It cannot be overstated the domino effect that the Ultima series had on the world of Videogame RPGs, and while a game like Akalabeth today is a very primitive and antiquated experience it's incredible to see what they managed to achieve with the limitations of 1979 technology. In Akalabeth you create a character, buy your equipment and then get thrown into the world were the King Lord British gives you a series of monster killing quests in order to become a Knight, as the player your role is to explore the dungeon finding the enemies and then return to the castle to claim your reward. After beating the final monster the game just keeps going infinitely and becomes a challenge to see how deep into the dungeon you can descend. Your stats are randomly generated at the start and you only get a boost in those once you clear a quest, with the exception of HP that raise by entering and exiting the dungeon after killing some monsters. The world is generated depeing on a "lucky number" you type at the beginning of the adventure, after that the core of the game is exploration while managing your HP and food consumption while also making a map of the dungeon floors. Food gets consumed everytime you take a step and if you run out of food you die. You only have two classes to choose from, a fighter and a mage. The Mage is the recommended class for having an easier time since the magic pendant can make dungeon exploring really easy, and there's also a spell that let's you transform into a Lizard Man giving you a massive permanent stat boost and making the game a cakewalk, while the fighter is for the players that really wanna test themselves. The experience itself is very primitive and mostly consists in hours of grinding, but if you're into videogame history and want to experience how the RPG genre basically started for videogames then give this a try.
