Category Archives: Richard Garriott

Ultima I: The First Age of Darkness, a computer game RPG by Lord British/Origin 1986

From Akalabeth To Earth Orbit: Ultima and Lord British

As a teenager in Texas in 1977, Richard Garriott confounded his high school teachers with adventure games produced on paper tape using a mainframe computer. He would chase his dreams of computerized D&D-type adventures all the way to the pinnacle of the computer games industry.

While working at a local computer store in 1979, Garriott produced his most elaborate game world yet, titled Akalabeth. Only a few copies ended up selling, painstakingly packaged by hand in Ziplock bags, but one copy winded up in the hands of California Pacific Computer Company. They purchased the rights to distribute Akalabeth, and eventually sold 30,000 copies.

The same company sold Garriott’s next game, Ultima, in 1981, which later received the subtitle The First Age of Darkness. A tile-based RPG programmed in BASIC, it sold more than his first attempt but Garriott eventually soured on his relationship with his publisher and signed a deal with Sierra for the sequel, Ultima II: Revenge of the Enchantress, released in 1982. For Ultima III: Exodus, Garriott teamed with his father Owen and brother Robert, along with Chuck Bueche, to found a new company to produce the popular Ultima games: Origin Systems. The company signed a distribution deal with EA in 1984, the result being the groundbreaking Avatar trilogy.

And so it goes, as the Ultima games became one of the biggest franchises in gaming history.  The Ultimas went 3D in Ultima Underworld: The Stygian Abyss in 1992, and blazed a trail in the MMO genre with Ultima Online in 1997

Garriott himself blazed a trail into space in 2008 as a customer of private space trip facilitator Space Adventures; he was also a principle investor in the organization. The Ultima creator was simply  following his father’s footsteps, as Owen Garriott himself was a NASA astronaut.

With his more Earthbound adventures, Richard Garriott has made an indelible impact on computer and video gaming.  For more information on Lord British and Ultima, consult your local Dot Eaters article.

Origin Systems logo circa 1982

Website Featuring Ultima Remakes

Ultima: The Reconstruction is a website listing known remakes of Ultima, the classic RPG series by Lord British (Richard Garriott).  Some of the projects are abandoned, some are in active development, and some are completed.  One or two are homegrown engines, but most are mods or reskins that require having the computer versions of games such as Dungeon Siege or Oblivion.

All of them, however, are loving testaments to one of the most revered RPG series of all time.

Ultima: The Reconstruction:

For more information on Lord British and Ultima, consult your local Dot Eaters article.

Title screen for Ultima IV: Quest of the Avatar, a computer RPG by Origin and Lord British

Return of the Avatar

Play Ultima IV online, complete with saves, with this link. It is a slightly updated, but completely faithful version of one of the best Ultima experiences ever. Ultima IV was the first of the vaunted “Avatar” trilogy of Ultima games, and its feeling of epic accomplishment was a gaming revelation.

You can read more about it, Origin, the Ultima series, and Lord British, in this article on TDE.