PSX-port of Ultima Underworld

Ultima Underworld (PSX) – CD and cover

Ultima Underworld: The Stygian Abyss is the sole Ultima ported to the Sony PlayStation (PSX), released in 1997.

Description[edit]

This marks the last time a console port of any Ultima product was produced, and was only released in Japan with no localization anywhere, not even an announcement like with Savage Empire's SNES-port. The port was released five years after the PC version of Ultima Underworld, and numerous changes were made to update the engine to standards of the time. Most of the items and dungeon designs remained the same, but NPC and monster models were overhauled significantly. Lacking the benefit of mouse and keyboard input, the port has some difficult gamepad controls, but it is no worse than the various Dungeon Master and Eye of the Beholder ports.

A complete fan-made translation was released in September 2023, see: Ultima Underworld PSX Translation.

Included with the Game[edit]

Memoirs of Sir Cabirus (heavily reduced)

Differences[edit]

Here is an overview of the differences between the PSX and PC-DOS version of the game. For an in-depth technical analysis of the differences see this article:

Technical Differences in Ultima Underworld on the PSX

The game is fullscreen, with indicators like health, mana and torch visible. The inventory and the spellcasting area are in separate menu screens.
The animations for the introduction, death, resurection, and game ending were redone as full motion videos. The intro and ending have additional dialogue.
Player sprites are redone in an anime style

All of the graphics in the game (eg, terrain textures and item sprites) have been redone. They are mostly similar to the PC version but have a unique look for the PSX version.
All of the creatures and NPCs were converted to polygon models.
Numerous character portraits were changed to give them a more anime-like look. In the PC version some portaits where shared among several characters. In this version every characer has a unique portrait. See a side-by-side list in this article:

Ultima Underworld Characters

All of the music was remixed. Most of it resembles to the original music.
The port has many digital sound effects, while the original had no digital sound effects (apart from the voice acting).

Other than the introduction and ending movies, information about the story is currently unknown.

Game-wrecking bugs[edit]

This list is of the most critical bugs. For a full list of known bugs see this article:

Technical Differences in Ultima Underworld on the PSX: Bugs

The inventory bug present in the original PC release of Ultima Underworld is also present here. While this was fixed in later PC releases of the game, it can cause loss of plot-critical items in the PSX-port, making saved games unbeatable.
Dropping an item out of a container will sometimes delete other items from inventory, and they will no longer be available in the game. If dropping an item out of a container, first move it into main inventory (not in any container) and then drop it from there.
With the English 1.0 patch talking to the bandits on level 3 causes the game to start glitching and crash. Get a newer version of the English patch before playing the game. Details in this article:

Ultima Underworld PSX Translation

When Shak repairs a magical item he returns it as a mundane non-enchanted item. You can lose some good equipment this way. A good reason to buff that repair skill.