Produced by: Thepal
Website: Ethereal Software
Releases:
* Buccaneer’s Den Demo (requires the official plugins, Bloodmoon and Tribunal)

This remake is the only Ultima remake, at present, that is being made with the Oblivion engine. Unlike Redemption, Infinity Eternal is being made to be more faithful to the plot of the original Ultima 9 while adjusting those things which irritated many Ultima fans. The most interesting thing about this remake seems to be that it will feature travelling to other worlds, including Serpent Isle and other familiar worlds.

The above demo is from the days when the project was being built with the Morrowind engine, and so will not be reflective of the final product. It is being kept online for the moment pending the release of a new demo from the team.

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Produced by: Firstknight, Hawkwind, Iceblade and Splat
Website: Forgotten World
Forum: Forgotten World @ Titans of Ether
Releases:
* Freedom Mod (3.1 MiB, 71 hits)
* 2009 Beautiful Britannia Demo (6.7 MiB, 217 hits)

Forgotten World started as a ‘Freedom Mod‘ for Ascension, assembled by Michael Menapace in response to the rather absurdly linear feel to the plot of this last Ultima title. The mod didn’t do much to alter the order of events in the game, or to change at all the inconsistencies encountered in Ultima 9’s plot. What it does do, however, is alter some aspects of the structure of Britannia, eliminating obstacles that previously prevented you from roaming the land of Britannia freely.

Eventually, the project grew and a team joined FIrstkniGHT. FIrstkniGHT himself left the team for a while, though the project moved on; it gained a website and grew more ambitious, evolving into an attempt to decode the Ascension game files with an eye toward building a world and game editor, in order to provide players with a better experience.

Firstknight (slight spelling change) has since rejoined the team, and the project has been split into two separate projects: Beautiful Britannia (a more “lush” version of the original Ultima 9) and its “Unlimited” spinoff (a more lush Ultima 9 with a few additions and revisions), and Forgotten World proper (the in-engine remake, which will feature many corrections and updates). The world editor is not being worked on as much; the team instead want to produce a series of viable Ascensions mods.

The ultimate goal of Forgotten World hasn’t changed, however: they are still intent on turning Ultima 9 — using its original, promising engine (albeit with a little help from the OGRE 3D engine as well) — into a canonical, consistent-with-its-predecessors Ultima game.

The project focus has also shifted in terms of the content the team is aiming to produce; Firstknight’s principal aim is to produce a series of well-crafted Ascension mods, rather than become lost chasing something which may not be deliverable in the first place.

Tags: Beautiful Britannia, Britannia, Forgotten World, Freedom Mod, OGRE, Ultima, Ultima 9

Produced by: Gordon McNutt
Website: Nazghul CRPG
Releases:
* Windows Binary v0.6.0
* Mac OS X Universal Binary v0.5.6
* Source Code v0.6.0
* Nokia 770/M800

Still in development (although you can download and compile the source, which is currently at version 0.6.0), Nazghul is a 2D single-player computer role-playing game (CRPG) engine in the grand tradition of Ultimas 1 through 5. Much as with EUO, the developer proudly states that if you are looking for gorgeous graphics and squad-based combat, you should look elsewhere.

Haxima is the game being developed concurrently with the Nazghul engine, and features an Ultima-inspired tale of adventure.

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Produced by: Olivier Marcoux
Website: U7-Wizard
Releases:
* [drain file 36 url Ultima 7 Wizard v1.9 (with source code)] ([drain file 36 size])
* [drain file 185 url Technical Documentation] ([drain file 185 size])

Before there was Exult Studio, there was the Ultima 7 Wizard. This program allows for the editing of maps, scenery, and objects of Ultima 7 and Serpent Isle. As well, it allows you to browse the characters and portraits, and listen to the sounds and music in the game (including dialogues).

Tags: Exult Studio, Serpent Isle, Ultima 7, Ultima 7 Wizard

First off, Happy New Year to everyone. I hope that you were able to ring in 2008 in a way that was both safe and enjoyable for you and your friends or family; I spent it with my wife and her two sisters at the big New Year’s bash in Edmonton’s downtown core.

Here, I’ll share a photo:

Anyhow, I said I wouldn’t be posting again until the new year, and this has happened. In the interim, a few things worth reporting on have taken place in the Ultima community. Dino’s Ultima Page has tracked a number of these, so let’s get down to those updates first:

Forgotten World

The Forgotten World team report that their world editor is progressing ‘fairly’ — rendering is essentially done, and they are almost ready to begin work on UI design. That’s a promising development for this in-engine remake of Ultima 9

To that end, they need someone to join the project to help out with that aspect of development. So, O reader, if you happen to be:

• an experienced user of world building software
• willing to help us design the user interface of our world editor
• interested in the Ultima series and in creating maps for the game
• patient, communicative and team-oriented
• experienced with programming (perhaps even with wxWidgets) as a plus

…then perhaps, just perhaps, you should drop the Forgotten World team a note and let them know you’d be interested.

Forgotten World was also evidently featured in a German game magazine, “PC Action“, recently.

Lost Sosaria

I have added a dozen new screenshots to the Lost Sosaria website, showcasing the mountain areas I’ve been working on recently. Hopefully, these will be the last screenshots released using the current version of the mountain tileset for the project; a new version is slated to be released shortly after the next update to Neverwinter Nights.

Ultima IX: Redemption

Spyder has posted a number of screenshots of Moonglow in the relevant developer’s diary (you have to be a registered user of the Titans of Ether forums to see them), including one of an Observatory and one of what might be a blacksmith’s shop.

