Chlorthos Dragon (you may also know him as Rothbardic or stereoprism, depending on where you follow his work) posted a 27-minute video on YouTube last week that showcased a new attempt at creating Ultima IX: Redemption, this time built on the Ultima Online engine.

As he describes it, his goal is to adapt:

the documents and all the design work that went into the original Ultima 9 Redemption project back in the early 2000s.

Chlorthos was a long-time member of the Ultima IX: Redemption team, going back as far as Avatus’ association with the project. Long-time readers may recall that Redemption both changed hands and changed engines during its long, sometimes-troubled development; the Titans of Ether finally cancelled the project — based, at the time, on the Morrowind engine — in 2016. For his part, Chlorthos wants the game to play like Ultima VII, “as if this game was released in 1998.” That means keyword conversations, none of the usual Ultima Online interface, and as much freedom to explore as he can manage.

He’s also upfront about how he’s building it. In his words, he has “heavily used AI” for the code and the placeholder art, and to remake music he originally composed himself. If that’s not your cup of tea, he says, he wishes you well.

What he shows is still early, and a lot of the art is placeholder, but you can already see a game taking shape. There’s a main menu, saving and loading, and a gypsy sequence with a new set of Virtue questions. The Avatar arrives as a comet at the Cape of Heroes, at the start of a story told in five acts, and Act One is called “Ruin and Wake.”

Some portraits come from an artist who, Chlorthos says, worked on the original Redemption project, and they already look far more alive than the generated stand-ins. In the video:

• the Avatar has an Ultima VII-style conversation with Hob, a sea scavenger who returns the Avatar’s old pocket watch,
• Shamino joins the party,
• Margaretta speaks a prophecy at the gypsy camp, and leaves it unfinished.

Footsteps change with the terrain, and the music for each area plays once instead of looping forever. Combat, party orders and much of Trinsic are still rough. A second video, released today, shows off day/night cycles, NPC schedules, and significant improvements to the artwork and character creation sequence.

There’s no public download available for the project as yet, although I have created a basic project entry for it here at the Codex. Chlorthos lists ModernUO and CentrED# among the tools he’s using to create this new take on Redemption, so expect to need both of those installed to play it whenever there is a release-ready build available.