On Wed, 18 Sep 2024 11:20:06 -0400, Spalls Hurgenson <spallshurgenson@gmail.com> wrote:

Since many of its features are controlled by directly editing its
CONFIG file, here are some tips for newbies.

Thank you for the information. I took a screenshot of your post and
filed it away with my Ultima files. If or when I get around to playing
this one, I will definitely be trying out Nuvie and referring to your
info. But I am also going to remember what Ross said.

I already played Ultima 1-5 so I am actually up to this now. I did
play Ultima 7 and 7.5 but it was so long ago I barely remember them
and I am not sure if I ever finished them or not. They were my
favorites though so I wouldn't mind playing those two again.

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On Tue, 24 Sep 2024 23:14:44 -0400, Spalls Hurgenson <spallshurgenson@gmail.com> wrote:

That said, I actually sort of _liked_ the combat system. Not because
the combat was fun (it wasn't) but because it de-emphasised the combat >entirely. Your party generally was incredibly overpowered anyway, and
by mid-game you could easily trounce any enemy. Pressing "c"
essentially turned into a "make the bad guys go away" button; no fuss,
no muss. That let me focus more on the bits that Ultima 7 _was_ good
at; the exploration and world-building.

I'm not sure if that's what Origin intended, but that's the effect it
had on me.

I agree completely. I had the exact same opinion of the combat. It
sucked but I was ok with its suckage. I liked exploring the world and
talking to its inhabitants. A deep involved combat system would just
get in the way.

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Mike S. <Mike_S@nowhere.com> wrote:

I enjoyed Ultima 4 and 5 a lot for reasons other then the combat and I
did not have any nostalgia for them as I never played those as a kid.
I think I am going to like Ultima 6 and 7 just fine.

I played Ultima V when it was new and I enjoyed the combat. It was the
first RPG I played where the combat felt "tactical" to me. It doesn't
hold up compared to the tactical RPGs that came later, but it showed
that the sort of combat I had always wanted in RPGs was possible.

--
l/ // Ross Ridge -- The Great HTMU
[oo][oo] rridge@csclub.uwaterloo.ca
-()-/()/ http://www.csclub.uwaterloo.ca:11068/
db //

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On Tue, 24 Sep 2024 23:14:44 -0400, in comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.action,
Spalls Hurgenson wrote:

On Mon, 23 Sep 2024 12:52:51 +0200, "Werner P." <werpu@gmx.at> wrote:

Am 19.09.24 um 18:07 schrieb Spalls Hurgenson:

I replayed Ultima 7 a few years back. I was disappointed to learn that
the experience wasn't as great as I remembered. Without argument,
"Ultima 7" was a groundbreaking game, taking many of the ideas of
"Ultima 6" and giving them some necessary polish.

Ultima 7 did not age well, the combat system was a mess and that drags
the experience down nowadays.
I will stick to my fond memories, had the same experience as you!

A lot of people complain about Ultima 7's combat, and understandably
so. The game stripped out all strategy -and pretty much all control-
from the game. You'd hit the "c" key to switch your party into combat
mode, and the AI would instantly take over, automatically running
about willy-nilly swatting at enemies until all nearby foes were dead.

Technically, you _could_ control the characters manually but -because
the game was real-time- this was functionally useless. The enemy AI
didn't wait for you, and managing the characters was a mess.

Worst was when a party member got seriously wounded; he'd run away
(often dropping his weapon and equipment) and -if the enemy chased
him- might even die offscreen and you'd never find him.

That said, I actually sort of _liked_ the combat system. Not because
the combat was fun (it wasn't) but because it de-emphasised the combat >entirely. Your party generally was incredibly overpowered anyway, and
by mid-game you could easily trounce any enemy. Pressing "c"
essentially turned into a "make the bad guys go away" button; no fuss,
no muss. That let me focus more on the bits that Ultima 7 _was_ good
at; the exploration and world-building.

I'm not sure if that's what Origin intended, but that's the effect it
had on me.

Yeah. Didn't bug me either. You just learn to manage the side-effects and
move on.

