Ultima IX

[Vicente]

Hello, I know "ultima IX" have not relation with exult in any way, but I found this page, I read some forums like the quest for gold and I think "hey this folks have a forum about ultima which really works in 2004, and there are spanish speakers too" so Im in the glory and would like to ask a question about Ultima IX which no one could answer until now. (if my english is too broken please forgve me)

The question is I have ultima IX, a flamant new generation computer (a quite old nowadays, but flamant because is mine ) (Pentium IV 2 Ghz, 512 Mb RAM Geforce 4 440 MMX with Windows XP and directx 9.0c) the trouble is Ultima IX doesnt work!. It is install but when i execute it only appear a black window and is back to windows. The more irritating thing is that when i have windows 2000 Professional it is works.

I tried patch 1.19f, even install of windows 98 (i love this game and I would like to replay it especially when i found some fnas changes in the script) but to no avail. I suspect directx is the culprit but i dont read anything about ultima IX incompatibility with directx 9.0. Somebody knows anything out there? I guess everybody here have played ultima IX so is there any idea?

Maybe reinstall windows 98, but not directx 9.0 (the trouble is other applications need it)

I thanks every answer.

[Dominus]

my only guess is that you should update your video drivers.
Or execute the FinalSetup.exe in the dir you installed u9 to and make sure it is using D3D and not glide.
For me (Windows XP Pro SP2 (but also with SP1)) it works fine.

[Vicente]

Thanks for the reply. I want to know if you are able to run ultima IX with directx 9.0 because this way I can eliminate directx as culprit. Now I use the latest drivers for my 3D card but i would try to use some olds drivers, and what is finalsetup.exe? is a fan patch? You had give me hope, many thanks

[Natreg]

I can run Ultima IX with directx9 without problems, I´m using win2k, I have never used WinXP (I hate it).

The final setup thing is just the configuration of Ultima IX, it´s another executable in the u9 folder.

btw, I´m spanish too so... que tal

[Dominus]

the problem is neither DirectX nor Windows XP but must be something else. And yes like I said before and Natreg said, finalsetup.exe is found in the folder where you find u9.exe.

[MV]

Do you have F@H running? If so, stop it and try the game again.

Also try fiddling with the compatibility mode options. (Right click the u9.exe, click the compatibility tab).

[Vicente]

Hi! I only want to say many thanks for your time buddys. I finally was able to run Ultima IX in my computer and actually I am enjoying it again. For the record the answer was to use compatibility to win2000 (in compatoibility to win98/me) u9.icd go to error but in compatibility to win2000 the monitor go blank for almost five second (I guess that I hit Crtl+Alt+Supr at the first couple of seconds (Im a little impacient I supuose) and quit) but after that the game run smoothly. My own prejouices to directx 9.0 prevent me to play it, a little ironic. By the way thanks and keep working, this ultima 7 3D is worth to play again, ill check this page regularly to see the progress

[James I. Mitchell]

I am having the same problem that you are having. I have installed the patch and I have reinstalled the program and directX but none of it is working. the game will load and the intro will play, but when the game is supposed to start the screen goes black. I can't find the problem.
I am using a Geforce 3 card. I don't know if htat's a problem.

[kryptman]

You're not the only one to have this problem. It seems to have something to do with the hardware detection in Ultima 9. My Dad bought himself a big honkin' Dell PC with 512MB RAM, a new P 4 with hyperthreading, and some superfast ATI card(don't remember which one). Ultima 9 wouldn't detect the graphics cards properly, hung a bunch of times on the install, and when I finally got it to go it had the sound all turned off and the graphics details where all set to blank. I didn't know it could blank out the setting, but it did. It's a strange thing to happen. Ahh well...

[PascaL]

For what it's worth, U9 works fine on my computer:

Athlon XP 1800+
512mb
A7N266-VM, nForce1 (updated to latest drivers)
ATI Radeon 8500LE 128mb (lates drivers)

I don't even need it installed. I just run it from the directory of an old install.

It's too bad the interface is so miserable, I've never made it past 60 seconds of gameplay before I lose interest. Apart from that, the game seems quite appealing. I wonder if some enthusiast might make a patch or mod for interface.

[SB-X]

What's wrong with the interface?

[PascaL]

It makes the gameplay feel like a really bad console port.

[CK]

Drivers, Drivers, Drivers. Drivers are always a big issue, make sure they are up to date. I used to have a Geforce 3 till I upgraded to an FX5700. I had problems running old 3D games with Geforce 3 until I updated the drivers. If the screen goes black and doesnt specify any internal errors, then most likely drivers are the issue. I also had the same problem with Farcry until I updated drivers.

[Robert]

I get U9.icd has encountered a problem and must shut down ...Ihave been playing for a while now six shrines complete and seven dungeons. up til now it was just inconvienient. now I can't sail the ship it shuts down every time.

[Sam_Matthews]

I've had luck with a GLIDE for OpenGL wrapper like this one: http://www.zeckensack.de/glide/ . It should let you emulate a 3DFX card (which is what Ultima IX was designed for) pretty speedily.

Hope it helps!

- Sam

[SteveLord]

mmmmm U9. a game i spent following magazine previews for and had a lot of hopes for. thankfully i caught reviews before dumping money into it and realized it was one of the history's buggiest software.

i still have thoughts about getting it off ebay or somethin. however, some older games dont play nice with newer hardware. infact, that seems to be a curse with Ultima games in general. they hit retail right before a drastic change in the computer industry.

U7 was optimzed for DOS
U9 was optimized for 3dfx (right before they bit the dust)

[drcode]

I liked Ultima 9, and it wasn't all that buggy for me. But I had a Windows 95 machine with a 3dfx card back then. It's unlikely I'll ever get to play it again.

[octopusfluff]

Even if you had optimal hardware, U9 had a lot of severe plot breakage if you didn't do things /exactly/ as the devs flowchart intended. It was easy to totally break the gameflow, even _with_ the 'last minute' patch they released just after the game went gold.
It took quite a few patch revisions before it really got remotely ready for what I would have considered a releasable state.

This is an unfortunately common trend in the Internet age, where patches are 'cheap'.

[ShaggyMoose]

Hey Robert, I remember when I had recurring crash issues with UIX, if I went and did something else for a while then came back after a few saves/loads, sometimes it would work. Maybe a bad cache issue or something.

[Ultima man]

i have windows xp and im tryin to play the game. it wont let me use the auto run feature but it will read the disk just fine. i tried to install it through add-remove programs, but it has an error and just wont download it. if anyone can help with this email me at corwinguraedy69 at yahoo com

i have a disk that was updated in 2000 if it helps, im not sure if it is the same with every disk.

[Dominus]

I didn't say anything before, but now with people digging up this ancient thread again and again, please note that this forum is mainly here to help with Exult and related stuff. Detailed questions on how to run or deal with problems of Ultima 9 shouldn't really be posted here. I can't even direct you to such a forum but this is not the place. But please anyone who knows of a good forum to post such questions feel welcome to post links in here!

(note to the spammers, this is not an invitation to post links that deal with resizing body parts! )

[Paulon]

There are still a few people hanging around the Wayward Avatar forum. And those forums have a search function and a couple years worth of records of questions asked and answered. The Wayward Avatar site is at http://www.rpgplanet.com/ultima9/ and the forums are at http://ultima9.rpgplanet.gamespy.com/forum/index.php despite what the last topic on the site itself says.