The Ultima series of games has been with us for many years now. Ultima Online was an offshoot of those games and was groundbreaking in its scale; it was the first multiplayer online role-playing game and it still has many features that have not been replicated by other games.

Ultima Online is set in the fantasy world of Britannia (though there are several other worlds, I will say more of these later). Once called Sosaria, its people were enslaved by a tyrannical sorcerer using the power of the gem of immortality. This sorcerer was slain and the gem shattered. However the evil of the gem was not ended for in each shard of the gem was a duplicate of the world of Sosaria and each of these would develop along separate paths. Each Ultima Online server is meant to be one of these shards.

Each shard does not only contain Britannia but also other worlds. There are now four of these Facets in all; Trammel and Feluccia, which are alternate forms of Britannia, the mythical realm Ilshelnar and finally Malas. Malas is new to Age of Shadows, recently appearing and bringing with it a host of strange monsters that roam all of the Facets. There two great civilisations once ruled, but now they are gone leaving an empty world to colonise. Each Facet has some of its own rules. Feluccia stands out the most, as there are no limits on a player's actions. You can attack other player characters, steal from them, attack civilians - nothing is out of bounds. However, commit crimes and you will be marked as a criminal who anyone can attack without penalty and who is unable to travel to Trammel and many of the other towns, giving you few places to run and hide. Some players are what would be best described as anti-social and can be quite vicious to weaker players. Fortunately on the other worlds you are safe.

The characters in Ultima Online are customisable to a degree beyond any online game. There is a range of skills that you have scores of up to 100 in. A maximum skill total of 700 stops you from gaining too many. This gives the choice to be an expert in seven or skilled in more. These skills (at least 50) range from swordsmanship to fishing, allowing varied characters to be created. Also certain skills work better together. Some even require you to work with other characters, as it is unlikely one person can develop all that is needed. In the late days of Lord Blackthorn's Revenge (the last expansion to Ultima Online) and this new expansion, further aspects have been added to this. You can gain special scrolls from slaying champions that give you the ability to take your skills past 100 or to increase the total skill points allowed.

Two new character types have been added along with associated new skills: the necromancer and the paladin. These are proving very popular and all the forums are filled with discussions about them. Having tried both I can see why! These have added extra life to UO for long-term players who want to try something different. Each has some superb powers and these are very different to the magical powers already available in Ultima Online.

All of the manufacturing skills have been revamped. There is an ever-greater range of items to produce for every skill. This adds variety to non-tradesmen as well: who do you think they sell this stuff to? For those who have been on UO in the past it would be impossible to explain all the extras added in such a small place but if you check out the main website www.uo.com you will find all the details.

Combat has not been left out. There are now various extras like special moves and new weapons. The addition of damage types e.g. fire and ice which have different effects according to the opponent and different armours which have varying abilities to resist these damage types has added a new element. It is no longer best to just get the heaviest armour you can: it is often very weak against special attacks and magical weapons. The combat skills in general have been upgraded giving warriors more of a chance against other characters that had begun to dominate the game. So game balance has been re-addressed. Thus it is now sensible to create varied and unusual characters, in earlier versions these characters often suffered at the hands of most opponents (player and non-player alike) in Britannia.

Further customisation is possible with the new housing system. You can now produce custom built houses and the variety is astounding. I wandered around for hours and found no two new houses that are alike (though some of the old ones have stingy owners that will not pay for improvements!)

Ultima Online is and always has been the most customisable of all the online role-playing games. This also makes it very different. Unfortunately there are ways in which it has not kept up. There were no missions, combat was limited and warrior classes were severely disadvantaged. Also the storyline was somewhat vague and lacked application in the game world. Age of Shadows has begun to address these problems.

First of all is the introduction of the Virtues (some of you may remember these from the Avatars Quests in the later Ultima games). There are eight of these: compassion, honesty, honour, humility, justice, sacrifice, spirituality and valour. At the time of writing only three of these are active (the others will be brought online soon) the others have been discussed on various websites. Each virtue has a series of ranks; with each successive rank you gain new abilities. To gain each rank special quests can be undertaken, for example escorting NPCs (non-player characters), different for each virtue and involving not only NPCs but other online players as well. These will be welcome extra elements to the game as they are all introduced.

Then there are the new champion spawns. These are areas in which a progressively more difficult group of monsters will spawn, which after killing enough (this can take some time) their master appears. These "champions" are extremely tough and require co-operation to defeat. They are also all on the Felucca facet; a fact that encourages people to visit there and allow safer areas for beginners i.e. where there are no champion spawns. There was also some talk of quests and player sensitive plotlines being developed. We will have to wait to see how these work out.

New players receive what is called young status for the first 40 hours of play. This means that monsters do not attack you on sight, rather you have to choose to attack them before combat is initiated. Also there are various quests and special areas specifically for these young players. This gives you an opportunity to adapt to a game system that some of the other players will have had many years to get used to.

Graphically the Age of Shadows expansion has not made major changes to Ultima Online. There have been some teaks, but overall the game is a little lacking in that respect. Existing players and old fans will be glad to know there is still a 2D system that gives lower system requirements and is useful when connections are poor. The music is much the same as in the previous expansion and though it is of a decent standard and some areas have lovely atmospheric music, it perhaps could have been revamped. Still it often has a calming effect or works to build up excitement (depending on the situation). The system requirements are much lower than any online game; most PCs that are four or five years old will run this without any bother, which is completely different to Dark Age of Camelot.

Ultima Online has always had trouble with lag (a delay in your actions occurring online) due to poor connection quality. Broadband users will suffer from this less (but it is not altogether eradicated I am told). The designers are taking steps to deal with this, but be aware that it occurs. It can be extremely irritating and at times it may result in your character dying which will cost you a lot of your equipment.

There is a well-developed community in UO and that is its main strength. There are many types of players, each looking for something different out of the game and so you will be able to find lots of individuals like you. This is formalised in a guild system. It can be a little hard at first and after a time without these friends you may not find UO that stimulating. However, join one of the guilds and you will always have something to do.

Okay, if all you want to do is slay a few monsters or bully and slay those with weaker characters then UO is not for you. For those who want true roleplaying then there are many opportunities with a lot of guilds devoted to this. Ultima online does not have the greatest graphics, the most developed quest system (yet) or the best performing servers. It offers a large, varied world in which you can meet many people and generally do whatever you want to. There is no need to become a warrior or mage; you could be a farmer fisherman or seamstress. No one type of career will leave you greatly disadvantaged or leave you with little to do.

Ultima Online: Age of Shadows is another good expansion of the online game that is a worthwhile purchase and hints of even better things to come with future expansions.

Reviewed by Gavin Udall for AceGamez (All Rights Reserved).