Ultima VII, though much vaunted, was just not a very good game though
IMO. It was not the train wreck that was Ultima VIII, which effectively euthanized the series, but the quest was a huge McGuffin chase and the
Guardian was just not a good challenge compared to ethical improvement. I
blame EA demanding a more Hollywood experience. EA ruins everything.

I never got more than halfway through Serpent Isle, though the system was
more polished. I simply got bored.

U6 was the last satisfying Ultima I played. The third trilogy was pants.
U5 is the pinnacle, IMO. Especially the possibility of just getting
trapped with Lord British if you did the dumb thing.

--
Zag

No one ever said on their deathbed, 'Gee, I wish I had
spent more time alone with my computer.' ~Dan(i) Bunten

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El Sat, 14 Sep 2024 22:21:19 -0400, Spalls Hurgenson escribió:

So, today I learned about something that's sort of a dream come true for me...

Ultima VI, released way back in 1990, was something of a groundbreaking
game. But despite it having lush graphics, it hasn't aged all that well, largely because of its very clunky interface and extremely limited view-distance. I've often tried to go back and replay the game, but
these downsides have been such a thorn that I've given up before I'm
more than an hour or two into the game.

Often I've wondered why nobody ever created some sort of mod or patch to
this game to make it more palatable to gamers spoiled by modern
amenities. Well, it turns out they did.*

Ultima VI NuVIe not only allows the ancient DOS game to run on modern hardware (not that was so difficult with DOSBox, but still) and fixes
its two most egregious issues. First, it greatly expands the scale of
the view window**, allowing you to see more than five tiles in any
direction (I find double that satisfactory). Secondly, it improves the drag-n-drop mouse control. Given how much of the game revolves around inventory management, this is an incredibly useful feature.

The mod actually isn't new; it was in development over a decade ago. For
some reason though, it never came to my attention, even though it is _exactly_ the sort of thing I'd been looking for.

Anyway, I discovered it today, and couldn't be happier.

Get it here:
https://sourceforge.net/projects/nuvie/

Thank you Internet! You made my day!

Oh, and if you happen to have the FM Towns version of Ultima VI, it'll
even use the full-speech voice-acting! Although given the lackluster performances, that may not be as much a bonus as it first sounds ;-)

----------------
* actually, there are multiple such efforts, but they all transformed
the game into something too distant from its original form. One uses the Ultima VII engine, the other Dungeon Siege engine. They're both
interesting projects, but don't really feel like "Ultima VI" as I
remember it.

** albeit not by default. You need to tweak the config files to get the improved result

Current Scummvm supports Ultima games too.

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Am 15.09.24 um 04:21 schrieb Spalls Hurgenson:

Get it here:
https://sourceforge.net/projects/nuvie/

Thank you Internet! You made my day!

Apparently there also is a port of the game to the Exult/Ultima 7
engine, it was in active development a while ago, dont know how far it is!

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Zaghadka <zaghadka@hotmail.com> wrote:

I never got more than halfway through Serpent Isle, though the system was >more polished. I simply got bored.

I finished Serpent Isle, but never finished Ultima VII despite two
attempts because of the same bug. If you fly over the mountains where the final battle happens you can trigger it early, causing you to be permantly locked out of the room where it happens. The second playthrough I knew
about the bug and tried to avoid it, but still managed to accidentally
trigger it

--
l/ // Ross Ridge -- The Great HTMU
[oo][oo] rridge@csclub.uwaterloo.ca
-()-/()/ http://www.csclub.uwaterloo.ca:11068/
db //

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On Thu, 26 Sep 2024 13:10:14 -0000 (UTC), in
comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.action, Ross Ridge wrote:

Zaghadka <zaghadka@hotmail.com> wrote:

I never got more than halfway through Serpent Isle, though the system was >>more polished. I simply got bored.

I finished Serpent Isle, but never finished Ultima VII despite two
attempts because of the same bug. If you fly over the mountains where the >final battle happens you can trigger it early, causing you to be permantly >locked out of the room where it happens. The second playthrough I knew
about the bug and tried to avoid it, but still managed to accidentally >trigger it

Huh. I never ran into that one. I break games regularly, finding niche
bugs, but I guess I don't find major bugs.

--
Zag

No one ever said on their deathbed, 'Gee, I wish I had
spent more time alone with my computer.' ~Dan(i) Bunten

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