September 30, Sunday

Carpets under carpet? -Videric

September 27, Thursday

Its Fall time -Videric

Good old Fall, the nature prepares for the Winter and Gaming houses prepares to a release of another Massive Multiplayer Game, Dark Age of Camelot. You might ask yourself what has this all to do with UO? Perhaps one should think back in time, to release of EverQuest. Strangely, just before its release, strange items like Necromancy, new alchmey bottles and Names change deeds popped up in development. Needless to say they never came true at the end. It seems it is the time of "promise a lot of improvements, deliver what you can" for the industry. Hopefully they can manage to deliver all that they are concepting... Secure House Trading Commodity Deeds Repair Service Contracts Guaranteed Gain System Crafting System Overhaul Fourth Year Veteran Rewards

September 20, Thursday

Spoiler about future skills and items. -Videric

Here is a list of stuff that can be found on various UO files: Glassblowing Menu gargoyle vase large gargoyle vase gargish chair gargish table small flask medium flask curved flask large flask bubbling flask empty vial rack full vial rack gargoyle hourglass high quality granite blow pipe Blow Pipe flask (small) flask (medium) flask (curved) flask (large #1) flask (bubbling blue) flask (bubbling purple) empty vials full vials spinning hourglassflask (large #2) flask (bubbling red) Sand sand You don't have enough sand to make that. You must be near a forge to blow glass. There is no sand here to mine. You dig for a while but fail to find any of sufficient quality for glassblowing. You carefully dig up sand of sufficient quality for glassblowing. Your backpack can't hold the sand, and it is lost! You haven't learned masonry. Perhaps you need to study a book! You haven't learned glassblowing. Perhaps studying a book would help! Requires masonry (carpentry specialization) Requires glassblowing (alchemy specialization) Masonry Menu Decorations Furniture Statues stone block small statue (south) small statue (north) small statue (east) medium stone table (east) medium stone table (south) pegasus statuette large stone table (east) large stone table (south) You don't have any stone! Stones Mallet and Chisel You have no idea how to work this stone. You cannot work this strange and unusual stone. To me this sounds some sort of skill tree system (something like that was planned for UO2) being introduced.

September 14, Friday

Lord British says nothing -Videric

Very not informative chat with Lord British, although one question was interesting. Gilthas - *Jixxa|Gwia* While we realize this is not going to be another Ultima do you have any plans to put something similar to the virtues in this new world? Lord_British - Sadly, it does appear that at least "we" will not be creating any more "Ultimas"... Lord_British - However, few could argue that this team embodies the spirit of Ultima. With a fresh start we can shed that which was broken in Ultima and keep that which was compelling... Lord_British - Having a structure which includes a moral or Ethic, we do believe creates a compelling world reality in which to play... Lord_British - So, yes, we are crafting an deep world and deep backstory within which to create activities for the community. Lord_British - Which includes Ethics. Other parts included mentioning word NCsoft dozen times, and mentioning how many zillion players Lineage has (yet not mentioning most play from gaming centres from Asia). Here is a direct link to the interview: The Interview

September 13, Thursday

Acts of Terrorism shocks the world -Videric

Normally Tales of a Traveller does not talk of matters of the world, but because of scale and sickness of this terrorist attack, I feel I have to say few words. The terrorist attacks against US been shocking to see no matter where one lives. Even when few days has passed it still feels surreal, almost impossible to believe in its sadness. There will be a moment of silence at 12 o'clock today to show compassion to those who suffered in the tragedy. Also there will be day of mourning on Friday, all around EU. Our sympathy to the people who suffered in this dreadful tragedy.

September 11, Tuesday

Vet rewards... once again -Melissa

A new schedule for the veteran rewards has been published. Again. Tuesday, Sept. 11: Siege Perilous Wednesday, Sept. 12: Europa and Baja Thursday, Sept. 13: Arirang and Great Lakes Friday, Sept. 14: Catskills and Hokuto Monday, Sept. 17: Oceania, Izumo, and Wakoku Tuesday, Sept. 18: Drachenfels, Mizuho, and Asuka Wednesday, Sept. 19: AOL Legends, Balhae, and Formosa We'll see if it goes right this time. Read the entire announcement here.

