Ultima IV: Quest of the Avatar's Ethical Loopholes part 1
Channel: Michael Coorlim
Date: 2023-08-27

An analytical playthrough of a landmark game. Consider subscribing to the channel. https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCPeDM2RA_lyVQmjuR5Aq5ww/?sub_confirmation=1
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NOTE: The music cuts out in the last 5 or so minutes of video. The commentary is as it should be. Sorry about that!

This is an analytical playthrough of Ultima IV, a landmark title that introduced one of gaming's first ethical subsystems and keyword-based dialog systems to the franchise. 

It's much bigger than prior games in the series, so I'm going to divide my narrative analysis into parts. This is the first.

Get the game free for PC from Gog: https://www.gog.com/en/game/ultima_4
VGA Upgrade Patch: http://www.moongates.com/u4/upgrade/Upgrade.htm

Timestamps:
0:00 Intro
5:36 Cutscene
8:20 Character Creation
13:08 Keyword Conversation
19:40 Procedural Virtues
21:58 Combat
23:06 Core Town Loop
25:45 Party Members
29:07 Orthopraxic Ethics
32:20 Shrine of Compassion
34:19 Blood Drive
36:30 World Map Size
41:34 Superficial Sacrifice
42:47 Principles of virtue
46:05 Efficient Magic
48:37 Secret Spells
49:09 Exact Change Only
53:14 Ethical Questions
55:56 Shrine of Honor
59:15 Horse Gone, so what
1:02:34 Carceral Violence
1:05:08 Special Guest Star

Michael Coorlim is a science fiction author and game developer.

You can find my work here: http://www.mcoorlim.com

If you appreciated the video and want to buy me a coffee: https://ko-fi.com/mcoorlim

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