Some of you might ask, why I want to translate Ultima 7 – The Black Gate, given, that an official German version exists since 1993

Reasons why this project makes sense nonetheless are partly due to the age of the official version, partly immanent to the translation work done back then:

– The original game is not sold anymore and, hence, hard to get your hands on
– To extract the German Language Files from the official version and use them to patch an English version available today is just not possible, because these versions are not compatible on a binary level (been there, tried that ;-))
– The original, official version had some game breaking bugs that prevented you from finishing the game. At one point or the other, the game would crash before you beat it

Furthermore there are some really annoying limitations:
– The Add-on “Forge of Virtue”, which is part of every Ultima 7 – Black Gate distribution you can buy today, has never been translated into German
– In 1993 old spelling rules were in place in Germany. Hence, the game does not exist in nowadays diction
– In ignorance of the Ultima series the official translation has some flaws every now and then, that limited – at least my – amusement to a degree. The most notable of them all being Chuckles game, which did not comply to the rules of the game and accordingly corrupted it to a mere guessing game. Whatsmore: they constantly mixing up the translations for principles and virtues: “Courage” for example is often translated as “Valor”, “Truth” often reads “Honesty” (in a sense of “sincerity”) (in German “Aufrichtigkeit”) instead of the common and agreed term “Wahrheit”.

All in all, I’d say these are enough valid reasons to start this project, and, in the end, have a German Language patch, that works with versions of Ultima 7, purchasable nowadays without switching from German to English and back in the midst of a conversation, don’t you think? 😉