Usecode

Usecode is the common name for the scripting language used in some of the latter "Ultima" series games, particularly "Ultima VII", "Ultima VIII" and their descendants and spin-offs. The name is derived from the name of the compiled file in "Ultima VII". The Usecode in "Ultima VIII" is different from "Ultima VII" but similar in principle.

The languages were called AGIL (Another Goofy Interpreted Language) for "Ultima VII" and UNK (A nonsense coined by Tony Zurovec who also coined the term "Gump") for "Ultima VIII" both languages were created by Zack Booth Simpson. AGIL was a single threaded untyped language mostly for conversation scripting. Unk was a much more ambitious synchronous multi-threaded, multi-stack virtual machine and a corresponding language for describing non-cyclic dependencies which aimed to script complex threaded events for animation and AI. Unk included a full IDE and debugger while AGIL was debugged by various in-game mechanics.

The Usecode is a bytecode interpreter which interfaces with the game engine and which runs the Usecode scripts as certain events in the game happen. Most of the game logic itself is stored in the Usecode file. This includes NPC schedules, game script in general, and conversations.

Exult includes "ucc", a compiler that can compile C-like language to Usecode format.