Ultima on Linux

Mortimer.CA writes "O'Reilly has a story about someone hacking Ultima VII so that it's multiplatform. Exult is replacing the the rendering engine so the game can be played on more than just DOS. A legal copy of Ultima VII is needed to play Exult. I have 'wasted' so many hours on the Ultima series that it's not funny: now I can waste them again on my Unix box." I might have to see if I still have Ultima VII kicking around. I haven't played it since my college days.

Comments

Follow id's example

[jvmatthe]

I'd like to see more game companies follow the example set by John Carmack and id Software: after the period of greatest commerical gain has expired, release the source to your game, but require it be used with legally obtained data files.

Benefits:
- Your game lives forever. When everyone upgrades to the newest Windows and your game doesn't work, someone can fix it. When a new platform arises, someone can port your game for that community of users.
- Your game can be extended by any inventive, industrious fans.
- You gain a lot of good will with the community of gamers.
- Generates interest in your older products, which leads to interest in newer ones.

Potential harms:
- Increased potential for piracy.
- Increased potentially cheating if an online game (although having the source can mean that anti-cheating measures are easier to implement)
- Ugly coding exposed. ;^)

Anyway, when I see things like Exult and ScummVM which reverse-engineer game engines, I'm struck by how much easier life would be for all involved if the company simply realized that releasing the source could be a great idea, both for them and their customers.

Ok, I admit it, I just want Lucasarts to release the source to Grim Fandango. So sue me. :^D

Ultima Copy Protection Warning

[fm6]

Danger Will Robinson!

You can easily obtain all the Ultima games by downloading them from an abandonware site or (more legitimately) buying an "oldies" CD. One little problem: Lord British was fond of document based copy protection. And he was very creative about it.

I used to think this was pretty cool. Unlike games where you have to find the 3rd word on line 5 of page 23 of the manual to play the game, some Ultima games came with fancy maps (printed on cloth!) or lengthy treatises that you just had to read in order to solve some of the puzzles. And unfortunately these are not provided with most CD re-releases (and not at all with downloads of course). Some fans have provided online versions, but coverage is spotty. Make sure you have Googled all this info before you start the game, or you may find youself stuck in the middle of a game -- forever!