Also, Direhaggis left a comment on the Redemption entry here at the site, imparting the following information:

The progress has been quite good. I think our 3D artist and the new writers helped to re-stimulate us all, as well as the main plot coming to a close in the next 3-6 months.

Management decided that a demo would slow down production. Originally, we thought of isolating New Magincia and allowing the Avatar to solve the quest there. As it is, we want to try to get the game out by the end of 2008.

Good to know!

Ultima V: Lazarus

The German version of Ultima V: Lazarus has been released. I have updated the project entry here at Aiera with the new files.

Ultima 5 for TI Calculators

Ranman puts his development progress at 94% now, and notes that several new features have been implemented since last we checked in with him:

• the Lord Blackthorn cut scene
• Stargazing with the telescope
• Quit and Save, with game resumption
• the Shrine of Spirituality
• food consumption and food obtaining, starvation
• Skiff and Frigate navigation, sea combat

Ultima: Iris

Build 1648 of the 3D client for has been released. A copy is available for download from the project entry here at Aiera.

Additionally, I noticed that the following updates had also taken place on other remake project sites.

Pentagram

There’s no news from this Ultima 8 remake, but I did notice that a new version of the Windows snapshot had been uploaded on January 1st. This can now be downloaded from the project entry here at Aiera.

Project Britannia

Three core files for this project — britannia_art.dsres, britannia_logic.dsres, and pb_laz_comp_layer.dsres — have all been updated. Changes are as follows.

britannia_art.dsres

• 2 new lutes have been added
• More journal labels have been added — untested
• Two chest icons were brightened a bit
• A new trail ration texture was added

britannia_logic.dsres

• bookshelf animation reverted to a previous version
• minor bug-fixes to the sleeping system
• updated lute screen names
• updates to the journal UI
• a function was modified to allow NPCs to ignore locked doors
• …and at least 40 other changes

pb_laz_comp_layer.dsres

• minor change, just synching the compatibility layer with the latest updates in other areas of Project Britannia

The latest versions of these files are available for download through the project entry here at Aiera.

Ultima VII Mod

Matt Johnston informs us that he has done a bit more work on his Exult total conversion:

the outdoor areas of the main map are mostly done; I’ve done a bit with usecode, including one NPC who sells some mostly useless things; sewers and theives guild areas under the south-western city demonstrate use of newly implemented support of Z coords in intermap teleports.

While not complete yet by any means, Matt assures us that he continues his work on this project. As he periodically uploads new content to the site (without announcement of this fact, however), I have updated the copy of the project available for download through the project entry here at Aiera.

Serpent Isle for NWN2

Jaesun gives notice that the project is ON HOLD — it appears that the state Jaesun lives in suffered some catastrophic flooding recently. While he lost nothing project-wise, he did lose his vehicle, and was physically unable to enter the building for a few days as well.

In the meantime, he will be assisting with the Realms of Ultima project, a project he feels is “very important” for the Ultima community.

Which brings me to…

Realms of Ultima

What Project Britannia is doing for Ultima using the Dungeon Siege engine, Realms of Ultima is doing for Ultima using the Neverwinter Nights 2 engine. This is an exciting looking project indeed; NWN2 has a gorgeous engine, and Jaesun’s efforts above would seem to demonstrate that it’s possible to build very quickly with the engine.

A screenshot gallery has been posted online, with several amazing visuals. I have also added a project entry here at Aiera. There are even a few downloads for the project (although these primarily appear to be components of the whole, rather than early snapshots of the entire project).

Update: Ultima 7 Wizard

A user reported difficulties getting the Ultima 7 Wizard to run on their system, so I have updated the entry here at Aiera with the latest version (1.9) of the program, as well as a technical document. Source code (Borland Pascal) is included with this version.

Tags: Aiera, Dino's Ultima Page, Dungeon Siege, Edmonton, Forgotten World, Lord Blackthorn, Lost Sosaria, Morrowind, Neverwinter Nights, Neverwinter Nights 2, PC Action, Pentagram, Project Britannia, Realms of Ultima, Serpent Isle, Shrine of Spirituality, The Elder Scrolls, Titans of Ether, Ultima, Ultima 5, Ultima 7, Ultima 7 Wizard, Ultima 8, Ultima 9, Ultima Online, Ultima V: Lazarus, Ultima: Iris

Produced by: Jaesun
Website: NWN2 Ultima VII Part 2

I do believe this is the first remake to make use of the Neverwinter Nights 2 engine, and what a great Ultima to pick for it. Serpent Isle, the reliable fan favourite, is being re-made by Jaesun with what appears to be, at present, a minimalist style. The developer appears to be aiming for a straight-up, no “extra content” remake of the classic Ultima title.

Development is progressing pretty well, it seems — he seems to have completed most of the towns, and a fair bit of the dialogue as well. He has also completed the Silver Seed expansion. And, as is the case with many projects, he is looking for additional project team members.

No files have been released for this project yet, apart from a few screenshots. But it’s worth taking a look at, and the pace of development seems speedy.

Tags: Neverwinter Nights 2, Serpent Isle, Ultima, Ultima 7

Produced by: Matthew Johnston
Website: Ultima VII Mod
Releases:
* Ultima VII Mod

This total conversion for Exult tells the tale of the war-ravaged land of Norstadt, once a thriving kingdom and now overrun by Goblins and other monsterforms. The besieged city of Nordgarde is all that remains of this once-mighty human kingdom, and many refugees have fled south from the land.

Matthew Johnston’s ambitious mod is still in its infancy, but the screenshots he has released thus far boast a good deal of promise. He really seems to be stretching the Ultima 7 engine to the limits of its performance.

Tags: Exult, Ultima 7