Richard Garriott's next game goes 'back to my roots,' but in social media

Portalarium founder, Ultima creator and no-foolin' spaceman Richard Garriott delivered the keynote at Fantastic Fest's inaugural Fantastic Arcade event in Austin today. After giving the assembled audience his personal history, he offered a hint about where he plans to go with Portalarium (which is evidently both a company and game name).

Displaying a slide about going "back to my roots," Garriott said his company planned to make "AAA games, meaning the games we find compelling to create and play, but distributed through social media." Why that medium? "The power is in that you don't have to make a decision to buy it, you play it by clicking on a link, nothing to pay for up front, no real installation and only if you decide you really want to play it will we decide how to eventually charge you money for it."

Later, in response to an audience question, he explained his strategy a bit further. "Since everybody else is doing Flash and Java games, I can kick their ass pretty easy."