Ultima Manga

Around 1988, when Origin and FCI were creating Japanese versions of the Ultima series, the Japanese publisher JICC published four manga based upon the games.

Exodus

 * Publisher: JICC.
 * Author: Seiji Tanaka
 * Published: Aug. 15, 1988.
 * Length: 252 pages
 * Original List Price: 880¥ (about US$7)

"A space pilot named Genji gets sucked into Sosaria to battle Exodus, Mondain, and Minax, where he encounters the mage Aida, a robot named Bigelow, and a bard named...Lennon."

The first eight pages of this volume are in color, with the rest of the comic printed in black-and-white. The manga interprets the events of the NES-port of Ultima III, fleshing out the sparse narrative of the game.

The story follows the adventures of futuristic space explorer, Genji, who finds himself transported to Sosaria when a venture onto a previously unexplored asteroid results in him finding a gate to the world. He is eventually joined up by Aida, a peaceful, animal-loving cleric; Lennon, a paranoid and often disgruntled bard; and Bigelow, a mechanized robot with a capacity for human emotion.

The events of the comic differ widely from those of the Western Ultima series, and involve time travel and futuristic technology. Mondain and Minax, whose deaths were less explicit in the NES-port, work together alongside Exodus in this story, and are the fodder for earlier conflicts in the book before the final confrontation.

A complete English transcript of the story can be found here. Art examples in color and black-and-white can be found here.

Quest of the Avatar

 * Publisher: JICC.
 * Author: Yuko Tanaka
 * Published: Aug. 29, 1988
 * Length: 252 pages
 * Original List Price: 900¥ (about US$7)

The first eight pages of this volume are in color, with the rest of the comic printed in black-and-white. The manga interprets the events of the NES-port of Ultima IV, fleshing out the sparse narrative of the game.

The story follows the quest of the fifteen-year-old boy Deane, who was adopted in infancy by a druid of Yew after the murder of his mother, a knight of the Order of the Silver Serpent. The story revolves around his search for his adoptive brother Shiva, a druid who went missing in an attempt to become the Avatar.

Like the first manga, the events of the comic again prove very far flung from the expectations of Western Ultima fans. In Quest of the Avatar, many of the characters have switched genders as they did in the NES port. Iolo, for example, has become the fourteen year old girl "Io." Julia is now a thirty-eight-year-old male, still named "Julia," and Katrina is the ten-year-old boy "Kati."

The Fall of Magincia

 * Publisher: JICC
 * Author : Hiroyuki Watanabe
 * Published: Dec. 15, 1990.
 * Original List Price : ¥980

There is very little information available about this manga, apart from the title and cover. It can be speculated that the manga somehow ties-in with the destruction of the proud city Magincia, as told in Ultima IV.

One bit that did surface shows Lord British in the Lycaeum, talking with a scholar about some kind of omen. It is shown on the left. 

The Maze of Schwarzschild

 * Publisher: JICC.
 * Author: Seiji Tanaka
 * Published: Nov. 15, 1991
 * Original List Price: ¥980

Little is known about this publication, other than the title and the cover.

One bit that did surface is the illustration shown at the left. It shows an asteroid that is engraved with the Codex Symbol and the three people that are most likely the hero role call. However, from these bits no conclusion can be made about the story, other than it seems to be rather strange (outer space after all...).