What the Ultima series means to me

One of my earliest childhood memories, and one of the few positive memories I have of my dad (a malignant narcissist and an alcoholic who drank himself to death) was my father playing Ultima 4. Well, not so much “playing” as mapping out the world. The living room floor would be covered in graph paper that he meticulously filled in with all the tiles in the game. I remember playing Ultima 4, 5, 6,…