Brad Schoonmaker on 24/10/2000 at 21:46
xman
I never ran into save game errors, but when starting the Skara Brae related quests I did enter the Twilight Zone. I never did get the messages from Shamino's statues that are refered to later in the game. Someone told me to go to the sacked village NW of Yew, but I never did figure out what was so special there.
Brad S.
[This message has been edited by Brad Schoonmaker (edited October 24, 2000).]
PraetorJudis on 25/10/2000 at 15:42
Yop, my point about the linear gameplay is that you could create show stopping bugs by straying.
I don't mind being shepherded through a story, in fact it's often preferable to wondering, "what the hell am I supposed to do next," at every turn. U7 was pretty darn linear as far as the main plot line is concerned, but I could wander the entire world playing all the side plots as much as I liked without even worrying about the main plot and whether I was breaking the storyline (with the exception of that nasty Isle of the Avatar bug)...
So when I complain about a game being linear, I'm really complaining about not feeling free to wander around of my own accord.
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PraetorJudis
(
http://www.pjsattic.com) PJsAttic.com, (
http://www.pjsattic.com/odinbrea) Odin's Breath
Brad Schoonmaker on 25/10/2000 at 21:59
PraetorJudis
I got 'ya. I pretty much play U7 the same way, as I do with most games. I agree with you about wandering around the game being an important exception for the story flow as well as the gameflags placements.
U9 is a worthy ending to the series, I think, but I do see that there are plenty of times the player is left out of the loop of the storyline. Mostly, this is alright, since gamers can get back on track. Although, as you stated, there are times when this can literally stop the storyline's flow. At least in my case, it did. I kept going, though, and really loved the way the build up to the finale felt like an ending to a great saga.
I actually cheated and used Windows Media Player to view the video clips for all the cutscenes, but still the ending wasn't ruined by that, since the gameplay leading to that point was done so well.
Brad S.
Krynoid on 28/10/2000 at 23:24
I bought Ultima 9 about a month ago and I must say that it is a really good game beneath all the bugs.... I'm playing it on a PIII 600 with 128mb ram and a Riva TNT 32 mb graphics card. And it just about the slowest game I've ever played!!!!! Áctually, I wonder where the hell I get the patience.... I used to play Ultima 6 on my C64 and that game was faster..... anyway, U9 is still an awesome game. An example.... The ruins of New Magincia at dawn.... the morning fog and the ruins....
Brad Schoonmaker on 29/10/2000 at 00:54
Krynoid
I know what you mean by slow. My machine is a PII 400 mHz with 128 megs RAM and a VooDoo 3 graphics card. It runs good enough, but slows down a lot.
I played U6 on my C64 computer, too! That's definitely where you got your patience. A game without sound is hard to finish without some.
New Magincia is one of my favorite places in the game. The weather is so realistic in this game. Remember the rain storms out of nowhere near Yew?
Brad S.
[This message has been edited by Brad Schoonmaker (edited October 28, 2000).]
Steezo on 29/10/2000 at 11:40
Allright allright, I'm back.
First off, as to the guy who started this thread, save your money, U9 is a waste of space. It is exactly the type of tomb raiderish game that exemplefies what I think is wrong with various parts of the game industry. Great graphics and sound, lackluster gameplay. Plotholes large enough to sail a Navy cruiser through, and a dissatisfying ending. Not only did they change the nature of the good guy and the bad guy, let's see, they failed to deliver on so many parts. I was a long time fan of the series. I've even got a copy of the original plotline somwhere. But, after 5 years in development, all the original talent leaving Origin, EA dictacting that they'll do online games only after this [mainly due to UO's being able to screw people out of $10 a month.] The series creator had little to do with it's development, blah blah blah, i could go on. but as is, i'm beginning to ramble. I'll shut up now.
U9, crappy end to what used to best CRPG series ever, well, it was the best until Ultima 8, but that's another rant.
Nedan on 30/10/2000 at 05:30
Ok... I never encountered any of the plotline bugs. Could it be because I never strayed off the main plotline? I don't really know. I'll have to try straying next time I play to see those bugs.
Steezo... I can't agree with you. Ultima9 may have it's fair share of problems... but it wasn't a horrible game. If you would just overlook the bugs, you would find a really great RPG.
Brad Schoonmaker on 30/10/2000 at 22:52
Nedan
That's my point, too, but Steezo does have a point about the whole shift in priorities at Origin/EA during production. I didn't follow the forum there when it was still running, nor did I check the company's status too often, but from what I can see in Origin's forum archives and early screenshots, I am a little disappointed in how the game was shipped out seemingly just to ship it, finally. I can get over it, though, because what else are we supposed to do? It's not like a cafe where you return the food if it isn't to your liking.
Inline Image:
http://www.ttlg.com/forums/ubb/wink.gifBrad S.
xman on 31/10/2000 at 11:02
The simplest modification I made to make U9 run smooth (YES! SMOOTH!!!) was to switch mip-mapping OFF!
I have 128MB of RAM and I believe 256MB are required if you want the mip-mapping (I've just orderer 128 extra MB and I should receive them in a few days) I'll tell you if mip-mapping is OK then.
Other modifications I made were:
- set the MeshMemoryCacheSize to about 20MB
- install (full) the game on one drive (e.g. D: )
- set a fixed size swap file for windows (I chose 320MB which seems to be just fine) and locate this file on C:
(OK, you need 2 hard drives, but that's not a big deal)
With all this, there is less memory swapping (thanks to mipmapping off and increased mesh cache) and the few swappings left are faster because of the optimisation of the swap file.
[This message has been edited by xman (edited October 31, 2000).]
xman on 31/10/2000 at 11:06
And I definitely recommand this game if you can find it at a low price!
Even with all its problems, it's wonderful to run through Britannia in 3D with such fabulous graphics! (and with a few tweaks in the options.ini file, it runs rather fine).
