemy designs by phone.[2] The game's music was composed by Dan Schmidt and the recently hired Seamus Blackley. The two wrote the game's music in Blackley's apartment over the course of a week. They attempted to give each world a unique sound, while also hiding variations of the game's main theme in the themes of each world.[7] The music system from the original Ultima Underworld was retained with only minor alterations,[3] but the team included digitized sound effects, whereas the previous game's audio was synthesized.[7][3]
Ultima Underworld II was developed in nine months.[5] It was originally slated for a February 1993 release,[2][6] but the date was later moved up to December 1992.[6] The game underwent "two-and-a-half months" of playtesting by Origin and Looking Glass employees,[3] and by remote testing firms.[8] According to Church, the testing phase took more time than expected due to complaints from playtesters and the presence of numerous bugs.[3] Church went to Origin Systems' headquarters in Texas during the final stages of development. The team "tried desperately to make Christmas", and the game was completed around December 18, with Church creating the final build on his laptop in Spector's office.[2] However, according to Spector, the game could have shipped on time, but was held back for further playtesting.[8] Church stated that "there was one bug we couldn’t reproduce, and everyone really wanted to go home for Christmas. We ended up taking a few days off, checking it a few more days and using that version anyway."[2] The delay resulted in the game missing the holiday season.[8] It was shipped in January 1993.[6]
Ultima Underworld II was built with an improved version of the game engine used for its predecessor. The team sought to enhance the visuals; they increased the size of the first-person view by 30%, expanded the color palette, added more 3D objects and wrote a new texture system. According to Paul Neurath, the team "never got [the original game's texture mapper] to look quite as good as we had hoped", but the new system realized their initial vision. Church stated that the character sprites are higher resolution and "250% bigger (areawise)" than those of the original game. They also feature "1.5 times as many animation frames". Church summarized its code as "2.2 Mb of C, 2MB of Assembler, and about 800K of conversation code (an internal language which we wrote a compiler for, as well)", alongside 1 MB "support code". He noted that the code was roughly 30% larger than that of Ultima Underworld, which he said was a sign of "second project syndrome".[3]
According to Paul Neurath, Ultima Underworld II and its predecessor together sold half a million units.[5] Paul Presley of PC Review called the game "huge", and praised its atmosphere.[9] He also lauded the game's increase in variety and graphical detail over its predecessor. However, he hoped that the next game in the series would support adventuring parties, and wrote that, unlike its predecessor, the game does not feature "anything that takes it to a higher plateau to wait for the others to catch up". However, he summarized the game as "magnificent", and wrote, "If someone were to hand me £40 and say buy either Underworld I or II, I'd take the sequel any time."[9] David McCandless of PC Zone wrote, "Nothing can completely prepare you for the freedom the game gives you ... It's about as close to Virtual Reality as you are ever likely to get from your mouse driver." He praised the game's "atmosphere"-creating sound, and called its graphics "stunning"; he stated that, with a high-end computer, "dungeons can move like a film". However, he noted that the game's predecessor created a tighter and more involving atmosphere, and that Ultima Underworld II's length meant that "there's a lot of empty space between 'excitement points'." He awarded it a score of 94 out of 100, and summarized that "there really is nothing you can do with this game except sit there, dribble slightly, and say 'blimey' every eight to ten minutes."[10]
The Toronto Star's William Burrill wrote, "Ultima Underworld II is without rival the best fantasy [...] role-playing game in this (or any parallel) world." He praised its automap, and noted that "those who played ... Ultima Underworld will appreciate the improved graphics". However, he believed that the control system "takes a little practice to get used to", and stated, "This is not a game you can master quickly or play in a night. It has its frustrations and its flaws, despite its brilliance of design". He finished by stating that "those who are patient will be richly rewarded with a game like no other."[11] Computer Gaming World's Doug Sencat enjoyed the game's graphics, and praised the plot, conversations and 3D world for giving a sense of "being there". However, he noted that the game's movement was "a pain", and found that learning to navigate the environment was initially "frustrating". He was unfavorable toward the linearity of the game's plot and conversations, and toward the NPCs' inability to take actions independent of the player.[12] He described the game as "a long and grueling quest", and stated, "Many times, [it] seems more frustrating than enjoyable". Although he summarized it as "a relatively high-quality game", he finished, "By the time I finally saw daylight again, emerging from the Labyrinth, I must admit that it wasn't exultation I felt, but sheer relief."[12]
In a 2004 retrospective review, PC Gamer UK's John Walker stated that Ultima Underworld II "was new and exciting in half a dozen areas at once, not just one. Somehow, no game has quite achieved that since".[13] The magazine has included it in multiple lists of the 100 best PC games ever released, placing it variously at 54th in 2001,[14] 39th in 2007,[15] and 90th in 2010.[16] One writer for the magazine stated, "Like Ultima Underworld but again and better. No, that won't do. Ultima Underworld [II] needs to be hailed from the roof-tops for being one of the best dungeon-based adventure RPGs of all illustrious gaming history."[14] Another wrote, "Underworld didn't just give us the first 3D game world. It gave us the freedom of action we expect from modern first-person RPGs, too. ... No game since has raised the bar half as high."[15] In 2010, a writer for the magazine called it "so antiquated that it’s now very hard to play", but noted that "the sheer verisimilitude of UWII’s little world was like nothing we’d ever seen before, and still impresses."[16]
According to Church, Ultima Underworld II's the long testing phase was extremely stressful for the team.[6] Around the end of development, they decided that they "had done too many dungeon games", and they began considering a project with a similar design philosophy but without a fantasy setting.[17][6] Following brainstorming sessions that included Church, Spector, Grossman and Neurath, Looking Glass began development of System Shock.[6] Grossman later stated that his work on Ultima Underworld II's tomb dimension was to a certain extent a "mini-prototype" for ideas that he fleshed out in System Shock.[4] Looking Glass pitched a sequel to Ultima Underworld II to Origin Systems several times, but their idea was rejected.[5] Years later, Arkane Studios pitched Ultima Underworld III to Electronic Arts and received a similar response, which inspired the studio to instead create a spiritual successor: Arx Fatalis.[18]
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