Richard Garriott (Lord British) forges his own path with Ultima III in 1983Ī list of great games from Origin Systems, mid-80s Richard Garriott, aka Lord British, heralds his new company in the 1983 pages of Softline magazine.
ULTIMA III TIME LORD FULL
Deep into his persona as Lord British, Garriott has taken to appearing at software trade shows in full royal regalia, including crown, cape, and medieval sword. The game also marks the beginning of Ultima’s move to assembly language, greatly increasing the speed of the games. Ultima II: Revenge of the Enchantress is released for the Apple II in 1982, with a limited interaction with NPCs (non-player characters) now possible. After a falling-out with California Pacific, Garriott signs a deal with Sierra to distribute his next game, as they’re the only company he talks to that agrees to include a cloth map with the packaging.
ULTIMA III TIME LORD MOVIE
While working on a follow-up that year, Garriott attends multiple showings of Terry Gilliam’s movie Time Bandits, and uses maps and concepts from the film in the design of the game. When released by California Pacific in 1981, it sells even more than the first game (a re-release is made by Origin in 1986, featuring spruced-up graphics). In the package for Ultima is a game disk, as well as a master player disk which users are expected to copy if they want to create multiple characters. Upon entering a dungeon, the graphics are reminiscent of those in Akalabeth, with notable improvements. Multiple castles dotting the land are ruled by different kings, who’s quests must be completed to finish the game. Set in the mystical land of Sosaria, our nameless hero must use might and magic to slaughter evil creatures roaming the landscape, gaining experience and hit-points for the ultimate showdown with the big boss…the evil wizard Mondain. Later subtitled The First Age of Darkness, it features a tile-based graphics engine, with the same look-down perspective as Akalabeth. But a board game by Dallas, TX-based Yaquinto Publications, released in 1979, already exists with that name, so they shorten the title to Ultima. Still living at his parent’s house in Houston, he and friend Ken Arnold begin work on another game Garriott calls Ultimatum, also programmed in BASIC. That fall, nineteen-year-old Garriott starts classes at the University of Texas. Insert sheet for original Akalabeth packagingĪkalabeth cover for California Pacific releaseĪl Remmers, head of Akalabeth publishers California Pacific, image from 1981 While Garriott was a mere two months old when his family returned to California, this tale of a UK birth probably adds to the origin story of Lord British.
While born on the very American date of July 4 in 1961, the location of his birth was actually Cambridge, England. This formality in speech causes his fellow students to call him “British”. The creator of the games is credited as Lord British: this is a nickname used by Garriott and derived from the incredulous reaction of his fellow roommates during his sophomore year at the University of Oklahoma to Garriott’s use of “Hello” as a greeting to them. Dissatisfied with the original cover sheet design, a new one is commissioned by Garriott from acquaintance Denis Loubet, who goes on to provide artwork for many of Garriott’s later works. Releasing the game on 5 1/4″ floppies, Akalabeth is a big hit in 1980, selling 30,000 copies. But, unbeknownst to him, his boss has sent one copy to west coast software outfit California Pacific Computer Company, who fly Garriott to California to sign a contract for publishing rights. Spending 200 dollars on Ziplock bags and cover sheets, he only sells about eight copies on cassette tape. The game so impresses the manager of the store that he convinces Garriott to offer it for sale. In the game the player scrolls around a map of ASCII symbols completing quests given by Lord British and battling creatures in black & white outline psuedo-3D dungeons.
In 1979, while working part-time at a local Computerland store, he is exposed to the Apple II and decides to use the computers there and the Applesoft BASIC language to add more advanced graphics to Akalabeth, and he finishes the program that summer. This mini-opus incorporates elements from his other interests, organizing large Dungeons & Dragons games in his parents’ house and reading the fantasy books of J.R.R. He then uses the skills he has gained in game design and programming to create a larger RPG dungeon-crawler he titles Akalabeth: World of Doom. Through his high school “career”, he creates 28 such fantasy games. While attending Clear Creek High School in Houston, 16-year-old Richard Garriott is writing dungeon games produced on a teletype machine with punch cards at the school and getting A’s for them from bewildered teachers.
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