Review: Ultima: The False Prophet (SNES)

In this review, we escape from the gargoyles in the SNES game, Ultima: The False Prophet. we findo ut how well this RPG game plays.

This game was released in 1993 and is the port from the MS DOS version. It is the sixth instalment of this series.

At this point, we’ve gotten to know this franchise quite well. We first played the MS-DOS version of the series called Ultima I – The First Age of Darkness. That game didn’t really cut it for us. From there, we tried Ultima II – The Revenge of the Enchantress. That game flopped harder for us. Undeterred, we tried Ultima: Exodus. That game just didn’t impress us. From there, we tried Ultima: Quest of the Avatar. That one wound up being passable, but nothing that was all that impressive. After that, we tried Ultima: Warriors of Destiny. That one wound up being a pretty big fail.

We also tried the spinoff series. First is Ultima Underworld: The Stygian Abyss. That still wound up being the only game we’ve tried in this franchise that got a great score. After that, we tried Ultima Underworld II – Labyrinth Between Worlds. That one ended up being barely passable.

At this point, we aren’t giving up our quest to find another great game in this series, so we are venturing forth with this instalment in the main series.

The story is quite involved in this game. As the Avatar, you find yourself in the present real world. You find yourself longing to return to Britannia. So, in anticipation of the next time you will be summoned to return, you move close enough to the circle of stones that you can actually see it from a window in your house. One night, a storm suddenly passes over. You venture over to the circle of stones. A lightening bolt hits the centre and an orb appears. You take the orb only to see that a door has opened up. You are unsure about it because it is orange instead of blue. As the door begins to fade, you jump through it anyway.

As you travel through, you lose consciousness. When you wake up, you are strapped to a stone slab with gargoyles chanting. The gargoyle leader appears and is about to stab you with a dagger. At the last minute, your friends appear and save you. Everyone escapes through another teleporting door. You then defeat the gargoyles that followed you into the castle of Lord British. After that, Lord British explains what has transpired, urging you to free the 8 shrines from the gargoyles.

You have four party members including yourself. Each character has their own specializations. They also have their own inventory slots. Though limited, the space is quite generous. While you can move diagonally, your only other button you use is “A” to initiate things. This opens up the menu that allows you to sleep, go through your inventory, cast spells, or look around. Look is useful if you are attempting to open treasure chests or pick up items you see lying around.

Battles are handled in a turn-based manner, but take place wherever the battle initiates. In battle, you can move a space, attack, or cast a spell. Each action takes a turn. Every enemy you defeat nets you experience points. My understanding is that you need to meditate at a shrine in order to level up – something you don’t immediately have access to.

There is also day and night cycles. At night, a circle of darkness encircles your character to simulate night.

If you die, and you do this a lot, you’ll be teleported back to Lord British and fully resurrected. Lord British can also heal you for free.

Like in the previous game, magic not only requires magic points, but also the necessary ingredients. The game doesn’t tell you what ingredients you need to cast spells, but it will automatically use them should you case a spell. You need to ready a spell book in order to cast spells. This can be done by “using” the spell book in the menu.

Weapons and armour can also be equipped in a similar manner. Stats for each are visible from the item menu.

It’s possible to keep track of your characters health, but in order to do so, you have to access the menu system, then initiate the “use” command. Note that “B” will back out of menus and conversations.

You can also get status ailments. One such ailment is poison. Every step you take will flash a green screen to indicate damage. You can keep going until you reach all the way down to 1HP. After that, you stay there until cured or healed.

There are also potions you can take. Each potion has a different colour. What each potion does isn’t really indicated in the game itself. Some have positive effects while others have negative effects. You can use potions on enemies.

Keys are used via the menu system. You have to go through the menu system and use the key. After that, you can select the target where you want to use the key. If you are correct, you’ll unlock the door in question. Activating switches requires you to use the “look” command.

Once you make it out of the castle, you have the whole world to take on. Where do you go? The game doesn’t really say. You just guess and hope for the best.

For me, I hear all these great stories about this series. I am honestly trying to like this series. This is the 6th game in the main series and 8th game in the whole franchise I’ve tried. So, it’s not from a lack of effort. As for pretty much every other game in the main series, I got bored quickly after running into dead ends. I like RPGs, but this is a series I haven’t enjoyed save for the first Underworld game.

First of all, the learning curve is extremely steep. Guessing what potions do, only being given a clue of what you need to do before you are just plonked onto this open world without a direction, and barely having a clue of what is needed first is not a good start at all.

Additionally, the difficulty curve is very steep. I went west of the castle and got killed multiple times by bandits on the trail. Thinking I made a mistake somehow in the direction, I tried picking other directions only to constantly run up against mountains I could not pass.

I did eventually make progress and find a spider case. Unfortunately, all I could find was some loot that mysteriously disappeared in my inventory after. I did eventually find another cave system after some more mindless wandering around, but eventually got killed and got sent back. At that point, I couldn’t really bring myself to care about the game any longer and quit out of boredom.

Now, some of you might be telling me how this is an oldschool RPG game that requires a whole lot more thinking. It requires a whole lot more patient. It is how RPG games were made back then. Er, right. You mean SNES RPG games like Lufia & The Fortress of Doom and Secret of Mana? Both of those games were released on the exact same year. They were nowhere near as cryptic as this one. Potions and items are identified in those games and you generally had a solid idea of where you needed to go. I know what RPG games are like back in 1993 and this one, by comparison, is an abomination.

On the plus side, this game does handle combat reasonably well. It can be hard at times to see what is going on, but the system is relatively straight forward. Also, movement is actually decent with the ability to move diagonally.

Even with that, controls had a slight delay on input almost as if the SNES had a hard time running something like this. It’s odd because it doesn’t seem to be all that sophisticated. To compound the problem, it’s as if the developers had no idea that there would be an “X”, “Y”, “L”, or “R” button. Instead, it’s all crammed into using the “A” button for seemingly no reason.

Beyond that, it’s really hard to think of positives here. There are bad difficulty spikes and the learning curve is steep enough to be crippling. It’s hard to know what you need to be doing and it is ultimately a very not enjoyable game. Plus, the delay in controls doesn’t help things either, not to mention the poorly mapped out buttons. While basic movement is decent and combat is pretty easy to learn, most games by now have this down and then some. It’s just a bad overall experience.

Graphically speaking, this game almost comes off as a NES/SNES hybrid. The water and fire effects, you could tell, were taking advantage of the better capabilities of the SNES. While those effects do offer a nice start, most of the other effects like darkness seem to be holdovers from the previous generation. The character sprites have a slight angle effect going for them to give the game depth, but the sprites are also very basic. Meanwhile, the graphics of the ground are pretty decent, though enemies barely stand out because their sprites aren’t all that great. It’s passable, but nothing beyond that.

Audio-wise, things aren’t that much better. The music is pretty decent at first, but it can get repetitive after a while. The sound effects are extremely basic, though. You could come close to pulling off similar on a NES. There’s absolutely nothing impressive about the sound effects here. I know the SNES can pull off so much more then that.

Overall, the game is just a bad experience, plain and simple. The controls have a delay and are poorly planned out. The learning curve is extreme to the point of being extremely annoying. It’s hard to understand what you even needed to do in the game outside of visiting these shrines. The difficulty spikes are pretty bad. Graphics are barely passable and the audio leaves a lot to be desired. Overall, I can’t really recommend this game by any means.

Overall
Furthest point in game: Looted the Spider cave and found a second cave.

General gameplay: 11/25
Replay value: 3/10
Graphics: 5/10
Audio: 2/5

Overall rating: 42%

Drew Wilson on Twitter: @icecube85 and Facebook.