NCsoft announces Tabula Rasa, or rather Richard Garriott's Tabula Rasa, is gold, and the science fiction MMORPG will offer its namesake clean slate on October 16 for preorder customers, and October 19 for everyone else:

NCsoft Announces Launch Date for Richard Garriott's Tabula Rasa

Gaming legend's widely anticipated online space adventure to launch October 19th

Thursday 6th September/...NCsoft® Europe, the world’s leading developer and publisher of online computer games, announced today that Richard Garriott’s Tabula Rasa® has reached gold master status and will launch commercial service in Europe and North America on October 19, 2007. Pre-order customers will begin their three-day head start on October 16.

One of the most anticipated PC games of the year, Tabula Rasa is gaming legend Richard Garriott’s newest title, which combines a vast, persistent game world and rich storyline with fast paced action. Set in a near-future science fiction storyline, players create characters that must fight to save humanity against hostile alien enemies while trying to gain control of the universe. The game introduces several innovative elements to massively multiplayer online (MMO) games, including a Character Cloning System™ that allows players to explore different character classes without having to create a new character, and dynamic battlefields where players experience the frenetic action of combat in an ongoing war.

“It has been a heck of a journey,” said Richard Garriott, the game’s Executive Producer. “The fact that we are getting ready for the final stretch towards launch feels great, but it is also just the beginning. I think we’ve managed to do something truly unique and I hope that the gaming community likes it as much as we do. Now, I am looking forward to a really fun ‘end of beta event’ for our incredible testers, and focusing development on new planets and innovations for future expansions of Tabula Rasa.”

The standard edition box of Richard Garriott’s Tabula Rasa will be available at major retailers at an expected retail price of £29.99 / €44.99 and at the PlayNC® store (https://secure.plaync.com/cgi-bin/Store.pl?language=en-gb). Customers will be able to purchase the recently announced Limited Collector’s Edition box from major retailers at an expected retail price of £49.99 / €69.99. Both products include the first month of online game play. After the first month, players will be charged a monthly subscription fee of £8.99 / €12.99. The game is rated 16+ by PEGI (www.pegi.info).

For more information about Richard Garriott’s Tabula Rasa go to http://www.rgtr.com.