I played UO for years as well. I was on Lake Superior for a couple years until they introduced Trammel. Then I tried Siege for a few weeks but didn't have the foundation to get established with a group of people so it just turned out brutal and frustrating.

Later on (early 2000s) I played on IPY, the extremely popular pre-Trammel free shard. From the get-go I had a friend with me and he introduced me to a friend of his from World of Warcraft. The 3 of us met another group of people and we joined up to form a guild. We were so successful that we all became friends and played on multiple subsequent free shards together. A few years ago I even took a trip down to the Bay Area to stay with some of them; they've become lifelong friends.

Playing UO with a group of people you know really well that know how to work together as a team is a thrill like no other. Taking trips to a dungeon together and getting into street battles along the Vesper strip is just fantastic. On several occasions we found our whole group red (branded as murderers) and being chased by a mob of people from town.

UO is the only MMORPG I'm aware of where you can actually steal items from other people. I had a ton of fun playing a thief who could also cast spells. So many people expected a thief to run away instead of fighting back! They got a nasty surprise when they attacked me.