Under the pseudonym of “Lord British”, Richard is best known for creating the longest running RPG series, Ultima, which has been produced since the 1980’s. His love of creating fantasy computer games led to an early career in game development. Richard first made waves with his game entitled Akalabeth which was distributed in 1980 in the unique packaging of Ziploc bags. After Akalabeth was picked up by an early publisher, Richard began work on his Ultima computer game series which soon took off. The series maintained production via different publishing companies until Garriott and his brother Robert created their own company entitled, Origin Systems. Garriott continued to publish the new editions of Ultima through Origin until deciding to sell the company to Electronic Arts in 1992 where he continued development of the Ultima series. 

His place in video gaming history was solidified with his creation of Ultima Online which was the first large scale commercial “massively multi-player online game” (MMOG), outsold all previous versions of the Ultima series by ten-fold, and still remains a best seller to this day. Richard retired from Origin in 2000 and re-entered the gaming industry in 2001with his brother under the company title of Destination Games. Destination Games soon merged with the South Korean gaming giant NCsoft and developed an American branch - NCsoft Austin - where Richard currently works as an executive producer.   Richard has helped expand the NCsoft brand name to include branches in London, Los Angeles, and Seattle. His latest gaming project entitled Tabula Rasa is making waves in the gaming industry as it has been receiving critical acclaim from gamers and reviewers alike as it is deemed to take online gaming to “the next generation”.

• In 1992, Inc Magazine rewarded Richard and his brother Robert the Entrepreneur of the Year award for their work at Origin Systems.
• 2005 proved to be a big year with Richard being inducted into the Academy of Interactive Arts and Science’s Hall of Fame as well as receiving the Lifetime Achievement Award by the IGDA. 
• He has consistently received the “Game of the Year”, “Game Designer of the Year”, and “Role Playing Game Design Award” honors for his work.