Dungeon Siege based Ultima remakes: Ultima 5: Lazarus and Ultima 6 Project

[Ozzy]

Hi everybody. Not sure if there are many Ultima fans here, but I would like to point out two finished Ultima remake projects to the ones that are here. And of course to eveyone else interested. Both remakes were created as mods for Dungeon Siege (1), so you need to have that game installed in order to play the mods.

Ultima 5: Lazarus

The remake of the game Ultima 5: Warriors of Destiny was named Ultima 5: Lazarus and the final version (v1.2) has been released in April 2006. Despite initial scepticism the project has been very well received in the Ultima community.


Official description

Ultima V: Lazarus is an exceedingly ambitious project that greatly improves the graphics and sound of the PC version of Ultima V. However, that's not all. Rather than releasing an "upgrade patch," as happened with Ultima IV, what we've done is a true from-the-ground-up remake of the gaming classic, Ultima V.

It is built in the Dungeon Siege 3D RPG engine and it has brand new graphics, CD-quality orchestral music (including re-mastered versions of the original U5 music plus some new pieces), improved and expanded dialogue, and a much more "alive" design for the Underworld, amongst other improvements.

Links:

www.u5lazarus.com – Official site

http://www.sylore.com/games/u5-lazar...mod-guide.html - Utima 5 Lazarus mod guide (yes, there are mods for the mod)

http://www.gamersinfo.net/articles/1...tima-v-lazarus - Review of the game at Gamers Info


Videos:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UB-ITnsXTy0 – Official trailer

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o2_rdUSmzVg – Intro & Gameplay

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JUjy_...eature=related – Gameplay with commentary (55 videos in the playlist at the moment)

Ultima 6 Project

The remake of the game Ultima 6: The False Prophet was simply named Ultima 6 project. Version 1.0 has been released on July 5h 2010 (so, yesterday) .

Official anouncement of the v1.0 release

5 July 2010:

On this, the 20th anniversary year of the release of Origin Systems' Ultima 6, it is with much pleasure that we announce the 1.0 release of Team Archon's Ultima 6 Project, for Dungeon Siege 1 (PC and Mac). Players will find a huge and exciting world waiting to be discovered:

- Travel throughout the lands of Britannia, exploring deep, dark forests with bandits lying in wait, deserts and swamps teaming with monsters, and peaceful towns and villages filled with shops, old friends, and interesting people just waiting to give the player numerous and exciting quests to solve.
- Explore deep and dangerous caves and caverns full of treasure and hidden surprises. Bring your breadcrumbs to mark your trail, or be prepared to be thoroughly and completely lost, with your remains left to be found by future explorers.
- Sail the savage seas to explore remote islands, but be vigilant for there are sea monsters lying in wait for the careless traveler
- Discover a hidden new world, far from Britannia.
- Encounter strange and exotic races, including the mysterious Gargoyles.
- Fight fearsome monsters, find pirate loot, solve a murder, and discover the truth behind the numerous attacks on Britannia’s towns.
- Learn the commerce of the land for fun and profit.
- Learn magical spells, search for magic reagents, and join guilds to gain special benefits.
- Those players with proclivities to the dark side can follow an "evil path".
- And, last, but not least, ferret out the hidden Easter eggs.

Links:

www.u6project.com – Official site

http://www.rpgwatch.com/show/news?ref=0&id=36 – Coverage of the game at RPG watch including news, articles describing the project at various stages of development and a very nice gallery of in game screenshots

http://www.projectbritannia.com/inde..._smf&Itemid=98 – Official forum of the Ultima 6 project, which now also serves as a forum for Ultima 5 Lazarus as the original Lazarus forums are defunct.


Video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p_Ka634314Q – Video of the intro and gameplay made by a fan when milestone 5 of the U6 project was released. Although video is pretty old (2008), it gives a decent impression about the look and feel of the game.





I believe that you can find enough information about the games using provided links, so I won't go into more details for now, but feel free to ask me. If anybody is interested there is also plenty of discussion about both games on the RPGcodex forums (www.rpgcodex.net).



Btw: I am also pimping this as I was a member of the development team on both projects (programmer).