New Project Entry: Britannia Online
This is a second online remake of Ultima 6 (news of which broke yesterday) which is apparently being developed by someone at BioWare in his spare time. Which, in turn, is really cool.
This remake features a full implementation of the game’s day/night cycles, keyword-sensitive dialogue, and limited interactivity with containers and other objects. Powder kegs work, their explosions being handled and rendered by a high-speed particle system, and their ability to destroy nearby doors upon exploding is implemented. This remake also features a custom UI that derives elements from Ultima Online; it boasts a full-featured inventory interface, dragging & dropping of items, and an improved conversation system.
gulbsoft is implementing Britannia Online in C#. At present, he has no definite plans to release it, although that may change in the future.
It’s nice to see that Bioware’s employees have that kind of free time on their hands. I guess we won’t be seeing any “bioware_spouse”‘s.
I know a few guys at BioWare who are married, some of whom have kids.
It’s what else you give up, y’know? Sleep, for example. Who needs it?
Edit: A lot of them also will undertake projects like this as much for the challenge as for the research potential it affords them, which they can then apply to other games.
No definite plans to release it… Perhaps he’s floating it to his company to show he’s a superior employee.
I’d suspect it’s a legal thing, actually, Kevin. Non-compete clauses — pretty standard in the industry — even extend to open-source stuff like this.
I didn’t know non-complete clauses affected free projects too. That’s a shame.
The corporate game industry is a shame. Get back to hacking, folks. 😉
Oh, I dunno…they do put out some decent product from time to time. I’m looking forward to a few releases coming up, for sure.