On interaction and balance in the game.

The many objects that could be played with in the Ultima games, especially 6, 7 and 7p2, was wonderful. However, aside from leering at an NPC while they worked, there was very little reason to use these systems aside from just the fact that you could, or one off ( or even worse, repetitive) puzzles. I would like to see more purpose driven interaction with the worlds objects. Give me a reason to play all of those instruments. I could learn, and actually play songs, with my bard class on my enchanted musical instruments. If well cooked meals could give me a variety of timed bonuses I would have a reason to have a kitchen/campfire, and develop my culinary skills. Maybe weapons degrade in quality with use and when I go to town I have a reason to give my sword a few turns in the forge. The key being not to overly punish, by means of things like starvation, or broken weapons, but to encourage through penalties and bonuses, meaningful interaction with the game world. This also ties in with my next subject
Balance the game by not letting too many systems overlap. What I mean by that is that each system, be it forging, alchemy, enchanting, healing, etc, should not overlap in capability with other systems. Otherwise you run the risk of developing systems that become too generic, or systems that simply are never used. A good example would be healing. In many RPG's healing can be achieved in a variety of ways. The town healer, your druid, your mage, your cleric, your paladin, scrolls, potions, eating, sleeping, and so on. In doing this, these system overlap and some will always be favored over others. If each of these systems had a unique and important purpose they would all be utilized, creating a richer and deeper game. In a game like D&D, for example, if my alchemist can create a thrown potion that releases sleeping gas, my cleric can cast hold, my mage can cast paralyze, my druid can cast entangle, and so on, a large problem emerges. Each of these things overlap and become generic. You then have people picking classes based on what they can add to this ability and some end up vastly outnumbering others in player choice and importance. However, you can separate the systems so that they all remain useful. Maybe I can only heal by sleeping, the spells available to only certain priests, and potions made from rare alchemy ingredients. My elemental mages have completely different powers than my druids. An elemental mage is about harnessing the elements of the universe to cause, or counter destruction (freezing by an elementalist could be one the only ways, or one of the few, to cause that effect). My druid would be about using mother natures creatures as allies for both combat and puzzle solving, my bards magical instruments can have an effect on the mind, my cleric could have wild and illogical powers that don't follow any consistent logic because they are given a taste of the power of the gods, the power of creation itself, to bend and manipulate the laws of the universe. This opens up many new paths through areas that may otherwise be repetitive , it makes each character valuable, and each party mix a new experience, even in possibly repeated content. It can also add great variety to puzzle solving by having these various powers react realistically with the environment as opposed to just being tools of combat.
So, funny story, I actually wrote more than is here, but it is 5am here and I am tired, and like a moron, I bumped the mouse button that sends me back one page and I lost everything I wrote. In rewriting, I tried to hit my major points, but will expand on it some more with a little much needed rest. I would also like to write about 10 pages on how no rpg has given us realistic NPC relationships and systems with which to realistically develop them even though I think there are some fairly simple solutions to this problem. Goodnight everyone, and welcome back Lord British. Ultima 3 was my first PC game, I got it when I was about 7 or 8 years old and I have been an RPG addict ever since. I was sad to see Origin go and I hope this is the beginning of a new era.