Hi, guys. I'm back this week with Origin's 1985 smash hit Autoduel!

Ultima VIIBy request, this week's Matt Chat covers Ultima VII: The Black Gate. Ultima VII is a masterpiece of the early 90s, with tremendous scope and important innovations that would influence many later games. It's definitely not hard to see this game's influence on later hits such as Diablo (1997) and Baldur's Gate (1998).

We've been having a bit of a discussion about Ultima in the Gates of Delirium Live - Post 11 blog comments, and I was curious what everyone's thoughts were on the most authentic, interesting and error-free versions of each of the nine main Ultima games, not counting Akalabeth (though we can throw that in there too). This is both for my own selfish reasons of wanting to play these at some point (and to do it only once for each game) and also because I think this would prove to be an interesting discussion as I know everyone is very opinionated about the series. So, assuming you have access to any version - and any version's optimized hardware setup (for instance, you have an Apple II with two Mockingboards or a C-128), which would you pick, and in what order, say up to the top three systems for each version of the game? I'll start with my own only partially informed opinion.

After Matt's couple of CRPG articles, I’ve sat down and thought through rose tinted memories on my favourite CRPG titles, time for some armchair commentary on my favourite golden age CRPG's.

Magic Candle, Wasteland, Questron II, Curse of the Azure Bonds + Pool of Radiance, Eye of the Beholder, Bards Tale II, Ultima III, Demons Winter.

GameTap for PCThe GameTap service is at it again, going all "vintage" this and "classic" that on us and simply requiring our undivided attention. Richard Garriott, Ultima, Origin, all things a classic gamer simply can't resist. Here's the full press release (and ignore the line "many hardcore gamers still consider Ultima 1 to be the birth of the role playing game as we know it" - Garriott's own "Akalabeth" (AKA "Ultima 0"), though primitive, would be more appropriate):