Ultima IX - Released on GOG

This game can now be found at GOG. A tidbit from the promo:

Prepare to embark on the final adventure in Ultima—the best selling role-playing saga of all time that has nurtured generations of gamers. Answer the call and return to Britannia for your last epic quest. As the heroic Avatar, only you can save Lord British and his people from the evil Guardian who has devastated and corrupted the land. Valiant combat, magical prowess, and knowledge of the eight virtues are your weapons against evil in Ultima IX: Ascension

Also, be sure to visit GOG's Youtube channel.
More information.

I originally said I wouldn't buy it as I despised it so much when I played it a few years ago, but at $2.99 (if you have all the other Ultimas) and with the extras they threw in (like the design docs), I couldn't resist.

Who knows, maybe with the Forgotten World mods, this thing will become more enjoyable some day.

they should kickstart a remake one day

It'd be funny to see EA launch a Kickstarter.

My feelings for UIX is that it's mostly a bad Ultima, not necessarily a bad game. I did finish it, which means that I probably found it somewhat enjoyable. But in the end I was very disappointed. For people untainted by the spirit of Ultima, it may be an OK investement.

Not for me, this is one game I'll never replay, so I wouldn't get it even for free.

pibbur who find it appropriate to warn the watch that he also completed and probably enjoyed you know what (the M&M game which should not been mentioned in polite circles like the watch)

This release was just in time for the conclusion of Spoony's Ultima retrospective… bad timing actually…

this game was ackward at best, i spent maybe 10 minutes on it before flushing it off my hard drive.

I remember that finishing this game was a very emotional experience, seeing as it was the end of a love story of nearly fifteen years. I found the game frustrating and not really worthy of the Ultima name (much like Pagan…), but I had to accompany the Avatar until the end of his journey.

I honestly had fun with it for a while, but I had never played any of the previous Ultimas. Technical issues aside, it was a fun world to explore.

Enjoyed it. And I'm happy I played it … because Gothic did almost everything better than (ex-)Origin with U9.

Originally Posted by pibbur who
My feelings for UIX is that it's mostly a bad Ultima, not necessarily a bad game. I did finish it, which means that I probably found it somewhat enjoyable. But in the end I was very disappointed. For people untainted by the spirit of Ultima, it may be an OK investement.

I don't really think so. I wasn't an Ultima fan before I bought Ultima IX. However, I even bought the Dragon Edition of Ultima IX because everything sounded so awesome (and the DE included the entire Ultima saga on disk). In the end I found that the game was horribly disappointing. Clunky controls and technical issues (worst performance of a PC game ever) made it virtually unplayable. I even tried the game again a few years later on much better hardware and it was still the same choppy mess as years before, i.e. like Gothic 3 the engine was/is simply broken beyond any hope of repair.
Never looked back and contrary to pibbur I would only recommend a purchase to hardcore Ultima fans who might have missed out on the ninth installment for some reason or another.

Originally Posted by TheMadGamer
This release was just in time for the conclusion of Spoony's Ultima retrospective… bad timing actually…

What's a paladin? <evil grin>

Gtk about the sale, it's a maybe, thanks.

Besides being a buggy mess at release and all the other fair criticisms, U9 even won my worst quest ever in any RPG ever created.

This game is hopeless as presented. I've tried to start this 4 separate times, with 2 different systems, and gave up in frustration. The best hope is that somebody that knows what they are doing can make a 'fan version' of the game that actually works.

I remember being so excited about playing U9 only to have my expectations totally crushed. I could have gotten past the bugs and technical issues, but what they did to the story was a complete slap in the face to Ultima Fans…Spoony's review is dead on. Anyway, there is a group of talented Ultima fans that are creating their own version of U9 called Redemption. They have been working on it for a long time.

Check it out:
http://cfkasper.de/ultima/[/URL]

My experience with U9 wasn't that bad. The default controls are clunky, but I used a third-party program that allowed me to rebind keys and tweak the mouse speed. I never had any issues with framerate or lag, although it did tend to crash in certain areas.

Originally Posted by Sir Markus
This game is hopeless as presented. I've tried to start this 4 separate times, with 2 different systems, and gave up in frustration. The best hope is that somebody that knows what they are doing can make a 'fan version' of the game that actually works.

Are you talking about the GOG version?

Does this work on modern systems, or are GOG releases like this 'as is'?

Originally Posted by kalniel
Does this work on modern systems, or are GOG releases like this 'as is'?

The game started right up on my windows7 64-bit machine and is patched to v1.19.

Also, you can click here to download a nice little tool that let's you easily modify Ultima 9's options.ini file.

Originally Posted by kalniel
Does this work on modern systems, or are GOG releases like this 'as is'?

The entire business model of GOG.com is to not just (re-)release games 'as is' but to (re-)release them with the specific purpose of maximum modern system compatibility .
There are technical limits to what the GOG team can do, of course. They may tamper with the config files, "hack" DLLs or ship the game with a pre-configured DOSBox setup.
Still, there are a few tough cases where a game just won't run on Vista or Windows 7 or at least not on the 64-bit version or whatever.
That's why one should carefully check the system requirements and the game description before purchasing a game from GOG. If a game only lists XP and Vista as compatible OSs then they have either not tested Win 7 compatibility yet or it simply won't run on Win 7.
In such (and other) cases it also helps a lot to check their forums for known issues of a particular game. They got a great helpful community there.

Hmm, can't buy from them unfortunately All UK credit cards now have secure3d protection which they can't deal with at GOG