"I think D&D influenced everyone in the computer game business back in the '80s and '90s and that was certainly true at Origin," he says. "The Ultima games were about more than killing monsters and grabbing treasure. They were about embodying an avatar that was, basically, you, the player, deciding how to interact with the world based on your own desires and ideas as a person in the real world. You weren't trying to guess what your character would do or what the designer wanted you to do. It was you making the calls. It was all pretty primitive back then, but it was heading in the right direction."