I was bored. I had a little free time, but I was tired of reading novels, watching Netflix movies, or listening Podcasts. Well, I thought, this might be the right time to start a new project, and that project was something I wanted to do when I was younger. My thinking flew from here to there, and somehow, I decided to remake Ultima IV, and the target language was Python.

I googled a little bit, and found out Marc Winterrowd’s homepage and downloaded the u4decode source from there. The first attempt to run the code was not successful, because I used Python 3.x while the code was written in Python 2.x. After some struggling, finally I got the code running.

After that, I found out xu4 project and downloaded the source code. Then, I encountered ergonomy_joe’s Ultima IV decompiled source, which is an invaluable source for my project.

Those three things were very crucial for me to start my new project. Without them, I would not be able to start the project.

I had been always wondering how Ultima series were made since my youth. Nobody could teach me how to make that kind of game, and no book was telling me how I can hold of the forbidden magic. But now, as I am working for the remake, little by little, the hidden art of making the world-famous RPG is revealing to me.

It is like an archeological study – figuring out how the ancient Egyptians made the pyramid: what kind of support structures were used, how the massive stones were cut and moved, and how did the master architect designed the three dimensional layout, by using the most advanced science and human knowledge. It is so much hard work, but certainly a very fascinating thing to do.

I would like to write and post in this blog what I have figured out and learned in the process of remaking. It would be, I hope, more valuable information than just give out the source files without any explanation.