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Ultima V - Unofficially Reborn Via Dungeon Siege
Ian "Tiberius" Frazier writes "Team Lazarus, a volunteer-run 'mod' organization, has released a playable demo of Ultima V: Lazarus to the public. Ultima V: Lazarus is a complete, but unofficial recreation of ORIGIN Systems' classic 1987 role-playing game Ultima V: Warriors of Destiny, utilizing the modding capabilities of Gas-Powered Games' Dungeon Siege. Functional on both Mac and PC versions of Dungeon Siege, Lazarus Alpha Demo 1.0 is not yet feature-complete, but includes the ability to explore all of Verity Isle, a robust dialogue system, re-designed, custom artwork, vicious monsters and cunning wizards, and a digitally re-mastered soundtrack."
The Ultima series were some of my favourite games. I hope that Lazarus can live up to the expectations of the many fans that the originals gained.
I can't say that I don't give a fuck. I've just run out of fuck to give.
As to permission, IIRC, they spoke with Richard Garriot, who supported them on the project. He is the creator, and allowed them to use Lord British (Garriot's trademark, not EA's). Although he can't allow the use of Ultima (unfortunately, EA's trademark), he did allow the use of everything that he can.
As for EA fighting the trademark use, I can't say. Maybe they've decided that the backlash from angry gamers would be too great; maybe Lazarus hasn't registered on their radar yet. If EA does complain, then the Lazarus team may need to rename; however, they have many sources for names that RG has allowed them - Britannia, for example, would work as a game name, and would be recognizable to Ultima fans.
I can't say that I don't give a fuck. I've just run out of fuck to give.
Considering the fact that EA has failed to go after any of these projects, some of which have been publicly announced for *years*, I doubt they'll choose to go after any of them now. Consider that:
- Many of the free UO servers such as Sphere have been in widespread use for several years now, and EA has not batted an eye, despite obvious terms of service violations.
- Reimplementations of early Ultimas are being distributed on the net, including all the games' original data files, and have been for some time. If this is a violation of EA's IP, Ultima IV is the exception, since it has been officially released into the public domain.
- Ultima map viewers are available, and contain most of the data files for the first six games.
- The Macintosh version of Ultima III is distributed as shareware, with a paid registration requred to unlock the full version.
Not only does this demonstrate that EA does not care about the license for the early Ultima games, it probably also gives them a very loose footing for enforcing their copyright should they ever choose to do so, since they've let it slide for so long. It is actually in EA's best interest to just let these things go. A loyal fanbase that keeps their IP in the public eye is probably their last hope for being able to get any more cash out of the franchise. The loss of the fan's goodwill would ruin the marketability of the Ultima franchise, especially since Lord British is no longer part of the company (though he does still show great interest in projects such as Lazarus. I also recall he had some very kind things to say about the GameBoy Color version of Ultima III.)
Maybe I should contact them and grant them the rights to use my two trademarks that appeared in Ultima V, "Dr. Cat" and "The Cat's Lair". Not that anyone probably cares. I do hope their project and all the other re-creation projects do well. It's nice to see some of the older classic games kept alive, I've met too many people these days that think the only Ultima game is Ultima Online!
Furcadia - A free online game with user created content, DragonSpeak scripting, & more.
I swear I played the original game for months and couldn't win it. I knew everything I had to do but I couldn't advance my characters to levels high enough to make it through the underworld without being munched by "Demon: Summons Demon" BS. IIRC only the character that killed something got any XP for it, so I'd end up with a 9th level, hammer-weilding Shamino and a bunch of pansy 5th level hangers-on.
I played it simultaneously with the original Might and Magic. Both games were incredibly rich, filled with details. Both were very much opposite of modern games like NWN - I'd love to see an NWN-like game with outdoor areas the size of those found in the later Ultima games, or the tiny discoveries that suddenly change the way the game is played (such as U5's magic carpet).
I loved the fact that in Ultima5, the NPCs had their own schedules, and the free-form conversation system that really did reward me for the occasional tangent from a character's main purpose.
Dungeon Siege, on the other hand, was been almost the antithesis of a decent CRPG. The graphics and music were cool but it was at-best a half-step over a Diablo clickfest (don't even get me started on that one). The whole game was "Oh, a new tileset, and different color bad guys. Yay."
I'm glad I only paid $15 for it, and with an Ultima-like expansion, maybe now I'll feel like I got my money's worth.
-- I wanna decide who lives and who dies - Crow T. Robot, MST3K
EA was not involved in this whole affair.
While it's true that EA didn't "go after them", your summary is likewise incorrect. What actually happened is that they tried to get explicit permission from EA for the project, and failed to get any response at all; in the absence of any clear legal status they opted to use the engine for an original game. The timeframe is slightly confused, but their story, at least, is that the decision to go commercial was subsequent to that.
We'd love to hear from you! :) Also, if possible, we'd like to get a photo of you so we'll have something to base your character's in-game portrait off of.
Please drop me a line at tiberius@planetdungeonsiege.com