Corv has had a busy few months in his ongoing efforts to build Corven – Path of Redemption. From building quests and environments around a city (town? village?) called “Treynic” back in October, to adding new backer-inspired character portraits in November, to upgrading his development workstation in December, he certainly ended 2021 on a high note. But the latest news — included in a summary update for the first two months of 2022 — is even more exciting than any of that.

Many of you may recall that Corv, before striking out on his own with Corven, had taken over the project lead role for a long-in-development (and long-anticipated) Ultima fan project, a remake of Ultima 9 called Ultima IX: Redemption. This project was cancelled several years ago; the team that had been working on it — the Titans of Ether — disbanded at the same time.

However, as of this year, Corv has some news that may be of interest to those who were eagerly anticipating Redemption when it was still being worked on:

First of all: I am working full time on Corven starting next month already. This is a dream come true and it took many many years to achieve this kind of freedom, to do what I actually want to do as a job. 

That’s not the really exciting news, though it is good news; more time to focus on Corven should help speed Corv along in developing it. No, the much more exciting news is this:

I have worked for months, not just the last two, on adapting the UIX Redemption plot for Corven.

I realized how disappointed many Ultima fans were when I cancelled the UIX mod in favor of Corven. My reason was obvious, I have no desire to step on the foot of a big publisher and their IP when creating my first standalone game. 

However, this game is not called Ultima, this is not a remake of existing work. This is a brand new game inspired by Garriott’s work. There is no copyright issue. 

So, Ultima fans, you will get your UIX Redemption, but it’s called Corven – Path of Redemption!

It will have some adjustments to make it more accessible, in terms of story, for new players. People who have no knowledge of old Ultimas should be able to get into the plot without having to do research first.

The cat is out of the bag. I sincerely hope this will make fans happy. You will just have to live with the fact that you won’t recognize names other than Lord British and that the land you used to know looks a bit different now. But did it not always change over time?

Obviously, some changes will need to be made to keep Corven free and clear of any legal troubles with EA…but since Corv has been given permission to include Lord British as a character, it could quite reasonably tell an alternate story of a post-Ultima 8 Britannia. Or…well, probably not Britannia, but whatever the land has come to be called since its subjugation by the Guardian. Come to think of it, “Treynic” sounds a bit like “Trinsic”, doesn’t it?

At any rate, you can follow Corven on its (new or old) social media presences; links thereto are provided here (alongside a download of the soundtrack from the video embedded above).