New Underworld patches with WASD and mouse-look

[twisty]

From time to time I clear out old bookmarks to dead or abandoned sites that I have accumulated over the years. As you would expect, there are only a handful of remaining websites dedicated to the Underworld games (typically these are maintained alongside actual Ultima games), so I was surprised when I learned through Bootstrike of new UW & UW2 patches released this year.

The most notable enhancements include WASD and mouse-look, and there are also some other handy new keyboard shortcuts, although I find shift=jump and space=attack to be a weird combination. I've played around with the UW2 version and confirm that it works well, although I haven't spent that much time with it. If you're interested in trying either version, you can find the patches and instructions here: https://github.com/JohnGlassmyer/Ult...ly-the-patches

As I've got the GOG version installed, I used 7-ZIP to extract game.gog ISO, copied over the patched version of UW2 into the ISO and then rebuilt it with PowerISO.

Summary from John Glassmyer's site

The biggest change is the addition of mouse-look (looking around by moving the mouse), which can be toggled on and off with a keypress. In support of this, the allowed range of vertical view angle has been greatly expanded, and the 3D rendering engine has been hacked to have it draw the bits of the world that become visible when the player looks sharply upward or downward.

Also, spell runes can be typed directly (with Ctrl+Alt+<letter>), without having to navigate through the inventory and the rune bag.

Things made more convenient:

The opening title-screen or cinematic is skipped.
The player's heading is not adjusted when moving against a wall.
Skill points gained in training are immediately reported in the message log (currently only in Ultima Underworld II).

[Shadowcat]

Very nice!

[smallfry]

This is awesome and I can't wait to try it out!

[michael a]

I'm late. Looks cool!

[trueathletic]

That's look so cool!

[Mike34]

From time to time I clear out old bookmarks to dead or abandoned sites that I have accumulated over the years. As you would expect, there are only a handful of remaining websites dedicated to the Underworld games (typically these are maintained alongside actual Ultima games), so I was surprised when I learned through Bootstrike DMV Practice Test of new UW & UW2 patches released this year.

The most notable enhancements include WASD and mouse-look, and there are also some other handy new keyboard shortcuts, although I find shift=jump and space=attack to be a weird combination. I've played around with the UW2 version and confirm that it works well, although I haven't spent that much time with it. If you're interested in trying either version, you can find the patches and instructions here: https://github.com/JohnGlassmyer/Ult...ly-the-patches

As I've got the GOG version installed, I used 7-ZIP to extract game.gog ISO, copied over the patched version of UW2 into the ISO and then rebuilt it with PowerISO.

Summary from John Glassmyer's site

I've always wondered why the Underworld games weren't recreated in one of the Elder Scroll engines.