Ultima 6 Project - Beta 3 Released

Corwin

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The Ultima 6 Project has just released a 3rd updated beta which fixes most of the problems people experienced with release 2. Here's the official notification:
Beta 3 Release

Written by U6P Aletys

Monday, 19 April 2010:

It is with much pleasure that we announce the release of the Beta 3 Release of Team Archon's Ultima 6 Project, for Dungeon Siege 1 (PC and Mac). Some things to look forward to in this release:

* Many bug fixes have been implemented since the Beta 2 release.

* All NPC's are in place, and all the quests have been implemented.

* Those players with proclivities to the dark side can now follow an evil path.

* Additional enhancements have been made to the map and journal systems, and the Compendium is now complete.

* Performance improvements have been implemented

* It should be noted that anyone using a previous version will have to uninstall it prior to installing the Beta 3 Release, and start a new game.

While this is not the final release of the game, we feel that it is reasonably polished, enough for public consumption (read: scrutiny). We still expect that there will be some bugs, and are soliciting your help in finishing it.


More information.
 
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Woohoo!

<inserting text to get to character minimum, pay no attention to this sentence>
 
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Just so nobody has to complain about having to use google:
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http://u6project.com/
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Not that it wouldn't be most people's first or second guess. I think I foolishly typed uVIproject.com as a first guess, wastning 4 seconds of my time. Shame on you brother none for including Origin Systems-esque copy protection in the form of a test of knowledge- though in this case that test of knowledge was easier than reading the longitude and lattitudes on the low res pdf scans in the gold box versions of Ultima 7.
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On a serious note- thanks for the update. The Ultima series will always hold a special place in my heart; and Ultima 6 benefits more than almost any other Ultima game from a graphics and engine overhaul. Sure the Underworld games might feel even more dated given the incredible evolution of the 3d first-person centric engines out there, I think this is the most productive and enjoyable remake out there thus far. Besides, it seems like Underworld remakes just never feel right when show-horned into modern engines.
 
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Congrats, U6P team! Looking forward to checking out this release version.

though in this case that test of knowledge was easier than reading the longitude and lattitudes on the low res pdf scans in the gold box versions of Ultima 7.
Indeedy!
 
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Thank you so much Ultima 6 team for making this! Will play it for sure!
 
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Holy cow those screenshots are impressive. I've never really looked into what this project was about. As I've never actually played an ultima game (other than first dungeon of 9), it was just not interesting to me. I just might make this my next game especially since its playable. Aha but I dont have Dungeon Siege so maybe another time.
 
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You can pick up a copy of DS for about $5.
 
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After a fresh install of DS v.1 - U6 project B3 would not work for me, just a black screen. I could hear the music and the sword cursor was visible, the only menu selection that worked was 'exit to windows' - DS itself worked great straight out of the box. Some time back when loading Lazarus the same happened but was solved by installing the English patch downloaded from the main DS site, i might try this and some fiddling with it later.
 
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Wulf, the patch is mandatory. The game will not work without it. It's readily available if you don't have a copy handy.
 
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Is there a further patch for DS after v1.11? That's what I've got and yesterday when I tried the U6 Beta 3, the game performance was abysmal (bordering on unplayable). The game stuttered really badly and lowering the graphics settings did nothing to help this. Note that, the same computer runs DS itself and Ultima Lazarus (U5 mod for DS) withouot a hitch with everything maxed out. I tried searching for a later patch, but all I found was this v1.11 (some list it as v1.11.1462 apparently).
 
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Thanks Corwin, yes it was obvious, with the patch installed all is working o.k - very smooth in fact.

Yes Lurking Grue, install v1.11.1462 patch first followed by the U6 beta (got it from 'fileplanet') as microsoft's DS patch download server is no longer available.

http://www.fileplanet.com/111247/110000/fileinfo/Dungeon-Siege-v1.0---v1.11.1462-Patch

A fresh install is important as old stray files can cause havoc i believe.
 
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Yes, old stuff even Laz can cause problems. If you archive everything else and do a clean install you should have no to few issues. If you still have problems, report them at the official site ASAP and they will be addressed.
 
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To clarify, I do have the latest patch installed and I did a clean install. To my knowledge there's been only two patches for DS, these being v1.1 and v1.11.1462. My DS is a later re-release deal, and after install it reports being v1.11 which I assume is the 1.11.1462. This, because when I look at the patches offered for DS by Fileplanet (at http://www.fileplanet.com/90256/0/0/0/1/section/Patches), there's two options (disregarding non-English patches), to patch from v1.0 to v1.11.1462 and from v1.1 to v1.11.1462. There's nothing for v1.11 to v1.11.1462, thus I assume these two are one and the same.

Anyways, I'll do a little poking around tonight, there might be old U5 Lazarus saves and whatnot lurking about somewhere on my hard drive. I'll clean those out and install DS and Beta 3 again and see if that helps. If not, I'll post on the official forum then.

To end on a positive note, what little I managed to see of U6P yesterday, looked very good. Two thumbs up! Love the journal and the dialogue interface, plus the artwork (character portraits etc) is splendid!
 
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Problem solved. I deleted the old DS save folder which still had U5 Lazarus saves in it (located at My Documents/Dungeon Siege) and unistalled both DS and U6P. After which I did a reinstall of both and now U6P is running smoothly and without stuttering. Excellent! It must've been those old save games that were somehow causing performance problems.
 
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Yes, a number of people at the official site reported similar problems with earlier betas and clearing out old saves always solved the issue.
 
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