Press Release AUSTIN, Texas, May 10, 2017:
Portalarium®, an Austin-based game developer, today announced the completion of a deal with
Black Sun Game Publishing in Moscow, to publish and operate
Shroud of the Avatar™: Forsaken Virtues in Russia, the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) and the Baltic States.
Shroud of the Avatar is the spiritual successor to the hugely successful Ultima series of fantasy role-playing games created by legendary game designer Richard Garriott. The game is one of the largest crowd funded games ever, with more than $11.3 million raised since early 2013.
Shroud combines a single-player narrative story with a sandbox massively multiplayer online (MMO) experience. The production team includes Executive Producer Starr Long, who along with Garriott helped produce the groundbreaking
Ultima Online MMO and New York Times bestselling author Tracy Hickman, who wrote the popular
Dragonlance fantasy novels.
“We are extremely pleased to announce this deal with Black Sun Game Publishing,” said Portalarium CEO Richard Garriott. “We have a large and growing fan base in Russia and the surrounding countries. The Black Sun team is experienced and enthusiastic. They know their regional gaming community well and are ideally suited to bring Shroud of the Avatar to a very eager fan base.”
“It is a great honor for us to work with Richard Garriott, a legend of the games industry, and his team,” exclaimed Black Sun CEO Alex Yarovit. “There are many fans of his games, especially the Ultima series in Russia, the CIS, and the Baltic States. Shroud of the Avatar takes a lot of Richard’s hallmark RPG design principals and brings them up to date in a modern MMO and single player experience. We are looking forward to working further with Lord British and providing his newest creation to all Russian-speaking players. New Britannia beckons!”
Shroud of the Avatar’s crowdfunded campaign began in 2013. It remains in early access but it continues to generate monthly content updates to its backers. The game has now reached 41 straight months of continuous play without a single server crash. Currently with more than $11.3 million in crowd funding, Shroud is the second highest fully crowd funded game ever.
About Portalarium
Portalarium headquarters is in Austin, Texas. The company was co-founded by legendary game developer Richard Garriott, who created Ultima, one of the longest running and most successful fantasy role playing game series ever. The company is currently developing its next game, the crowd funded Shroud of the Avatar. In addition to backers with financial contributions, the SotA community may also participate with art, sound, music and even design participation in the main game. This a game created for the community and with the community.
About Black Sun Game Publishing
Black Sun Game Publishing (BSGP) is a Russian video game publisher that was established in 2014. The company develops and publishes only high-quality and interesting projects in Russia, the CIS countries, and China. BSGP’s top priority is to work with games that are unique to the industry and that can be called works of art on PCs and mobile platforms. BSGP also plans to tap into the console market.
Company website:
http://bs-gp.com/
Russian game website:
http://sota-game.com/
Press release can also be found on
Gamasutra.
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