The Kickstarter campaign for Divinity: Original Sin is well underway, and has raked in over 75% of its $400,000 goal. And Larian Studios chief Sven Vincke makes no bones about his inspiration for the game:

“Ultima 7,” Vincke says, and he says it a few more times for effect. “Ultima 7. No, Ultima 7, always. It’s probably one of the best RPGs ever made. It had an open world with the absolute height of interactivity. It didn’t have great combat, but it had a fantastic world where you could go anywhere. You could spend so much time in there, so this is something we’ve tried to recreate, that feeling, and I think we’re starting to get close to it. It’s one of my core RPGs. Everything out there after Ultima 7 never did it as good as Ultima 7, other than the visuals or the combat.”

And, as expected, there have been several different previews of Original Sin published at different gaming sites. Larian’s other Divinity game, Dragon Commander, also received a preview last week, and that game continues to look as fascinating and genre-bending as ever.

Vincke himself also gave an interview to Jace Hall, and has been blogging at an increased frequency about the progress the Original Sin Kickstarter has been making, as well as offering his thoughts on various matters surrounding the game and its development.

As well, GOG and Larian Studios have announced a partnership to distribute both Original Sin and Dragon Commander. Larian have also updated the Kickstarter campaign a few times, a shorter version of their Kickstarter video, demonstrating some unexpected results of the game’s open-world systems, and announcing stretch goals for the campaign. If they can reach $800,000, henchmen in the game will become proper NPC companions…and at $1,000,000, NPCs will get full schedules.