Ultima Designer Defects

Ultima: Ascension's lead designer, Bob White, will leave Origin Systems and, following in the footsteps of other Ascension team members, take up employment with ION Storm at its Austin, Texas, location.

White will assume the title of lead designer on Warren Spector's upcoming game - currently known as Warren Spector's Shooter (which certainly has an informal ring to it) or Deus Ex. Spector has repeatedly stated that a final title has yet to be determined.

White expressed a certain amount of excitement to be working with ION's Warren Spector, as well as anticipation just being part of the ION Storm team. "I've followed John Romero's work since Wolfenstein, and hooking up with a group he's directly tied to is very exciting," White said when reached Thursday morning. Commenting on his move to ION, White told GameSpot News, "Deus Ex is an exciting title."

Sharing the lead design responsibilities with White will be Harvey Smith, formerly the lead designer on Multitude's FireTeam, an online-only title that Smith helped wrap up at Multitude and a game that the company will release this July.

For those keeping track of Ultima: Ascension staff defections to Warren Spector's ION office, White's departure means that now four members of the team have left Origin within the past year to work at ION Storm in Austin. Currently, the Ultima: Ascension team numbers 16, a recent low according to a source inside Origin.

White had been at Origin for the past three and a half years and had worked on Ultima Online, as well as Ultima: Ascension when it was known as Ultima IX. An Origin spokesperson, confirming the departure, said today that White "has been a valuable member of the team."

"It was very tough to leave ," White said. He added that "there's no bad blood" between Origin founder Richard Garriott and him. As for reasons behind his and others' departures, White was reserved in his comments and would only say that those who have left Origin have done so "for their own reasons."

White joins ION Storm next month. For the next week or so, he will continue to lend his design talents to Ultima: Ascension, a title Origin has high hopes for. Ultima: Ascension is the single Origin-branded title the company will have on the show floor at E3.