Richard Garriot

So Richard Garriot won his lawsuit against NCSOFT today. Congratulations, Richard. Too bad EA holds the rights to the cash cow that you reaped your initial success off of (Ultima, for those of you wondering.). Tasty, succulent, un-humoginized frothy cash cow milk... I digress. I know everyone and their dog feels like Ultima 7 was the pinnacle of the series but I can't help but point out how much fun Ultima 8 was. I was introduced to Ultima Underworld, then Ultima 8. After that I played the rest of the franchise. In my opinion Ultima 8 captured the feel of the intellectual property much better than 7. It also seemed to be the slate used for Ultima Online as well.

How do you not love somebody that literally puts himself in his games. Have you ever played an Ultima Game? Lord British is Richard Garriot. Yes, in every game. He also makes (made?) regular appearances in his MMOs. Fuck him for banishing me to the Stygian Abyss in Ultima Underworld though. Fucker...

NPD

I was reading an article on Maximum PC about how the NPD is finally starting to look at digital download sales. This has a definite impact on any type of industry forecasting. Everyone and their retarded hamster uses the NPD numbers to say things like "PC Gaming's sales just don't seem as lucrative as console sales.", which we all know is worthy of flying ninja kicks to the face. Now that they're collecting the digital sales data and reporting more accurately they're showing that the greater evil of capitalism has been successfully posting comparable numbers in both the Console and PC arenas. This makes me happy.

The real question is why did it take so long for them to adapt to current market conditions and to finally begin the foray into recording digital goods/services being purchased?