It's been 9 months since I was honored enough to attend EA's soiree in San Francisco to unveil UX:O to the world and much as happened.
EA closed down OSI(Origin Systems Interactive) and absorbed it's resources into the parent company in March 2004. This also entailed closing the near-legendary offices in Austin and relocating the staff to Redwood City, CA to continue UO and UX:O development. Many of the UO and UX:O staff chose not to make the move and quit their jobs. UX:O was especially hard hit in this area with most of the team bailing. What was supposed to be for UX:O a Fall 2003 beta followed by a Q1 2004 release was now a Summer 2004 beta with a hopeful Winter 2004 release(as a sidenote, UO's annual spring expansion was pushed back to the end of 2004 as well). It was also announced that Earth and Beyond, another EA game, would be ceasing operations in late 2004. With no reason for further development of E&B, many of it's staff were redistributed to other areas within EA, with more than a few joining up on UX:O's rekindled team.
As this is written, an invitation-only beta for UX:O is finally underway with a rumored, more widescale beta late summer 2004. At present, interest and enthusiasm for UX:O has waned considerably among the gaming community at large. Not to say that UX:O won't be an incredible game, but the fantastic PR buzz generated by the San Francisco 2003 event has been squandered quite a bit. Hopefully, EA will follow up with another shot in the arm PR buzz before the actual UX:O release.
Looking back at my pretty incoherent ramblings(fueled by a dual mixture of plentiful alcohol and unbridled excitement), my report was not exactly the most journalistically sound account(and pretty embarassing to a certain extent, although I have chosen to leave the original account intact and uneditted). At the same time, there are dozens of accounts around the web on numerous fan and community sites about all the wonderful technical aspects of UX:O's game play, systems and structure. While I did touch upon those aspects in my eye-witness reports, I also paid some attention to the sights, sounds and people of the event. In hindsight, I would gladly have paid to have gone(and would again), although I would have eased up on the alcohol consumption. The event was unprecendented in nature and scope, but then again, so is the Ultima legacy.
Tancred RedStar
Original account follows:
August 22, 2003
 the logo in lights |
First of all, let me say that Im totally drunk as I send in this report, courtesy of Electronic Art's gracious open bar tab. Didnt touch a beer all night. No, it was all vodka sours and several glasses of some wine.
On with the show. |
 the unvieling begins |
Please pardon my stupor. Day began with 4 hours of sleep, hauling ass to the airport to catch my flight. Made it just in time. The UX:O fun began at 6:30pm at a convention center across the street from the hotel. About 100 ppl came, mostly from the United States, a few from Japan. We all signed in and were given a packet with name tags, a velvet pouch and other stuff. There was hors dourves and an open bar. I had some wine, haha. We were given these stones on a leather band inscribed with an "X" for the new game. I snagged a couple extra for giveaways/friends. Theyre pretty kewl. Dramatic music began playing and everyone shuffled inside the main room. A guy appeared on stage and in short order showed an intro movie from the new game. It was intense as hell.(sorry Im not good with names, I had already entered reality enhanced mode at this point). Let me also mention the dood I met from MMORPG Magazine. We had a nice chat as we walked to the event about various games and their flaws. |
 Dinner is served! |
OK, lets get down to details: The game is coming out sometime first quarter 2004. Ultima Online will continue as ever. Anthony "Sunsword" Castoro, the only dev member from Ultima Online, was present and mentioned a lot of kewl stuff happening with UO. UO is not going away. Ultima X:Odyssey will be a "sister product" and not a sequel. My head hurts, lol. |
 UX:O team takes the stage
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The footage of the gamewas ABSOLUTEY amazing!!!! It had nice music(produced by a real cinema score composer!). I later confirmed with Rob Martyn(VP of UX:O) over dinner that you will likely need a semi-decent 3D card to play - like a GeForce 4. Others may plod along, but for optimal performance you will need something fairly decent.
The Virtues, special moves, mongbats and ettins will be in it, lol. The Virtues will be integral to the game and you can "become an Avatar" at some point. I asked now long - more than a few months without a doubt. Some actions in the names of the Virtues may contravene others. For example, slaughtering orcs en masses may gain you Valor, but degrade your Compassion. There will be player races - gargoyle and elf among others. A player can have "descendants" that will be able to start off or benefit from their predecessor's achievements in game. This is still very vague, Im reluctant to mention it, but it will be part of the game. Absoutely NO non-conscentual PvP, anywhere. Crafting will be limited at initial release, there will be no houses. Houses will show up in an expansion/public of sorts later. Theyre already working on it now. Apparently, current UO players will be given "strong incentive" to try out UX:Odyssey when it is released. I saw a number of special moves in the melee portion of the video. They were simply incredible and very fluid. One part, this warrior gets rushed on all sides by orcs(?) and slays them in quick order. |
| After the presentation, dinner was served and everyone got down to chit chatting. I didnt know a soul, but soon met lots of interesting and nice ppl. Again, my lack of sobriety prevented me from remembering most names, plz forgive.
I did manage to have dinner with the head VP of the UX:O project and expressed a lot of my concerns about past UO-type problems like ppl GMing several skills within a week of getting the game or maintaining the wide world of exploration, both character and activity wise. He mentioned a private, quest-like engine where you could to a certain extent totally seclude yourself and some friends to embark upon a private quest of sorts. |
| I did manage to have dinner with the head VP of the UX:O project and expressed a lot of my concerns about past UO-type problems like ppl GMing several skills within a week of getting the game, or maintaining the wide world of exploration, both character and activity wise. He assured me UX:O wont be like this and also mentioned a private, quest-like engine where you could to a certain extent totally seclude yourself and some friends to embark upon a private quest of sorts. |
 find Tancred
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Well, I think Ive covered the Earth shaking stuff for now. More will come tomorrow, including my extensive and fascinating talk with Anthony "Sunsword" Castoro about UO, where its headed and whats happening now. I also want to mention EA is no slouch when it comes to throwing a party, lol. They do it well, hell, there were UX:O imprinted chocolates at the bar. There were UX:O cookies on my bed when I finally stumbled back to my room. Everyone I met was very kewl. I met the guy from Turbulent Waters!!! I have a million more things to tell, but my head hurts and there is a pvp tournament in like 4 hours with mega-prizes so I gotta sign off for now. Oh yeah, another Virtue is coming out soon for UO. Also, anyone who hacks or exploits is going down.  Some of the Stratics crew, very nice ppl I got my T2A map autographed by Sunsword, Stellerx and Krall and my event program signed by most of the UX:O staff(get the rest tomorrow). Lots more to tell, prolly already forgot to mention some, will give a better, more sober report tomorrow! Stay tuned! |
