That’s right, dear Readers — Ultima: Aiera now has its own domain: www.ultimaaiera.com. Don’t worry, though — your bookmarks for aiera.timeimmortal.net should still work. Wordpress is cool that way.

There’s actually a reason for the move, in that I’m looking to counteract the “subdomain sprawl” I seem to have developed on my server, and in so doing make the arrangement and distribution of subdomains a little more intelligent. In this specific case, I’ll be moving the Lost Sosaria subdomain over to this domain — it makes more sense to me, from an organizational perspective, to have my Ultima-related project be attached directly to my Ultima news website.

There’s one other reason as well, and that is to provide a framework through which to offer Ultima project developers who need web space the opportunity to have a subdomain set up for their project at Aiera directly, whether to host downloads or an entire project website as need dictates.

At any rate, the site has been configured to use http://www.ultimaaiera.com as its base URL, so when you click on links from now on, even if you came here via the old address (which will, as I note, continue to work), you’ll be taken to the new domain. I don’t foresee any problems, but if the reader should notice any I encourage him or her to let me know.

Tags: Aiera, domain, Ultima, Wordpress

Produced by:Babylon Team
Website: La Traduzione Italiana
Releases:
* See the developer’s download page!

An effort to translate The Black Gate and Serpent Isle into Italian, which is now complete (as well, the Keyring Mod has also been translated).

Please note that this project requires Exult 1.4 in order to work.

Tags: Exult, Serpent Isle, The Black Gate, translation, Ultima 7

Okay, so at least a few people contacted me while I was away with news of Ultima-related news, either via the contact form, direct email, or the comments for this post. Once again, it’s good — no, great — to see the community pitching in to help the site move along. Thanks go out to everyone who submitted information.

So…what’s news?

Ultima 5 for TI Calculators

Ranman dropped us a line about the status of his port of this classic Ultima title to the TI calculator. He pegs the development status as being 90.5% complete, and offers a new screenshot of Orcs in the game.

SI BG Merge

This was an interesting little tidbit that I tripped over in the Exult forums. It’s a patch that imports the shapes from The Black Gate into Serpent Isle, fabricated by Malignant Manor.

I’ve created an entry here at Aiera for the project, and uploaded the latest version of the patch (6.7) for download. It looks like this is a pretty active project at the moment, so I’ll be sure to keep an eye on it.

Project Britannia

Frilly Wumpus posted news at the Project Britannia website concerning an update to Siege Tools. This is definitely a developer-oriented update, and he notes that the improvements include things such as:

• DS1, DS2, LOA, and BW code completion
• Built-in API explorer and the ability to add additional documentation to core GPG classes
• Basic Syntax checking
• Code completion for Gas templates

The latest version of Siege Tools (1.0.29) is available for download either from the PB website, or through the project entry here at Aiera.

A forum for posting information and comments about Siege Tools has also been set up, which developers using this engine will hopefully find useful.

Ashes

The project website for this Ultima-like game has been changed a bit, and now features an updated note from project lead Andrea concerning what the game is and what its inspirations are. No new news is present, however.

Nazghul/Haxima

Gordon has released version 0.6.0 (only the source at present, though) of his Ultima-like engine Nazghul, and the associated game he is making with it, Haxima. You can download the updated version from the project’s SourceForge page, or from the project entry here at Aiera.

Hopefully there will be Windows and Mac OS X binaries available soon.

Notable improvements in this version of Nazghul include:

• Detailed speed handling
• Better support for diagonal movement
• Partial opacity support has been added to the terrains
• Improvements to the map editor
• New spells
• Improved dungeon randomization code
• …and a whole lot more

Serpent Isle for NWN2

Continuing with his tendency to move with alarming speed, Jaesun has made several updates to his remake of Serpent Isle. Notably, he has finished the Arrival Area, dialogue for Moonshade, the Northern Isle quest, the Mad Mage Isle, and Monk Isle. And all this in the last couple of weeks.

There are a few nice screenshots to see at the project site, so be sure to give them a look!

Also, there seems to be a bit of an interesting debate going on in the Exult forums over the practical and technical implications of making an “online” version of Ultima 7. We’ll see if that turns into any sort of project in the future. It wouldn’t be the only one to come along, of course.

Personally, I count myself as being in the camp of people who would like to see Ultima 7 go online, as has been done with Ultima 6, although I admit that I lack the necessary technical skill to put any sort of meaningful work into the code necessary to realize that dream.

Tags: Ashes, Dungeon Siege, Exult, Haxima, Mac, Nazghul, Neverwinter Nights 2, Project Britannia, Serpent Isle, Siege Tools, Texas Instruments, The Black Gate, Ultima, Ultima 5, Ultima 6, Ultima 7, Windows

Grace and I landed safely at Edmonton International Airport later in the evening last Friday (the 2nd of November), ending off our ten-day honeymoon in Greece tired and more than a little glad to be back in North America, but still in awe of what was, for the most part, an enjoyable adventure abroad. Although it started out feeling more like a trip than a honeymoon, we slowed our pace down a bit and just enjoyed each others’ company for a few days…and it was great. I am truly blessed to have such a wonderful wife as she.

It was nice to just get away from all the hectic tedium of the wedding and post-wedding frenzy, and to be equally sure it was nice to just get away from the apartment for a day or ten. I had only moved my things over to Grace’s a couple of days prior to the wedding itself, and hadn’t had time to unpack much. Add that to a considerable load of gifts* and it makes for one very messy, box-filled apartment indeed.

And really, I don’t think we could have picked a better place to escape to than the town on Crete that we ended up in. Hania is not exactly a “small town”, with a population somewhere between 57,000 and 70,000 depending on which source you consult, but the architecture has strong Venetian influences, and in the “off season” it has a slow, relaxed pace to it that we just drank in for all the days we were there.

So before we get to the news that’s happened in the last couple of weeks, let me just say that it’s great to finally be married to a girl whom I have loved so much for so many years now. I’m grateful that we had a blast in Greece and that we were able to travel in safety…but that gratitude cannot compare to the joy and praise that I feel in my heart at finally being able to see here there on the next pillow when I wake up in the morning.

Tags: Crete, Edmonton, Grace, Greece, honeymoon, wedding

Produced by: Andrea B. Previtera
Website: Ashes

Ashes is a 3D RPG inspired by, and using similar textures to, Ultima VII. The author is aiming to create a game that has a very similar feel to the classic Ultima title in terms of graphics, world interactivity, and other aspects.

Not to be confused with Exult 3D, which is a 3D visual environment for the actual Ultima VII world, Ashes is definitely a spin-off that has been inspired by the Ultima tradition. It looks very promising, and should be very interesting to play when completed!