Ultima VI problem

[ParanoidLittleMan]

I DL-ed STX images at atarimania. It has install to HD option, and I did it on Steem. But when gameplay should start it crashes. There is no sign of any floppy access, so does not look that it checks floppy for copy protection when running  from HD.

Question: anyone had success with those STX images ? It is http://www.atarimania.com/game-atari-st-ultima-vi-the-false-prophet_10736.html

French, German, English lang. version.

[+DarkLord]

Ultima VI on the ST is hard drive installable by design. It's an option

from the software when you run it.

 

As far as I know, there is no floppy based copy protection in the game.

It uses the manuals. It will ask a question that you have to look up in

the docs to answer before you can continue the game. I've never had

to keep the U6 floppies in the drive.

 

That being said, I've not tried the STX version you mentioned because

I bought the game originally when it came out.

 

HTHs. 

 

[ParanoidLittleMan]

Questions would be by that gypsy women with flasks ?

[newtmonkey]

The questions from the gypsy woman are for determining your class/stats.  The copy protection questions are asked by certain characters throughout the game.

 

Here's some info (and the answers btw haha)

https://ultima.fandom.com/wiki/Ultima_VI_Copy_Protection

Edited April 30, 2021 by newtmonkey

[Atariforce]

Here is a version that actually works - 1 Meg minimum (like the original):

ULTIMA6_file_version.zip

[vol]

It is a very good game.  I played on the IBM PC clone in 1991.  Is there any difference between the Atari ST and IBM PC version?

Sorry I was a pirate and didn't have manual so I had to find a proper answer myself.  It was easy. I just made memory dump and sought the question in it.  The answer was always near the question.

[Atariforce]

The main difference is that the ST version sucks. It requires 1 MB of RAM, is way too slow, looks like crap and is virtually unplayable without a hard disk, unless you want to swap disks every 10 seconds. But yes, beyond the technical shortcomings a great game is hiding even though I prefer the previous 2 episodes.

[+DarkLord]

Characters throughout the game ask the copy-protection questions (as was

previously answered).

 

The PC version used 256 color VGA graphics as well as taking advantage of

sound cards (although some sounds still came through the PC speaker?).

 

I have to agree about a lot of points concerning the ST (as well as the Amiga)

version of Ultima VI.

 

I have to say, the 1 meg or really needing a hard drive part does not bother

me at all. Are there really that many people running with 512k of RAM and

nothing but floppies? If so, why in God's name? 

 

Pro's - hard drive installation is easy. Story is great. Scope is amazingly huge.

Sound effects and music are...okay.

 

Con's - Graphics in certain parts of the games, especially the portraits are just

horrible. It looks like they took the CGA/EGA version of the game and brought

it over without any adjustment, refinement, or taking advantage of anything

that the ST can do. If you're playing from floppy - ugh! Speed;, it can be a

little slow in sections on a standard ST. I played it on my AdSpeed equipped

Mega ST4 and it as fine there.

 

Would love to see some of the dedicated coders/teams that are re--doing so

many games these days (Lotus, for example) and give this game the justice

it deserves.

 

[vol]

I played it on the 286@12MHz PC without hdd but I used RAM-disk because I had 2 MB RAM.  It was fast.  There several fan-made recreation of Ultima VI but I didn't try to play them.

[vol]

10 hours ago, Atariforce said:

The main difference is that the ST version sucks. It requires 1 MB of RAM, is way too slow, looks like crap and is virtually unplayable without a hard disk, unless you want to swap disks every 10 seconds. But yes, beyond the technical shortcomings a great game is hiding even though I prefer the previous 2 episodes.

IMHO Ultima VI was the last true Ultima.  Ultima VII has much better graphics but it is corrupted somehow.  Ultima VIII became even slightly more corrupted - a man wrote a good text about it.  And Ultima IX is a real horror which is almost impossible to play.

[ParanoidLittleMan]

OK, this AL v. posted here works. So, according to what is told here, STX dump at AM is faulty (now I will be some very bad persona saying something bad about STX ) .

 

I don't think that this v. is much worse than previous ones. Intro looks pretty good. Yes, faces in game self are pretty much red - maybe just too much drink in those times, space ?  Slowness is biggest problem, and that happens when it is large and coded in C .

 

" Would love to see some of the dedicated coders/teams that are re--doing so

many games these days (Lotus, for example) and give this game the justice

it deserves."

I don't think that it will happen ever. And mentioned 'coded in C' self is probably enough to stop people from that idea. It is long, extremely hard to follow.

And basically, to make it significantly faster should rewrite complete thing. Example of Lotus is not good here - coded in ASM, and what is changed is code for screen draw - using blitter. By some arcade game, with fast movement, where abbr. 'fps' - frames per second is important value it can really make it better playable, smoother ...  Games like this have much less CPU time spent for screen draw, so making draw faster will not make it run much faster.

Examples of what is improved:

Giana - ASM, scroll done with STE HW scroll or blitter .

Pacmania - STE HW scroll, ASM

Uridium - ASM, blitter, some control improvement

Prince of Persia - STE DMA audio - what makes it smoother (less slowdown by sample playback) - coded in ASM, and even disassembled complete code.

Dungeon Master - this was coded mostly in C, but was not too hard finding audio sample playback code and mod. it to STE DMA . Plus same mod was 100% good for Chaos Strikes Back

 

 

 

 

[+DarkLord]

Well, I was just hoping, since it's such a great series...

 

 <grumble, grumble, sad look on face>

 

[Atariforce]

Here is an update to my previous uploaded hack which fully bypasses the password thingy (previously you had to type something, any character string was accepted as a correct answer, now the 3 related NPCs won't even bother you with asking the password questions). Modified files are CONVERSE.A and converse.B and should even work with (GOG) PC version.

ULTIMA6.zip

[Atariforce]

Another update.

 

What's new:

 

-updated loader

-added back some missing pieces from the Nitpicker's delight patch

-you can now create a new character

-manual included

-runs on CT60 too!

ULTIMA6_file_version_2.zip

[Atariforce]

Another update...

 

What's new:

 

-added trainer mode where the runes are replaced by standard letters so you don't need the manual to figure out what they say;

-loader should not randomly exit upon startup.

ULTIMA6_file_version_3.zip