Ultima Attorney Talks Back

GameSpot News asked George Schultz - the attorney representing a group of gamers suing Ultima Online publisher/developer Origin Systems for damages based on breach of contract, misrepresentation, and other alleged deeds - to react to Origin's March 12 statement asking gamers not to draw any hasty conclusions concerning a pending legal action against Origin and its parent company Electronic Arts.

The link to the right will take you to Thursday's GameSpot News article containing Origin's March 12 "statement" to gamers.

What follows is Schultz's response, tendered to GameSpot News on Friday.

"We as a group were more responsive before the suit even to our harshest critics, and more responsive now than EA/OSI have been regarding UO. Given the fact that the game has now been out for over six months, I hardly think customers are coming to any hasty conclusions about the game that EA/OSI allege. It is their own game and conduct that has caused these conclusions and not a lawsuit or any individuals.

The reason the complaint is so widely distributed all over the Net is because, unlike EA/OSI, we are responsive in providing information. When people, even those who don't agree with us, request information or the complaint itself we provide a response and fast.

Whether EA/OSI want to stretch boundaries of creativity may be great advertising lingo, but I would be much more comfortable if they spent more time exploring the boundaries of law and their own customers' concerns and perhaps even a dose of common sense and courtesy.

Their post-lawsuit no-comment policy about the important issues concerning UO gamers really isn't that much different from their comments prior to the suit. I am sorry they have so little confidence in the press and their own customers as to not be able to comment on an issue that has obviously struck a nerve of not only UO players but almost everyone involved in the gaming industry.

Instead of maybe taking this bad situation and using it to turn things around , perhaps even learn from it and use it to some advantage, we get some PR person's sad idea of what gamers throughout this country want to know?"