Pierzak posted:

You go back for that lantern this instant. I'd like to see what you're doing.

(ed: Also, new update on previous page)

rojogames posted:

It does seem like things are darker. I thought the basic light spell was the same as the torch, but perhaps not. If people are actually having a tougher time seeing things with the current light spell I'll go pick it up for the sake of watchability. Monday's episode is already recorded, so it'll have to happen after that.

Pierzak posted:

Something's been bugging me:

Why do you use vertical stretching (look at circles like inventory spaces), especially when your video's widescreen with black bars on the sides?

Tax Refund posted:

Tax Refund posted:

The sun icon for the sunlight spell also looks better in the Don't Keep Aspect Ratio. I wonder if the original game was designed for displays with non-square pixels, and that's why it looks squashed when Keep Aspect Ratio is chosen? Modern displays have pixels that are actually square in shape, but many older CRT displays had pixels whose shape was actually a rectangle, not a square. So if you wanted a circle to appear like an actual circle on the user's screen, your game had to draw it a little "squashed", i.e. you had to draw an oval for the user to see a circle. Hence why displaying that same image on a modern display makes it look like an oval, and you have to "stretch" the image to undo the deliberate "squashing" it was subjected to in the original program.

But the Avatar's icon on the paper-doll inventory screen looks a lot pudgier in Don't Keep Aspect Ratio mode. I think it's probably correct, given the circular circles and the square spell stones that you get, but that sure is going to take a little getting used to.

Antistar01 posted:

Man, I remember almost nothing that's happening in this game. I don't know if that's because I only played Ultima Underworld once over twenty years ago, or because I just missed that much stuff by virtue of being young and dumb.

Tax Refund posted:

Notes for episode 9:

pre:

Mantra "Ra" to "see thy blows land with greater effectiveness." Unarmed? Attack?
Mantra "Un" to "make better deals." Charm.
Mantra "Hunn" to "better gauge the quality of a deal". Appraisal.

Remove Bet from a Resist Blows spell for better protection.

In a crystal ball on level 2, we saw a room with blue walls and a gold square on the floor.
On the gold square was a gray sphere, but there were also green worms in the room.

The thing I thought was a secret door was apparently just an artifact of the way the game renders corners, since I saw the same thing at just about every corner and not one of them actually had a secret door. So don't worry about it.

CAPT. Rainbowbeard posted:

Same here. Probably both, you know?


The runes are a language, so if you can figure out that adding/removing one changes the strength of a spell, logically the same should apply to other spells as long as you have the runes...

Tax Refund posted:

Oh hey, I just noticed something about the mantras.

Summ Ra is the mantra that gives you two random attack skills, and Ra increases your specific Attack skill. I wonder if Summ would increase your Defense?

Om Cah is "mastery of practical skills". I wonder what chanting Om alone, or Cah alone, would do?
And Mu Ahm is mysterious arts. I wonder what Mu alone, or Ahm alone, would do?

turol posted:

You're going to want that incense so you should go back and get it. In fact you want still more after that so keep an eye out.

You have been down to level 3, you found the staircase down shortly after entering level 2.

The thing in the crystal ball is on level 2 but actually getting there is not possible yet. There are at least three ways to do that. There might be a fourth but the thing that allows that might only be available in UW2.

Make item stashes on each level. DON'T just make one big stash somewhere, each level can only have a limited number of items. I'm not sure what exactly happens when you reach it but the game might pick some "nonessential" items to remove. I remember that some blood stains vanished at some point but might have been imagining it.

Don't bother carrying a bedroll or food, it's usually easy enough to just run back to your current stash. Also you can sleep with F10 I think, check your manual. You just might not recover quite as much HP/mana.

Gold is HEAVY, also leave most of it in your stash.

Tylana posted:

Items placed where NPCs can roam will also be hovered up by them, IIRC.

busb posted:

Getting mad nostalgia and urge to play this again. drat you Ultima games!!!

Pierzak posted:

Shut the gently caress up and fire up the dosbox

Mundane Fighter progress report: killed big bad, looking for a certain key, just realized I totally forgot major parts of how to get needed items the legit way.

Also, FML I realized that a magic-less playthrough of UU2 will not involve cheesing the game with gear enchanged up to Unsurpassed stats

Pierzak posted:

Something's been bugging me:

Why do you use vertical stretching (look at circles like inventory spaces), especially when your video's widescreen with black bars on the sides?

Old Grey Guy posted:

Those aren't circles, they're ovals. 4:3 is the correct aspect ratio for the game, it was the only one available at the time.

rojogames posted:

Old displays also used non square pixels, so that's also a thing. I'm looking for some more confirmation in a couple places.

Since I don't want to be switching back and forth between aspect ratios, I'm going to hold off on the episode for today and release it tomorrow or Sunday after found out a bit more.

Old Grey Guy posted:

Here's a scan of a bit of the drawn, printed map of level 1 that came with the game, compare that to the in-game map at a 4:3 ratio. Again, the game would fill out your screen, and that screen had a 4:3 ratio. The non-square pixels etc. all had the purpose of looking the way they should in that one available aspect ratio.

Note, for instance, that the hand-drawn compass is an actual oval like the one shown in the game.

rojogames posted:

Read an interesting article about the resolution thing last night. The game undoubtedly ran at 320x200. However, I forgot that most old CRT monitors let you adjust the screen position & size manually via buttons on the chassis. The closest 4:3 VGA resolution was 320x240, meaning 40 rows of pixels were missing. Most people probably let the image stretch vertically to fill the screen rather than letterboxing it, which would result in the 4:3 look that I was originally using. However the game was probably intended to look as it does in the 16:10 ratio, as evidenced by the manual screen shot in my previous comment.

Tax Refund posted:

I'd say that manual scan settles it. The "Don't Keep Aspect Ratio" setting will present the game the way it was supposed to appear when it was originally released, and I'll just have to get used to the Avatar's, well, avatar looking a bit chunkier than before. But the circles being actual circles will be nice.