Underworld Ascendant - Interview @ IncGamers

Peter Parrish of IncGmaers interviewed Paul Neurath of OtherSide Entertainment.

IncGamers: In the Kickstarter pitch video [for Underworld Ascendant] you imply that Ultima Underworld was in a publisher’s “deepest vault.”

Paul Neurath: That’s right.

IG: Is there a story behind that? You presumably wanted to do this project earlier, but … is it getting hold of rights, or the name? What’s the story there?

PN: The story there is, when we developed … the original [Ultima Underworld] game was developed by the first studio I had going, which was called Blue Sky Productions. Back in 1990 we started that project, and finished the first one in ‘92.

Origin was the publisher – Origin Systems. Richard and Robert Garriott’s studio. They were independent when we were doing that. Around the time that game was done, I don’t remember exactly, very soon after they were acquired by Electronic Arts (EA.) And so that added a layer of complexity, because suddenly EA had to make decisions about what projects got approved and greenlit and funded and all that.