Shroud of the Avatar - Interview @ GamersNexus

Portalarium Lead Richard Garriott was interviewed on a site called GamersNexus to talk about the origin of the MMORPG genre, his innovations, and Shroud of the Avatar.

In the interview, we cover just a few of Garriott & team's most memorable contributions to the gaming world:

• Introduction of 3D perspective line drawings and tile graphics.
• The adaptation of the Sanskrit word “avatar” as a means to represent the player's effective in-game incarnate, replacing the incumbent “character” name.
• The concept (and even the word) of “sharding” servers to better accommodate large player bases.
• Coining the term “MMORPG” as a game genre, later to become one of the world's most successful categories of games.

We also discuss Garriott's first encounters with Star Citizen's Chris Roberts, prior to the hiring of Roberts onto the Origin team. Closing dialogue focuses on Garriott's return to fantasy RPG roots – Shroud of the Avatar – and hopes to continue a legacy of innovation in the new title.