Ultima Franchise Producer’s Letter Mentions Ultima Forever

The actual subject of Jeff Skalski’s latest letter to the Ultima Online community is addressing some of the concerns that members of the UO fandom have articulated over the past few weeks. However, in addressing some of those concerns, he briefly mentions a handful of details about Ultima Forever as well:

…Why is BioWare not putting more development effort into UO instead of wasting time on U4E? Why are they doing U4E instead of UO2?

…First, it’s important to know that U4E was never built to compete with UO. In fact, they are two very different projects run by two different teams. We have a phrase here in the office that every generation deserves an Ultima game. It’s been far too long, and when we looked at the gaming landscape of today, and more importantly tomorrow, we birthed the concept behind Ultima Forever — an online RPG adventure game you play with friends as you quest to save Britannia and uphold the eight virtues to prove your Avatarhood. Just as the classic Ultima titles of the past differ from UO, so is the same for U4E.

A little later, he mentions Ultima Forever again:

…what I will say by everyone continuing to support UO and Ultima Forever this is the kind of ammunition I need to convince the high level execs that the market is ready for more Ultima.

Which is something I believe some of us here have been saying for a while now, as well. But it’s nice to hear the point re-iterated by someone who is actually intimately connected to developments in the Ultima franchise!