Shroud of the Avatar To Be Published by Black Sun in Russia


Portalarium has announced that a publishing deal has been struck with Black Sun Game Publishing to distribute Shroud of the Avatar in Russia, the Baltic States, and the CIS:

AUSTIN, Texas, May 10, 2017 — Portalarium®, an Austin-based game developer, today announced the completion of a deal with Black Sun Game Publishing in Moscow, to publish and operate Shroud of the Avatar™: Forsaken Virtues in Russia, the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) and the Baltic States. Shroud of the Avatar is the spiritual successor to the hugely successful Ultima series of fantasy role-playing games created by legendary game designer Richard Garriott. The game is one of the largest crowd funded games ever, with more than $11.3 million raised since early 2013.

Shroud combines a single-player narrative story with a sandbox massively multiplayer online (MMO) experience. The production team includes Executive Producer Starr Long, who along with Garriott helped produce the groundbreaking Ultima Online MMO and New York Times bestselling author Tracy Hickman, who wrote the popular Dragonlance fantasy novels.

“We are extremely pleased to announce this deal with Black Sun Game Publishing,” said Portalarium CEO Richard Garriott. “We have a large and growing fan base in Russia and the surrounding countries. The Black Sun team is experienced and enthusiastic. They know their regional gaming community well and are ideally suited to bring Shroud of the Avatar to a very eager fan base.”

“It is a great honor for us to work with Richard Garriott, a legend of the games industry, and his team,” exclaimed Black Sun CEO Alex Yarovit. “There are many fans of his games, especially the Ultima series in Russia, the CIS, and the Baltic States. Shroud of the Avatar takes a lot of Richard’s hallmark RPG design principals and brings them up to date in a modern MMO and single player experience. We are looking forward to working further with Lord British and providing his newest creation to all Russian-speaking players. New Britannia beckons!”

There’s even a Russian-language Shroud of the Avatar website now: sota-game.com.