Worlds of Ultima™: The Savage Empire

One of the defining games of my childhood, and it took me YEARS to learn all of the game controls and features. Logic puzzles, sweet gear and text based NPC interaction makes this a game that all children should be challenged with.

I know this is a pretty old game with very dated graphics, but when I was in college this was one of my favorite games. I still have my original box game on 5 1/4" floppies, but I do not have a working 5 1/4" floppy drive. I am so excited GOG has this game now and being FREE this is like Christmas in June.

Savage Empire is rushed. You will feel this budget/time crunch problem from the moment the frozen-in-motion Raptor in the intro pointlessly blinks at you. The game world is very empty and unfinished. You will explore a lot of completely empty caves with no enemies or loot. Most loot/equipment you will find for free in towns. The graphics are uneven, some portraits look awesome, some environments are a sloppy mess. You can never visually tell what plants you can walk across and which plants count as walls until after you bump them. Combat is few and far between, you will fight mostly one monster at a time: 1 cougar, or 1 tiger, or 1 dinosaur, or 1 snake. And the ONLY monster in the game that drops loot are parrots (...????). Only Emeralds out of the MANY currency types in the game have implemented in-game purpose. Diamonds, Rubies, Gold, and Crystals (Kotl) are pointless to carry and heavy. Also there is only ONE shop in the entire game to spend your Emeralds. Intelligence has no in game purpose so don't waist any level ups on raising it. Ultima games have every person in the world as an individual characters with names and stories (except city guards) Savage Empire only has a Chief or Shaman in town, then a bunch of generic Female/Males who only indicate that you need to talk to the Chief/Shaman. (in the first couple of towns every generic Female/Male has individual names... then the later half of the game the designers stopped naming people) The most fun I had in the game was the Spider Cave, its the only part of the game where it feels like someone actually bothered to finish the section with monsters, a puzzle, and loot. Everything else in this game is so shallow and empty. Savage Empire is only OK at best by generic RPG standards. Go play a REAL Ultima (or Martian Dreams)

Great fun, and a refreshing departure from the high fantasy setting of previous Ultima games. The setting is clearly inspired by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's "The Lost World", and it has all the fun tropes you'd expect: dinosaurs, savage primitive tribes, lizard men, erupting volcanoes, an advanced lost civilization, and of course a jungle princess to rescue. My favorite aspect of this game is that with a bit of help from Professor Rafkin, you can jury rig firearms to give you a leg up on the natives and wildlife. But to do so, you'll have to do what they did in the old days and actually find the chemical components of gunpowder in their natural state. Good luck! And don't forget to talk to the Wisp...