Ultima: Warriors of Destiny

"Worse than the NES version of Exodus. No, seriously."

When I first heard that they were finally porting Ultima V over to the Nintendo, I was overjoyed, having played it on the Commodore 64 as a child. They managed to bring the story and dialogue over without a hitch, but somewhere along the way they forgot to include the actual GAME.

Graphics (1/10): Worse than ANY ultima game on the old Commodore 64, and a thousand times worse than the other NES Ultima's. They're slightly detailed and colorful, but are also hideously dark, gritty, grainy and depressing. If you actually dare to play this game, you'll suffer from serious eyestrain in 5 minutes, permanent brain damage in an hour and incurable blindness after 6 hours. After about 5 minutes of daylight the game enters its hideous night cycle, in which the screen becomes so small and dark that you have no choice but to stop and rest until morning. The addition of tiny, but adequate facial portraits for conversing with townsfolk was a nice touch, though. Just don't expect to be able to do any of those nice things you took for granted in most RPGs, like recognize and identify everyday objects or find out where anything is. If you're lucky, you'll be able to recognize the difference between grasslands, roads, and poisonous swamps.

Sound (0/10): Mute your television before you even turn this game on, unless you'd like to hear the cute little 8-bit rendition of Rue Britannia first. Don't even think of listening to the OTHER two tunes this game has to offer. The first, played at the character generation screen, may cause internal bleeding. The second, a 10-second loop of medieval-fanfare-from-hell plays ENDLESSLY THROUGH THE ENTIRE GAME. Someone needs to tell Amnesty International about this game. If you're thinking of giving this game a try just to listen to the hideous music and laugh, I implore you, DON'T. Too many good men have lost their sanity to this game already. As for sound effects, there are none. Period.

Gameplay (1/10): I don't even know where to start. Pressing the control pad 8 to 653 times in any particular direction will cause your character to move one step in that direction. All other buttons have similarly awful response. Press A to access one of your two ''quick items'' (a shield, a sword, etc.) and press B to pull a switch or chat with someone. Chatting is the only good point of the entire game, following a sane and reasonable dialogue tree system. You can actually learn useful things from the townsfolk (mantras necessary to get into shrines which you must visit to advance, etc.) Unfortunately, the conversations are a short relief from the hellish gameplay. You'll spend most of your time staggering slowly across the overhead map, bumping into tiny objects such as trees and shrubs which may or may not obstruct your path, depending on how lucky you are. The game politely informs you when monsters are nearby and from which direction they come, but this information is often COMPLETELY WRONG and will send you chasing after enemies in the wrong direction, or lead you into a completely impossible fight which you are trying to avoid. When it comes down to a fight, you are hopelessly doomed. Your comrades stand around idly while you frantically press the A button in the hopes of bringing your weapon to bear. Meanwhile, the enemy repeatedly attacks you until the ''fight'' is interrupted by the gleaming face of Lord British, who informs you that you have died and been revived. At this point, if you have any sense left in you, you turn the game off.

Story (8/10): At least they left the story intact. Lord British has gone underground to fight evil demons, leaving his trusted servant Blackthorn to rule in his stead. Unfortunately, Lord British has disappeared with little hope of ever returning, and Blackthorn has been corrupted by the evil shadowlords (powerful spirits born from the shards of the gem of immortality, which you shattered in Ultima I.) As the Avatar who saved Brittannia many times before, your job is to find Lord British, destroy the Shadowlords and topple Blackthorn's reign of terror. Classic story, to which this awful game fails to do justice.

Challenge (10/10): Well, if you're looking for a challenge, look no further. If you finish the game, let me know so I can commit you to a mental institution.

Overall (1/10): Absolutely no value whatsoever as a game. Don't even try it. Don't take it if someone pays you to. Don't waste valuable bandwidth by downloading the ROM. Feel free to thank me for sacrificing the time and brain cells it took to ''play'' this monstrosity, so you could merely read the review and save yourself a massive headache.

Reviewer's Score: 1/10, Originally Posted: 08/29/01, Updated 08/29/01