GuestLog in

Pros:

Overall, the look and feel of the game is better. Sprites are great, font is great, battle system is slightly better with the ability to cancel a menu.

Treasure chests have a chance to drop weapons/armor now. A suit of iron armor can sell for 1000, so this can potentially reduce the gold grind.

Many classes have been revised so they are way more viable. Barbarians deal extra damage per level.

Cons:

The beginning grind is WAY WAY worse with the drastically lowered accuracy of repel and undead. They work, but the reduced accuracy makes the process really slow, even when I use the emulator's speed up function.

As usual, after level 1, you run into enemies that repel/undead doesn't work on, so you have to fight them the old fashioned way, which is even more time consuming.

The original had a workaround for this: Just never level up, grind using repel/undead until you have enough experience for level 5, and then go to Ambrosia. Then pump your stat increases into your wizard(s) INT and now you can deal with every monster in the game. Get a flower for each person, exchange that that with Sherry for the compass heart now you have a warp, go rob death gulch for gold and warp out before the guards overwhelm you.

This doesn't work in remastered as well, simply because that beginning grind to level 5 is so terribly slow now. What's worse, is that the OPEN spell now has a high failure rate for some reason, probably to make thieves required (?) What's even worse, is that the game now makes you earn less and less exp the more they have 'stored' until they level up.

My suggestion? DRASTICALLY increase the xp gained from later game enemies. Like x5 exp for everything except very early game monsters. OR, even better, if you can do this: Make it so every kill gives your entire party XP, not just the person doing the killing.

Also PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE increase the accuracy of standard melee attacks. Dear god, my party couldn't hit water if they fell off a boat.

In brief, most of the extensive changes are for the better. You can read about them in the Release notes.txt.

Three things of note.

1. One of the reviewers had complained that the Repel and Undead spells no longer worked. This isn't true, but they DO hit less (at least before increasing attributes) than in the original game. I THINK their probabilities are now tied to Int and Wis respectively, so if your, say, Ranger begins with 0 Wis, their Undead spell will have an abysmal success rate. On the other hand, when either spell is supported by a spellcaster with a 25 in their pertinent attribute, they'll usually have no trouble getting off a Repel or Undead or two before the chance the front line has to step in.

2. Monsters can spawn on top of you when you enter the world map. This is a rare occurrence, though, and if you double back to the town you came from within a second or two, you can escape this glitch before combat begins.

3. Most of the new sprites are an improvement, but some of the original PC and monster sprites had their charm. It would've been nice if there was an option to select different sprite sets, but it's not that big a deal.

First off, a lot of hard work went into this patch, and I *really* wanted to like it. - So please don't take this criticism as me hating on your work. - I would love to test a new version if the issues are fixed.

Pros:

• The new font is nice.
• The dialog fixes are nice.
• Overall things look better.
• Being able to cancel a menu without losing your turn is awesome.
• The added rock, etc. to the middle of the encounter battles are awesome.
• Being able to save on the overworld is awesome.

Cons:

• Some things are completely broken, like REPEL and UNDEAD always miss now; making level 1 battles / grinding pretty impossible.

• The added randomness based on the start timer sounds good (and other games definitely do this too), but there isn't a lot of checking, meaning you could immediately be in battle from the second you leave the first town, and since REPEL/UNDEAD don't work, you just have to tough it out.

• The player portraits and sprites are not always as satisfying as the originals. - The Paladin with her heart shaped shield, and the way the theif and warrior looked were just iconic for this game, and that has been completely done away with. - Other sprites are mostly changed for the better, but... not always.

• Something was changed with adding LZSS compression to the levels to add more caves or something? - that sounds really cool on paper, but in practice, on original hardware (NTSC 60hz USA), sometimes a scanline here or there "twitches". Not sure how to describe it, but usually for about a third of a scanline, randomly, usually towards the end of the scanline, for exactly 1 frame, it will just twitch white. - 1 frame doesn't sound that bad, but it's like an unpredictable "twitch" that just happens as you're walking around. - The original ROM, using the same flash cart, does not have this issue on original hardware, and it seems tied to screen scrolling, so I think it has something to do with the map compression? Could be caused by some other change though.

This hack really lives up to its name. Ultima Exodus Remastered truly feels like the definitive edition of the game. If the original programmers would've had some more time to polish the game, they could've come up with this version. Finally you can just level up without messing your game up. Not wasting turns in battle by canceling a menu action, also makes a huge difference. That was such a frustrating issue of the original game. The Cleric role is way more useful in this version, since she can use ranged weapons now.

I really like the inclusion of weapons and armor in treasure chests. It makes exploring and battling more worthwhile, and reduces the time to earn enough gold.

Talking about earning gold. The main improvement point to this remaster might be to reduce the grind some more. It still feels pretty disappointing to explore a daunting dungeon, find a secret room, only to get 19 Gold from a treasure chest. For me, an optional, "improved gold earnings" patch, would do wonders!

The graphical improvements are really well done. The game gets a new style from it, and it's consistently implemented in every area of the game. I love the new faces when talking to NPCs, it gives so much more character to the game!

Overall this hack is highly recommended if you have nostalgic memories of Ultima Exodus. It's the best way to experience this game. Because of the gameplay improvements, and definitely for the new graphics!

This is a total hack and update, make the game total amazing.

• Great pixel graphics
• Excellent custom stats
• Better in all ways

You must play it.

The things that hackers can achieve is incredible to me. Some of my favorite games have been tweaked in ways that have breathed new life into them. But the thing that astonishes me is when someone manages to fully replace the original game; as in, there's no reason to ever go back to the vanilla version again.

This is not an easy thing to do. If a game is good to start with, it's hard to improve upon in such a way as to not violate whatever made it good in the first place (and if it's bad, it's hard to make it good). There are many hacks that I love but would never have anyone play as a substitute for the original. This hack, however, is a very rare exception.

Virtually every single thing that could have been fixed or improved upon from the original has been. Aspects of the game that I hadn't ever even considered changing have gone through a makeover that can only be described as an upgrade. This hack isn't some personal flavor that only appeals to certain people, it's just better. Better in every way than the original.

Character creation is infinitely superior. Battles are smoother and make much more sense. Leveling is no longer a counter-intuitive punishing mess. The towns are gorgeous as are the inhabitants (frankly, I am surprised that this in particular was pulled off on the NES). Most importantly, however, is the replay value. Having solved every major problem with the vanilla version, there is a lot of fun in trying out different class combinations and playing through the game more than once.

The only possible complaint that I have is that there is still some slowdown and graphical glitches but my assumption is that this is more related to the limitations of the NES hardware than it is the game itself. But who knows? The hacking community continues to amaze me.

If you are thinking of playing Ultima: Exodus on the NES for the first time, do not even bother with the original version. This hack is an upgrade in every sense of the word. Playing the original would just be an exercise in needless frustration.

Thank you to the author for taking on this project. You have reforged a problematic game with potential into a true gem.