Akalabeth is a game Richard Garriott (the creator of Ultima) programmed back in his high school days. Essentially his first programming project, it launched a career and was the spiritual predecessor to the Ultima series.
From the auction:
This is one of RIchard Garriott’s ORIGINAL Akalabeth labels, created for his high school project Akalabeth, the one that sold under 15 games (NONE of the original games sold are in the hands of any collector’s as far as I know). This label was obtained in a trade with RG many years ago. His game was bought out by California Pacific which startted the Ultima revolution, Cal Pacific later released Ultima I, then Richard went to Sierra where Ultima II was released, he then founded his own company, Origin which released most of the Ultima games and others over the years. This game was the beginning. May be the ONLY original new Akalabeth label around unless RG has any left. New, still on it’s original backing.
Auction Here (Far From Cheap)
This seller actually has one of the top Ultima collections in the world and is thinking of selling it off – over $70,000 of stuff on paper. More on that when and if it happens.
I’ll also mention this neat little Garriott interview I watched recently. Looking at his collections of various stuff it frightens me to think of what a millionaire could do with a retro gaming collection. He also mentions some his his early days including Akalabeth.
