Ultima V: Warriors of Destiny

The Good
This could very well be my all-time favorite RPG.

Warning, author is biased and probably nuts

Ultima IV was supposed to have been the last in the Ultima series (never fear, if it makes money, they'll keep doing it, that is, until they get so old that they can't walk and chew gum at the same time, let alone act--admittedly, they never could do that when young either--...what?!...oh, sorry, I was on a Star Trek trip).

Back to the normal programming

So after playing Ultima IV, which has a great plot, I thought, "This is it. This is the end of the world. It can't get any better than this. There is nothing better to look forward to in my generation anymore." Then, BAM!!! Lord British dishes out Ultima V like the good bro he his and we're off to la-la-land (i.e. Britannica) again.

As good as the Final Fantasy series is, I still like Ultima IV and V better. I'm not entirely sure why. Maybe it's the icon based combat system, which I like better than the Final Fantasy combat system. Maybe because Ultima was the first to weave an interesting plot into an RPG (IV's plot is better than V). Or maybe it was because Ultima was the first RPG where you recruited other characters in the world to join your adventuring team. Except for the combat system, a good RPG game today has all the elements that Ultima V had. So in that sense, Ultima V is probably past it's prime. But when it first came out, it was so far above every other game in its genre that Jack couldn't even get up there with his bean stalk.

The Bad
Now that I've pumped it up so much, you will hate it when you go play it yourself. Oh, well. No sense clinging on to the past when the future is beckoning. Time to do that Final Fantasy thing one last "final" time!

The Bottom Line
Ultima V was the climax of the whole series (now up to 9). Play Ultima IV first for the plot. Then play V and savor it. If you can't make yourself stop, go ahead and play VI. But from VI to VII is a huge cliff drop. Don't go there, and don't come crying to me if you do!