Hi everyone. I'm trying to set up ultima 7. I've read it's best played with exult and the keyring mod. I've managed to get exult set up and it seems to be running fine but I can't for the life of me figure out how to get it to run the keyring mod. Apparently I've to make a mods folder in the games directory and then copy the mod files to there but it doesn't seem to be doing anything. What am I doing wrong?

Inside the Exult folder you should have an Exult, Serpent and Ultima 7 subfolder. Inside the Ultima 7 subfolder is where you need to add the Mods folder. This is where you unzip the Keyring mod. Once installed, when you next start Exult you should have an option to play the Keyring mod from the Ultima 7 start menu.

It's working now! Thanks a lot. Hope the game still holds up for a newcomer to the series like me!

As I understand it from what the uber fans say about it, one of the problems with the Exult path to playing U7 is that Exult isn't exact emulation of the code, so the scripts aren't so much broken, but rather it's a rewrite interpreting many of the elements of the game. So if you want the original U7 experience you're probably best going via the Dosbox route, rather than the Exult one. If you want the convenience mods (especially for a second run through) then the otherwise excellent Exult option can be an alternative.

Would be interested in hearing opinions from old fans and players of U7, especially if they've tried both or spent time looking at the code.

Makes it hard to choose what option to go with when these differing opinions are going about, especially as the game takes some investment of time to play through and enjoy, so you don't want to regret the choice halfway through the game...

Pretty much, yeah. Exult uses the original games' data (USECODE), but runs on a newly written engine. They do their best to make it as close as possible to the original, but in some cases they just had to guess. DOSbox is the purist's route, but it can be difficult getting the game running at the right speed consistently. It tends to run smoothly with only a few party members, but then gets choppy with the full group of eight, which didn't happen on old hardware.

This is a bit of an old thread, but does anyone have the paths that should be in exult? I looked in C:\Program Data(x86)\Exult and it doesn't have a Ultima 7 or Serpent Isle file. Unless do I need to copy the gog install files to the exult directory?

Hey TheWatcherofWays,

you could make your Exult portable, thus you will have no more hassle with the paths if you want to move the folder. It's what I do:


1. Copy the two folders "Ultima7" and "Serpent" from the GOG-installations into a new folder

2. Then install Exult into this folder and choose the two games in the installation process. Start Exult once.

3. After that, go to your appdata/local and copy the contents of the "Exult"-folder there into your installation folder (not the folder itself).

4. Then open the exult.ini (which you copied into your Exult-folder in the last step) and change the paths of "Ultima7" and "Serpent": if in the exult.ini it is something like "c:\games\Ultima7" or c:\games\Serpent", change it to ".\Ultima7" or ".\Serpent".

5. As a last step, create a batch-file to start Exult as a portable version (i.e.: instead of saving your configurations in the appdata/local-folder, it will save everything in your Exult-folder):

5.1. open notepad

5.2. enter the following:

@echo=off
exult.exe -p
exit

5.3. save the file as a ".bat"-file ("save as")

It's a bit of work, but that way Exult should be portable and the paths should work.

First let me say, great icon,

Second. I found what needed to be done. Its actually asking for the mod folders to be put into the installation path of Ultima.
In my case I have D:\Exult and D:\GOG Games\
I was putting it in D:\Exult\Ultima7\Mods\ at first but that isn't what it was asking for it wanted me to put it in:
D:\GOG Games\Ultima 7\Mods
D:\GOG Games\Ultima 7 - Serpent Isle\Mods
Then it picked up the fact that I have the mods.
Also it couldn't be in a sub folder it needs the folder and the cfg.
e.g.
D:\GOG Games\Ultima 7 - Serpent Isle\Mods\SiFixes
D:\GOG Games\Ultima 7 - Serpent Isle\Mods\sifixes.cfg

Thank you.