Always found it strange that EA never bothered with using the Ultima IP to make an open world game that competes with TES. In spite of Oblivion's gigantic success, the open world RPG sub-genre has surprisingly little saturation.
You mean "open world" like Ultima Online, or "open world" like the failed Ultima 9: Ascension? I think after IX the franchise was pretty much a dead duck - until now, it seems...