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'''''Times of Lore''''' is a 1988 action role-playing game by [[Chris Roberts]] that was developed and published by [[Origin Systems]].

Barbarians have invaded, the king has vanished and the world has become dangerous. It’s up to the player to set things right, as a powerful barbarian, a quick-moving Valkyrie or a hard to kill armored knight. The player awakens at an inn, receives their first quest and gets started hunting orcs.<ref name=":4">[https://greatestgames.substack.com/p/the-classic-pc-gaming-era-1977-1989-2e7 The Classic PC Gaming Era (1977-1989) - Times of Lore], Sean J. Jordan, greatestgames.substack.com, Jan 28, 2024</ref>

Earlier RPGs, chief among them Origin’s ''Ultima'' series, featured a text-based interface. As games became more complex, the number of commands multiplied. For times of Lore, Chris Roberts developed a mouse-drive icon-based interface. ''Times of Lore'' managed with eight icons what contemporary RPGs and adventure games were doing with dozens of commands.<ref>{{Cite RSI|url=https://robertsspaceindustries.com/comm-link/spectrum-dispatch/12671-Blast-From-The-Past-Times-Of-Lore|text=Blast From the Past: Times of Lore|accessdate=2013-06-12}}</ref>

It has a whole interface for the conversation system that was menu driven for joystick.<ref name=":2">[https://paullicino.tumblr.com/post/140850063441/paul-dean-as-i-understand-you-were-born-in-the The forgotten interview with Chris Roberts by Paul Dean], March 11, 2016</ref>

There is also a hunger system that requires the player to carry food to avoid starving to death.<ref name=":4" />

American influences aside, ''Times of Lore'' still fit best of all into the grand British tradition of free-scrolling, free-roaming 8-bit action/adventures, a sub-genre that verged on completely unknown to American computer gamers.<ref name=":3">[https://www.filfre.net/2017/04/from-squadron-to-wingleader/ From Squadron to Wingleader,] The Digital Antiquarian, April 21, 2017</ref>

The game featured an intricate world map and boasted a lack of in-game load time.

Chris Roberts was working on his own on Ultra Realm, the precursor to what would become [[Times of Lore|''Times of Lore.'']]<ref>[https://web.archive.org/web/20140914215106/https://www.usgamer.net/articles/chris-roberts-star-citizen-profile "The Stars His Destination: Chris Roberts from Origin to Star Citizen"]. 2014-09-13, archived.</ref> It was inspired by console action-adventures, particularly ''The Legend of Zelda''.<ref name=":0">''Computer Gaming World'', issue 68 (February 1990), pages 34 & 38</ref> He started working on it in England before he came to the US.<ref name=":2" />

When he went to a boardgame club in Texas he saw the art of local artist Denis Loubet displayed on a wall and contacted him to make art. Denis Loubet had been working with Richard Gariott since ''Akalabeth'' in 1980 and had been hired as a fulltime artist at nearby Origin Systems just three weeks earlier. Loubet showed what he was working on to Richard Garriott and Dallas Snell at Origin, who were impressed by the work-in-progress of Chris Roberts, and they invited him to Origin’s offices to ask if he’d be interested in publishing it through them. Chris Roberts had never heard of Origin Systems or the ''Ultima'' series; he’d grown up immersed in the British gaming scene, where neither had any presence whatsoever. But he liked the people at Origin, liked the atmosphere around the place and he ended up with a publishing contract at Origin Systems.<ref name=":3" />

Working from Origin’s offices as a contracted outside developer, Chris Roberts finished ''Ultra Realm'' and changed its name to ''Times of Lore''. During the development, it grew considerably in scope and ambition, and took on some light CRPG elements as well. In much of this, Roberts was inspired by David Joiner’s 1987 action/CRPG ''The Faery Tale Adventure''. Roberts made sure the whole game could fit into the Commodore 64’s memory at once to facilitate a cassette-based version for the European market.<ref name=":3" />

[[Erin Roberts]] helped with the game.<ref>[https://youtu.be/L7upV9Pl1bk?feature=shared ATV Interview: Erin Roberts], Star Citizen, YouTube, 19 april 2016</ref>

''Times of Lore'' went on to inspire several later titles by Origin Systems. This includes the 1990 title ''[[Bad Blood]]'', another action RPG based on the same engine. It also inspired the 1990 title ''Ultima VI: The False Prophet'', which adopted several elements from Times of Lore, including real-time elements, a constant-scale open world (replacing the unscaled overworld of earlier ''Ultima'' games).<ref name=":0" />, and an icon-based point & click interface<ref name=":1">''[https://archive.org/details/TheOfficialBookOfUltima/page/n95/mode/2up?view=theater The Official Book of Ultima]''. 1990.</ref> The interface of ''Times of Lore'' had a huge influence on later Origin games''.''.<ref name=":3" /> Richard Garriott, in addition to citing it as an influence on Ultima VI<ref name=":1" />, said that Ultima VII: The Black Gate was also inspired by Times of Lore<ref>[https://books.google.fr/books?id=mKF5AgAAQBAJ&pg=PA347&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q&f=false ''Vintage Games: An Insider Look at the History of Grand Theft Auto, Super Mario, and the Most Influential Games of All Time'',] page 347</ref> The game was a precursor to Diablo and Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance.<ref>[https://www.lemon64.com/review/times-of-lore/768 Times of Lore], Lemon64</ref>