( The page is part of Xe Dragon's Aerie ) ( Comments to: <[email protected]> )
Quick Index
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(
Background |
HRUMP |
The Search |
The Maps |
Links
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News
- December 1, 2011: Added maps for Ultima 6
- April 3, 2000: Added maps for Ultima 7 and Ultima 7 Part 2
Background: A Dragon with a Cause (or Two)
As a fan of Ultima since the days of its, umm... origin, I've recently found myself buying a number Ultima products on CD. While I'm very happy with Origin for re-releasing these titles, two little details nag at me:
Origin has not yet released Savage Empire or Martian Dreams, and I refuse to pay US $55 at the ultra-cool eBay Auction site for them.
Every digital rendition of the cloth maps that originally came with these games... well, sucks rocks.
Amid rumours (from Sith Dragon's impressive Ascension page) that Savage Empire and Martian Dreams might be included in a so-called "Ultima Vault" in Ultima: Ascension, I decided to tackle my second beef first.
HRUMP, the High-Resolution Ultima Map Project
I think you know what I'm talking about. You fire up your brand spankin' new Ultima CD -- and realize that the digital maps that Origin provided (or didn't provide) blow chunks. Being a true Ultima fan, you realize that the cloth maps are an integral (and sometimes critical) part of the game, and are surprised at the crappy version you're expected to suffer with. You long for a decent scan of the old cloth map for the game -- even something that will look halfway decent when you print it out. Is that too much to ask? No, it's not.
Possessed by an altruistic desire to to serve the Ultima community (not to mention myself) and ensure that no Ultima player suffers for want of a good map, I am attempting to create the definitive collection of legible electronic Ultima maps. My aim was to make sure that those of you blessed with a colour printer could generate a reasonable -- and my standards of "reasonable" are quite high -- version of the map.
Don't have a colour printer? Don't despair! For each map, I've included a "floppy version" that is somewhere near the largest map that will fit onto a standard 3.5" floppy diskette. (Thanks to JPEG compression, the floppy versions of all of the maps are actually of extremely acceptable resolution.) Now you can pop the map on a floppy walk it over to someone who does have a colour printer -- like a less-unfortunate friend, or even your local print shop.
The Search Goes On...
Ken Rice has graciously agreed to lend me all of the maps that I lacked. What a guy! So, for now, I'm not actively seeking any maps. But thanks for thinking of helping out.
Many thanks to Samuel Nichols, Jr. (VisElEchNon Dragon) for helping me get the Ultima 6 maps up, well over 10 years since I last updated this site.
The Maps
If you're like most normal people, you just skipped all that stuff above. (Remember U3? "No, really, read the manual!" Or was that U4? ;D ) Well, here's the good stuff. Please address any feedback to <[email protected]>.
Here's a quick guide to the table below:
- 50% Scale is a version of the original map that is half the length and width of the original, and therefore one quarter of the area of the original map.
- 100% Scale is a full-sized (at 72dpi) version of the original map. This means that at on most monitors, the map should appear its original size.
- 200% Scale is a version of the original map that is twice the length and width of the original, and therefore four times the area of the original map.
- Scaled for Floppy is a version of the map that is as big as I could make it and still have it fit onto a 3.5" floppy diskette for easy transport.
