I played Ultimas 4-9, skipping 6 because I was oot & aboot in the world at the time, sans computer. Loved 5, the roots of my pc snobbery as I was questing through Britannia while my band was jumping on mushrooms or whateverthefuck on the NES. 7.5 was probably my favorite, because I was working part-time and totally catassed it. I also loved 8 once it was patched.
U4 I got through the piracy group I belonged to, yay air force research geeks. But no manual, and no internet :) So I had to figure out spells and all that command line stuff on my own. Being an art major, I wrote my own manual with illustrations and ran a BBS wiki equivalent (actually it was an adjunct to my skateboarding BBS that ended up taking over the site due to popularity and $$).