A Somewhat Unsurprising Announcement

Posted on November 11, 2008 by Scott Jennings| 19 Comments

Richard Garriott leaves NCsoft

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  • http://westkarana.com Tipa

    So, the entire purpose of Tabula Rasa was to deliver the DNA of Earth gamers to the aliens in orbit?

    Of course. It all makes sense now.

  • http://www.channelmassive.com Jason

    “So, the entire purpose of Tabula Rasa was to deliver the DNA of Earth gamers to the aliens in orbit?”

    I’m starting to smell a conspiracy brewing here. I guess we’ll know for sure when the Earth is invaded by thousands of Stephen Colbert clones.

    Jason (resident drunken idiot of Channel Massive)

  • Pingback: Amber Night » Blog Archive » Insane Space Alien Richard Garriot (Real Name Unpronouncable By Human Tongue) Bids Farewell To Earthlings After Placing Gigantic Fetus Into Low Earth Orbit

  • Vaxhacker

    Scene from a near future: a pallet or two of Rockford moving boxes arriving at NCsoft.

  • http://antipwn.wordpress.com IainC

    Did you ask if you could have his stuff?

  • dartwick

    Wouldnt it be nice if he retired and we never heard from again.

  • etherealwolf

    you know, the original ultima series was quite good for its time. hopefully his next effort will be more about art and less about milking lucrative cows (mmos in general).

  • Merkwurdigliebe

    I think he learned some secret about aliens or catholicism out there in space and realizes the futility of human society. I think he’s finally going to walk through a real portal to Sosaria.

  • Freakazoid

    Wouldn’t it be nice if, instead of having yet another inane vision to do some thing he thought of in the moment, maybe he had real, inspiring reflection on life and the universe?

    Maybe then, he’d take back the Ultima franchise and do something awesome with it that doesn’t involve logging in.

  • Gawain

    Have they merged servers on TR yet?

    You know, what he should do now is make another ultima game, except make it like… one of those MMO things! Man that would be sweet.

  • Pingback: Garriott verläßt TR und NCsoft | I DoT! MMO Blog

  • Njal

    Meh.

  • Ashendarei

    he must have run into Xenu up there …

  • Amaranthar

    Wouldn’t it be nice if, instead of having yet another inane vision to do some thing he thought of in the moment, maybe he had real, inspiring reflection on life and the universe?

    Maybe then, he’d take back the Ultima franchise and do something awesome with it that doesn’t involve logging in.

    I wish. Awesome doesn’t include level grind, in my opinion, because it ruins economy, freedom, and social spheres as it divides the entire game into partitions of level groups. (My constant obligatory effort to change the status quo.)

    UO brought me back into gaming after years of not giving two hoots for games. I’ve been looking for something to replace it since because I loved it. But the question of exactly what I loved about it has been difficult to answer exactly. There’s several issues…..

    1) It was a world simulation, where you could do what you wanted, move things, take or leave things, watch critters, follow MOBs to see what they did, etc. Not completely, of course. But enough to make it feel like a simulation of a world that you merely visit.

    2) Because of the freedoms, the social aspects were unmatched except maybe for EVE Online. No, even EVE didn’t have the full effect due to not having game “on the ground” with Avatars. (That may change at least partially with their station avatars, in this social sense).

    3) The biggest thing though, was the history. The Ultima games had a specific, defined history that left open many questions. The early UO used this to very good effect. It left open room for lots of player . This was game play too, even if much of it was done outside of the game.
    No other game has as rich of a background for the use in an MMO.

    In pre-release days to UO, there was so much speculation, so many questions, lots of historical arguments, that it gave players a feeling of deep mystery. A mystery that they themselves could hope to solve. But that’s completely lacking these days.

    Unfortunately for gaming, Garriott probably has no designs of this sort.

  • Amaranthar

    Oops, screwed up the Link to player speculation on UO and history.

  • Axecleaver

    Ultima 3 was my first computer game. I loved all of RG’s earlier work, especially the Ultima series. Lots of us did. I’m interested to see what he does next, and hope it’s something that plays to his strengths as a game designer: wide, compelling story arcs, working player-morality/decision making into the game mechanics without being too overbearing with the social commentary, and making fun, ground breaking games that entertain.

    Tabula Rasa was none of those things, and I’m encouraged to see him move on. Perhaps he will get back to his core strengths. Good luck, Richard.

  • DoubleD

    I”m guessing his next venture will no be computer games, but maybe something like private space tours.

  • Slyfeind

    Yeah, his farewell letter seems to hint that he’s done with game design. I think he took too much time off back in the 90′s, and the industry left him too far behind.

  • sentack

    Is it that unsurprising? Why is that? And is he leaving to somehow pursue a career somehow involving space?

    I for one, think that he’s always been one to be one step ahead of the curve, for good or ill. Even Ultima 9, universally hated by the playerbase and panned by critics, was actually still ahead of it’s time, look at most Fantasy RPG’s today, heck, Look at Fable. It almost seems like they descended directly from Ultima 9.

    I think he’s a great designer, perhaps a little self congratulatory but, over all, you can’t deny he’s done a lot for gaming.

    Still, I would like to see him stay in gaming, but maybe stay out of the online realm. He usually has great ideas as to what players might respond to in the next generation in games, that’s for sure.