Ultima VII: The Black Gate used a game engine that was really, really flexible.

In Britain, it was possible to talk to the baker, Willy. Willy bakes sweetest bread on the whole world, and offers to buy flour.

He also pays you for baking bread! This sort of flexibility is something that is regrettably not seen too often in CRPGs; It was completely unheard of when the game came out, and even today's new games it's not always certain...

Instructions are just marginally simpler than what bread baking is in RL:

  1. Take some flour, pour it on a table.
  2. Add water.
  3. Put dough into an oven.
  4. Wait until the bread is done.
  5. Mmm-mm!

Of course, this is not the only place where you can make bread... You can also do this in Lord British's castle which has a room with oven, table, water and lots of flour sacks.

(When Ultima IX: Ascension was in production, the hottest question about level of detail in the world was, of course, whether or not it was possible to bake bread. For comparision, with the first incarnation of Infinity Engine used in Baldur's Gate, it was not possible to do things like this. Apparently such things would theoretically be possible in BG2... and the Aurora Engine in Neverwinter Nights not only allows it but also gives that power to your average game modder.

Actually, the simplest way to bake is to put flour on the table, then put it straight in the oven. It can also be put on top of the oven for the same effect.

For some reason it is not possible to tip flour directly into the oven. In fact, the flour MUST be tipped straight from the flour bag onto those grey tables, no other surface will suffice. Fortunately for all you little miscreants out there, once the flour's out of the bag it can be moved as a normal object, dropped on the ground and such before being baked.

If you don't like the way Willy exploits your hard work (rounding down to the nearest 5 loaves before paying you) adopt the minimal effort-maximum simplicity-tasty bread model. Get hired, then bake a whole pile of bread and leave it on the floor/table - do not put it in your backpack. Talk to da man Willy and collect your paltry earnings. Willy coughs up cash; Willy does not take the bread! You are now free to stuff the scrummy (albeit by now, somewhat filthy) steaming loaves of flour-induced consumability into your backpack without fear of reprisal.

The complete instructions for putting some effort into your apprenticeship:

  1. Dump flour on a table.
  2. Swish flour around on ground. (er, a matter of personal taste, that bit.)
  3. Add water to the flour. There's a bucket and well outside Willy's shop. Buckets of blood do not work for this.
  4. Use a rolling pin on the dough. If you can't find one any other way, Willy will give you a rolling pin if you ask him very nicely.
  5. Swish the bread in the mud again, try that blood bucket one more time.
  6. Whack bread into, or on, an oven. Note that this is extraordinarily more difficult than it sounds, as there are but two working ovens in the fair land of Brittania.
  7. Implement diabolical schemes to exploit Willy boy and get as much bread & coins as possible out of the building.

Just don't try getting your grubby hands on Willy's specialty bakery treats; if Willy puts something in that oven, and you take it out, you're going to be resisting arrest sooner than you may have planned.



Willy bakes the sweetest bread in the whole world. Quite an accomplishment when you control 50% of the world's ovens!

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