In line with Electronic Arts’ Play4Free platform, BioWare (which is part of EA Studios) is slated to revive the Ultima RPG series with Ultima Forever, which is primed as a cross-platform game.

The title is pegged to work with an “option to pay later” feature, allowing interested players to easily download the game title, requiring only an existing EA Origin account. Currently accepting sign-ups for Beta testing, the game is calling upon the expert inputs of gamers with EA Origin accounts, to road test and “preview” the game.

The Ultima series gained a strong following in 1997 when its first version was released as a massive multiplayer game title dubbed Ultima Online. The title, in fact, is still up and about, with updates and revisions still ongoing, though major revisions aren’t as frequent as what one would consider as ideal.

Ultima IX in 1999 is slated to have been the last major update of the series, which pretty much says a lot about how overdue an update for the series is.

As a revival title, details regarding Ultima Forever are not as specific as one would want to hear or read, but based on information gathered from the game’s official site, elements of older Ultima titles are evidently integrated in the new revision.

Certain characters from previous Ultima releases are also brought back into play, which can be ascribed as the game title developer’s tribute to the title’s hit characters from previous versions.

Given that Ultima’s last major facelift happened in 1999, its high time a new version came to be.