September 6, Thursday

UO board changes and the Future -Matthius

Cynthe posted this on the uo.com boards. To see the whole post go here. Here is the most important bit: The changes to the forums will be as follows: -- The In-Game Support forum will be consolidated into the Development and Discussion forums. Game play questions and discussion of GM and support policies should be posted in the Discussions forum, and posts on bugs or concerns about new game updates should be posted in the Development forum. -- The Factions board will be merged into the Development and Discussions forums. Questions or discussions about changes and updates to the Faction system should be addressed to the Development board, and discussion of the failures or successes of the faction system should be posted in UO Discussions. -- The Connectivity board will actually be expanded to become the Connectivity & Tech board, as technical questions don't necessarily fall into the realm of being development-related, or being a general discussion topic. This means that there will now be a forum for people to discuss technical issues, such as patching problems, loading problems, connectivity issues, etc. The forum is not an official source of technical support (urgent tech support needs can still be addressed to our tech support department at [mail]tech@uo.com[/mail]), but it should make it easier to players to find relevant answers to their technical problems once these are brought together. -- The Third Dawn forum will be merged into the Development, Discussion, and Connectivity & Tech forums. Since most updates now affect both the 2D and 3D clients, the Development and Discussion forums will be open to discussion of both clients. The technical posts that are common in the Third Dawn forum may be addressed to the Connectivity & Tech forum. -- The In-Concept board will be merged into the Development forum. In the past, concept ideas have been relegated to a separate forum, preventing many posters who may not frequent the Concept forum from getting the full scoop on new and proposed changes. From this point out, threads will be started in the Development forum to discuss proposed changes. -- The Magic and Alchemist focus forums will be merged by request, due to the fact that the Alchemy forum is very rarely used, and most players have expressed that they prefer to post their Magery-and-Alchemy-related threads in the Magic Forum. -- The Woodcrafter and Metalworkers focus forums will be merged to create the Metal and Wood Crafts forum, due to both the low traffic of the Wood Crafters forum, as well as the fact that many crafting characters commonly utilize lumberjacking and carpentry as well as tinkering and mining. The remaining boards will be arranged as follows: -- Development: Discuss and offer feedback regarding development-related issues, such as game features, updates, and systems. -- UO Discussions: Discuss non-development related aspects of UO. This includes policy discussions, game play questions, and other general UO discussion topics. -- Connectivity and Tech: Discuss and share advice on technical, server, and connectivity issues. -- Scenarios and Ongoing Content: Discuss the global scenarios and development of ongoing content here. -- Roleplaying and Events: Discuss and coordinate Ultima Online roleplaying and player events. -- Trading and Selling: Trade or sell your in-game items here! *in-game transactions only* -- UO Fan Events and Luncheons: Discuss the Ultima Online World Fanfest and player-run UO Luncheons. -- There will be seven Focus forums, as listed: Magic and Alchemy, Barding, Combat, Metal and Wood Crafts, Rogues and Thievery, Tamers and Rangers, and Trade Skills. The Process: The boards that are being merged with other boards will be marked as read-only at this point, to allow anyone who needs that information three days to read the posts there before they expire naturally. The specified boards will be removed after that point. Thanks, and we’ll see you in the forums! In other "news" I was going to quit UO (again), after veteran rewards, but Stellerex really got me excited. Are they really, after all these YEARS going to make UO an Ultima? Yes the name of the game has always been Ultima Online, but it might as well have been Fantasy Online: Using Ultima Graphics. I always thought that they made the game art looking at past Ultima games, taking everything that "looked cool" and put it in the game. But if I interpret Stellerex's comments right, they might really be adding that special feeling of Ultima to the game and that would be something really great. Long live Britannia!

September 5, Wednesday

Comments from Stellerex -Videric

Big promises from Comments... I highlighted the important parts. Development Comments from Stellerex Sep 5 2001 12:11PM Most residents of Britannia would really like to know what OSI has planned for the future of the kingdom. Chances are if they got their wish, though, it would spoil the fun of discovery and anticipation that comes with any good mystery. For those folks, I would like to take this opportunity to give some assurances that we are indeed working on some very significant features that I believe will return the real flavor of Ultima to Britannia. Although the core people on the dev team will continue to address continuous content, system improvements, and GM support, I’ve mentioned a couple of times in the past that the team is bigger than it has ever been before. Real expansion of the world and the game is within our grasp. Life – well, virtual life - has really only just begun. And before anybody asks, no I’m not going to give specific details. Not that some folks won’t read into my comments and figure out a lot anyway. Every once in a while, I like to turn a phrase just the right way to give a clue, and see if anybody can figure it out. Chances are I’m too obscure in my presentation, but it’s fun to give it a whirl anyway. Regardless of that, there are plenty of obvious improvements that have recently been released as well. Everybody should have noticed by now that it’s more fun to create a starting character and work your way upward. A first circle spell is actually useful for something besides skill improvement, for instance. Though many veterans get upset when we make changes specifically for new players, they do have to realize that improving the learning experience helps to grow the community and make the world more vibrant. Unpopular as that idea may sound at first, hopefully most of you can see the long-term benefits to keeping the population of the world strong. Real life always has a way of creeping back into our plans, though, so we’ve also been making strides to listen more closely to our veteran players. Everything from the Scenario program to upcoming changes for the Siege Perilous shard has been a consistent effort to attend to that. Siege Perilous is being modified by members of the design team who really enjoy that style of play, so I’m confident it’s moving in the right direction. Veteran’s Rewards are finally having the final kinks worked out, after much ado, and that system will be active on all shards soon. I have to admit, it’s taken us quite a bit of work, but it’s a system that can be adapted for other uses in the future, so hopefully all of the work will pay off in the long run. Running just a little behind that, we’re working on two very significant undertakings that you’ll be able to find out more about at this year’s World Faire. Technically, I can’t go into specific detail on that, but I’ve given a couple of clues already. Until the end of October rolls around, you’ll just have to watch carefully for little foreshadowing and hints of what’s to come. Even that’s not the whole picture! Several more publishes are on the horizon to address even more client optimizations (for both the 2D and 3D clients), new game art, improved user interfaces, new creatures, and even new craftables. Yes, it sounds like a lot, but that’s one of the benefits of having such a large dev team. Simultaneous development paths are wonderful things. Tomorrow isn’t that far off, but until then I’d like to leave you with a few key concepts that should give you a feel for what we’re trying to aim at now and in the future. Environment and personality. Mechanics that are simple, but provide depth. Intuitive UI. Less tedium. Systems instead of features. Harder quests. Easier learning curves. NPCs and monsters that have some intelligence. Action and pacing in combat. Return to the Ultima tradition. Fighting with a purpose. Originality. Role playing. Attention to community. Logical, thematic enhancements. Let me know if you have suggestions, because I’m always happy to chat. Stellerex Senior Producer Ultima Online Lots of promises at least, I hope they can deliver the promises. And the same can be read here: Team Comments