To celebrate the release of Ultima 9 on GOG.com, the Ultima Codex is pleased to present this document — which has been broken out into twenty six (26) images — which gives a summary of Ed del Castillo’s revisions to the plot of Ultima 9.

For those not entirely familiar with the development history of Ultima 9, Ed del Castillo was hired by Origin Systems – he had previously worked on the Command & Conquer series — as the Ascension’s producer after development on it was restarted in late 1997 (after development on Ultima Online had begun to wrap up). His revision of the plot departed from the “Bob White Plot” in many key respects, and actually is a bit closer to the version that ultiamtely shipped.

At least according to the Wikipedia entry on Ultima 9, it was del Castillo that wanted to fully exploit the possibilities of the new 3D engine that Origin were working with; the third-person perspective of the game can evidently be traced back to his time at the helm.

At any rate, enjoy! Pull up the images, download the PDF, and pore over them. Search out every little detail, and enjoy a fascinating glimpse into the nuts and bolts of how the plot of the final single-player Ultima title evolved. The Ultima Codex is indebted to Joe Garrity for providing these documents, to Bill Randolph for releasing them and making them available for us to see, to Ben “Bandit LOAF” Lesnick for his invaluable insights, and to Ed del Castillo and everyone who worked at Origin Systems.