For the past few weeks I have been completely absorbed by a remake of Origin's Ultima V, called Ultima V: Lazarus.  It was built with the Dungeon Siege engine, and is technically a mod for Dungeon Siege, but the land of Britannia is so vast and detailed, and the plot and dialogue are so immersive that it feels like a stand-alone game.  It was built entirely by volunteers, who have made it available to download for free - all you need is a copy of Dungeon Siege, or Ds Legends of Aranna.  I have written a short Guide to Getting Started that lists everything you need to start playing.

I will not write a full review, since great reviews have been written by better writers than myself, but all I can say is, once I started playing, I spent every possible minute I could spare at my computer playing Lazarus!

If you are familiar with the Ultima series, you will be familiar with the style of gameplay, and if you played the original Ultima V, which I did not, I have heard that it is very close to the original in terms of plot etc, even with a few subtle improvements apparently.  If you have not played any Ultimas before, and you like RPG/adventure games, YOU SHOULD GIVE THIS A TRY!  It is fairly non-linear with a complex plot, with tons of side-quests and a huge world to explore with lots of secrets.  There is a lot of dialogue with many npcs, which makes the game very immersive, and it's up to you to decide what is important. As far as combat goes, you will meet foes which range from rats to dragons, so you will need to be prepared, but the game is less about constant, high-intensity combat than it is about the story.  In other words, it's not a typical dungeon-crawler, where you hack and slash your way from one end of the world to the other to finish the game.

If you're interested in trying it out, you should visit the official site .  The forums on their site also have a lot of information so it's definitely worth checking them out.  After that, take a look at the Guide to getting started , and the U5: Lazarus Mod Guide . 

Happy gaming!