Is Ultima 4 freeware? We, the Ultima fandom, have thought so for some time, but the truth of the matter is rather more complicated. And EA has finally taken notice, which has had some unfortunate consequences.
Ultima creator Richard Garriott will be the opening keynote speech for the 2011 LOGIN Conference, discussing the “new era of gaming” that is the modern era of “cheap or free-to-play, virally spread, casual…gameplay.”
The latest two “awesome screens” from Beautiful Britannia/Forgotten World show off new water textures developed by Firstknight. And as a bonus, he also re-worked the grass texture again.
Former Looking Glass Studiosprogrammer Dan Schmidt shares one other story about the development of Ultima Underworld, in this case a peculiar boundary case in the dialogue of the ghouls.
Two separate engines for running older Ultima titles — Nuvie (Ultima 6) and xu4 (Ultima 4) — have published updated downloads in the past month.
Dino the Dark Dragon has re-launched his Ultima Web Database, a comprehensive listing of all Ultima-themed websites known to the community.
Zynga — the social gaming giant, producer of FarmVille — has acquired Floodgate Entertainment, the gaming company founded in 2000 by Paul Neurath (formerly of Looking Glass Studios).
