Ultima Trilogy I II III
Ultima Trilogy I II III is a compilation of Ultima I, Ultima II and Ultima III, released by Origin in 1989. It was available for the C64, Apple II and IBM PC.
Gameplay[edit]
Note that the real cover art for Ultima II is not used on this collection's box. That is because Sierra was unwilling to release the rights to Origin at that time. In its place is a mock-up adapted from the original cover of Akalabeth.
The Apple II version of this box set contains a rewritten version of Ultima II, distinguished by blue borders around the gamplay/status areas and a custom text font (with lowercase letters). The Ultima Trilogy was the only time this version of the game was made available and it is notable as the final Origin product written for the Apple. The C64 and PC versions contained the original, unaltered Ultima II for their respective platforms.
The IBM PC and C64 versions of this compilation were later included in the 1990 release of the Ultima Value Pak in their original form.
Included in the Compilation[edit]
The following materials were included with the compilation:
- All three of the games. Ultima I was the 1986 rewrite, even on the Apple II. Ultima II was altered to remove all references to Sierra (Origin had regained the rights to the game from them). All games are on their original floppy disks.
- A combined manual for all three of the games, called Ultima Trilogy Manual.
- Three cardboard maps, Ultima I map, Ultima II map, Ultima III map.
Other Versions[edit]
The Japanese edition of the compilation for the FM Towns computer was released in 1990 and had numerous differences to the original package. This was unavoidable, since the games had not been ported to this computer before and technical advances made the originals dated. The compilation was sold on a CD-ROM.
All three games had a complete graphical overhaul and a high-quality introduction each. A new soundtrack is included and shared between all games (the first two games originally had no music), even replacing Ultima III's original soundtrack. For more detail, see Computer ports of Ultima I, Computer ports of Ultima II and Computer ports of Ultima III. Included as well was a message from Richard Garriott to the fans concerning the port. It was also included as an CD-audio track. Lastly, the box contained paper maps, an operation manual and a game manual.
There also are Korean and Chinese (Taiwan) editions of the compilation. While the software is the same as the western PC edition, the manual was fully translated. However, while the version in Taiwan had the full color maps, the Korean version only has grayscale copies of the maps.
Gallery[edit]
The Japanese box
The message
Magazine advertisement announcing the release of the Ultima Trilogy collection.
