Asheron's Call (AC) was a fantasy massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG) for Microsoft Windows PCs, developed and published by Turbine Entertainment Software. Though it was developed by the Turbine team, it was published as a Microsoft title until 2004. The game was set on the island continent of Dereth and several surrounding smaller islands and archipelagos on the fictional planet of Auberean. The game was played in a large seamless 3D virtual world which could host thousands of players' characters at a time.
Brian Reynolds is an American videogame designer who now designs online social games. Reynolds has designed at SecretNewCo, Zynga, Big Huge Games, Firaxis Games, and MicroProse and has been chairman of the International Game Developers Association. He has played a major part in designing a number of multi-million selling games including Civilization II, Rise of Nations, Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri, and FrontierVille. He has also founded or co-founded three game companies, SecretNewCo, Big Huge Games, and Firaxis Games.
Big Huge Games, Inc. is an American video game developer located in Timonium, Maryland since 2000, known first for real-time strategy games such as Rise of Nations, later for the console RPG Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning, and more recently for mobile games such as DomiNations and Arcane Showdown. Throughout most of its history the company has been associated with its best-known founder, Brian Reynolds, whose prior career already included work as lead designer of Civilization II and Alpha Centauri, and co-founder of Firaxis Games. The studio's ownership has changed hands several times over the years, and it became briefly defunct in May 2012, but it was revived by Reynolds along with several original alumni and new partners. The company is presently owned by Nexon, and actively runs its mobile titles DomiNations and Arcane Showdown, while continuing to develop new games.
Louis Castle is an American video games designer. He is known for co-founding Westwood Studios, designing the PC game Blade Runner, and collaborating with Steven Spielberg on the Boom Blox and Boom Blox Bash Party video games for the Nintendo Wii console based on Spielberg's design ideas.
Christopher P. Granner is a freelance music composer, best known for composing music for video games and pinball games.
A casual game is a video game targeted at a wide, mass market audience, as opposed to a hardcore game, which is a game targeted at a more niche audience of hobbyist gamers. Casual games may exhibit any type of gameplay and genre. They generally have simpler rules, shorter sessions, and less learned skill than hardcore games.
Steve Cartwright is an American video game designer. He is best known as one of the original Activision game designers, credited with such games as Barnstorming, Megamania, Seaquest and Hacker.
Jeffrey Kaplan is an American video game designer who was vice president of Blizzard Entertainment. He designed elements of World of Warcraft and was the lead designer on Overwatch.
Gamezebo is a website that focuses on editorial coverage of the mobile gaming industry, offering interviews, reviews, previews, strategy guides, and news. It had been centered on casual games, but after a redesign in 2014, the site changed direction to primarily highlight mobile games.
Zynga Inc. is an American social game developer running social video game services and founded in April 2007 with headquarters in San Francisco, California, United States. The company primarily focuses on mobile and social networking platforms. Zynga states its mission as "connecting the world through games."
Laura Shigihara is an American-born Japanese singer-songwriter, video game developer, composer for video games, and Twitch streamer. She is best known as the lead composer and sound designer for the tower defense game Plants vs. Zombies and as the creator of the acclaimed indie RPG Rakuen.
Laralyn McWilliams is an American game designer and video game producer.
Empire & State is a browser-based, free-to-play political strategy MMORPG developed by Novel. Empire & State was released as an open beta in April 2011 and was fully released in November 2011. In addition to being available through Empire & States website, the game became available to play through a game portal at Bigpoint Games in November 2011. The Lead Designers were Mike Marr and Toby Ragaini with Paul Furio as Technical Director and Keenan Purk as Lead Artist. The game involves the exploration and conquest of a new planet and is designed to appeal to both casual and hard core gamers.
Paul Gouge is a games industry entrepreneur and investor, the founder of BattleMail, Rockpool Games, Ironstone Partners, Ideas Pad and Playdemic.
Mark E. Nelson is an American video game designer and humor writer best known for his work with Bethesda Game Studios and the game series The Elder Scrolls. In March 2007, he joined computer games company Big Huge Games to create a new role-playing game, joining industry veteran Brian Reynolds and long-time collaborator Ken Rolston.
Frank Lantz is the Director of the New York University Game Center. For over 12 years, Lantz taught game design at NYU's Interactive Telecommunications Program. He has also taught at the School of Visual Arts and Parsons School of Design. His writings on games, technology, and culture have appeared in a variety of publications. In 2012, The New York Times referred to Lantz as a "reigning genius of the mysteries of games" following his design of iPhone puzzle game Drop7.
Adam Gubman is an American songwriter, arranger, and composer.
Boss Fight Entertainment is a video game development company based in Allen, Texas, with a second studio based in Austin, Texas. Boss Fight was formed by former Zynga Dallas and Ensemble Studios employees in June 2013.
Mark Skaggs is an American video game producer and executive. Skaggs is known for leading the team that created the Facebook game FarmVille for Zynga, leading the team that created CityVille. He served as Executive Producer and product lead for the PC real-time strategy games Command & Conquer: Red Alert 2, Command & Conquer: Generals, and The Lord of the Rings: The Battle for Middle-earth.
