So I mentioned that the various weekly round-up posts — CD Projekt Sundays, Random Wenesdays, etc. — would be moving to a new home today, and that is in fact the case: there’s a brand new Ultima Codex subdomain up and running: the WtFBlog.

The problem with running an Ultima fansite is…branding, more or less. Even when talking about another game development company (besides Portalarium, Mythic, or Origin Systems, of course), there always has to be some tenuous link back to Ultima that I can draw. If I want to talk about BioWare, I’d better be able to refer to their drive to implement complex moral decision-making as a gameplay element…and tie that back to Ultima 4, which arguably pioneered the concept. If I’m going to talk about Piranha Bytes, I’d better be able to refer to the way the early Gothic games were openly inspired by Ultima 9. And of course I have to be ever-cognizant of the wispy thread of history that connects Ultima Underworld to BioShock Infinite.

Not that I always have to explicitly draw out these connections, invoking their existence every time I want to wander off the Ultima brand and discuss what other game companies are doing in the RPG(ish) space. But if I’m going to discuss these other things on what I refer to, in my discussion with those who help run the site, as Codex Main, that connection — however tenuous — needs to be there.

Because branding.

My problem with that is that it basically defines the success or failure of what I write in terms of its contribution to building the Ultima/Shroud of the Avatar/Ultima Dragons brand. There isn’t room to wander too far off those brands and just have a chance to speak honestly about other stuff that interests me.

Don’t get me wrong: I intend to keep running the Ultima Codex, and running it well. I just want the opportunity to step away from the brand for a bit and talk about other stuff. Stuff I find interesting. Stuff that’s true. I like what I do, but a lot of what I do is just…shilling. And that’s fine; there’s some great stuff happening right now that I want to promote, to (in effect) shill for. But doing just that gets tiring after a while, especially because I end up passing over other content, and other topics, in pursuit of it.

Hence, the WtFBlog…my “off brand” space, as it were.