id Software LLC is an American video game developer based in Richardson, Texas. The company was founded on February 1, 1991, by four members of the computer company Softdisk, programmers John Carmack and John Romero, game designer Tom Hall, and artist Adrian Carmack. Business manager Jay Wilbur was also involved. id Software made important technological developments in video game technologies for the PC, including work done for the Wolfenstein, Doom, and Quake franchises. id's work was particularly important in 3D computer graphics technology and in game engines that are used throughout the video game industry. The company was involved in the creation of the first-person shooter (FPS) genre. Wolfenstein 3D is often considered to be the first true FPS, Doom is a game that popularized the genre and PC gaming in general, and Quake was id's first true 3D FPS.
Lionhead Studios Limited was a British video game developer founded in July 1997 by Peter Molyneux, Mark Webley, Tim Rance, and Steve Jackson. The company is best known for the Black & White and Fable series. Lionhead started as a breakaway from developer Bullfrog Productions, which was also founded by Molyneux. Lionhead's first game was Black & White, a god game with elements of artificial life and strategy games. Black & White was published by Electronic Arts in 2001. Lionhead Studios is named after Webley's hamster, which died not long after the naming of the studio, as a result of which the studio was very briefly renamed to Redeye Studios.
The 3DO Company, also known as 3DO, was a video game company. It was founded in 1991 by Electronic Arts founder Trip Hawkins, in a partnership with seven other companies. After 3DO's flagship video game console, the 3DO Interactive Multiplayer, failed in the marketplace, the company exited the hardware business and became a third-party video game developer. It went bankrupt in 2003 due to poor sales of its games. Its headquarters were in Redwood City, California in the San Francisco Bay Area.
Peter Douglas Molyneux is an English video game designer and programmer. He created the god games Populous, Dungeon Keeper, and Black & White, as well as Theme Park, the Fable series, Curiosity – What's Inside the Cube?, and Godus. He currently works at 22Cans as the founder.
Origin Systems was an American video game developer based in Austin, Texas. It was founded on March 3, 1983, by Richard Garriott and his brother Robert. Origin is best known for their groundbreaking work in multiple genres of video games, such as the Ultima and Wing Commander series. The company was purchased by Electronic Arts in 1992.
Bullfrog Productions Limited was a British video game developer based in Guildford, England. Founded in 1987 by Peter Molyneux and Les Edgar, the company gained recognition in 1989 for their third release, Populous, and is also well known for titles such as Theme Park, Magic Carpet, Syndicate and Dungeon Keeper. Bullfrog's name was derived from an ornament in the offices of Edgar's and Molyneux's other enterprise, Taurus Impact Systems, Bullfrog's precursor where Molyneux and Edgar were developing business software. Bullfrog Productions was founded as a separate entity after Commodore mistook Taurus for a similarly named company.
Gabe Logan Newell, commonly known by his nickname Gaben, is an American computer programmer and businessman best known as the co-founder of the video game developer and digital distribution company Valve. Born in Colorado, he attended Harvard University in the early 1980s, but dropped out and worked for Microsoft, where he worked as a producer for some of the early Windows operating systems.
Mythic Entertainment was a video game developer in Fairfax, Virginia that was most widely recognized for developing the 2001 massively multiplayer online role-playing game Dark Age of Camelot. Mythic was a prolific creator of multiplayer online games since its formation in the mid-1990s.
Film Roman is an American animation independently owned company. It was originally owned by Starz Inc., which is now a division of Lionsgate and later by Waterman Entertainment, the production company of producer Steve Waterman. Founded by veteran animator and director Phil Roman in 1984, it is best known for producing source animation for the Garfield primetime specials and series such as The Simpsons, King of the Hill, and Family Guy.
Naughty Dog, LLC is an American first-party video game developer based in Santa Monica, California. Founded by Andy Gavin and Jason Rubin in 1984 as an independent developer, the studio was acquired by Sony Computer Entertainment in 2001. Gavin and Rubin produced a sequence of progressively more successful games, including Rings of Power and Way of the Warrior in the early 1990s. The latter game prompted Universal Interactive Studios to sign the duo to a three-title contract and fund the expansion of the company.
Ted Woolsey is an American video game translator and producer. He had the primary role in the North American production and localization of Square's role-playing video games released for the Super NES between 1991 and 1996. He is best known for translating Final Fantasy VI and Chrono Trigger during his time at Square. Limitations on text length and strict content guidelines forced Woolsey to make many script changes in his translation work, which became known as "Woolseyisms" in popular culture and were both praised and criticized.
Criterion Games is a British video game developer based in Guildford. Founded in January 1996 as a division of Criterion Software, it was owned by Canon Inc. until Criterion Software was sold to Electronic Arts in October 2004. Many of Criterion Games' titles were built on the RenderWare engine, which Criterion Software developed. Notable games developed by Criterion Games include racing video games in the Burnout and Need for Speed series. As of April 2017, Criterion Games employ approximately 90 people.
Flight Unlimited III is a 1999 flight simulator video game developed by Looking Glass Studios and published by Electronic Arts. It allows players to pilot simulations of real-world commercial and civilian aircraft in and around Seattle, Washington. Players can fly freely or engage in "Challenge" missions, such as thwarting a theft or locating Bigfoot. The development team built on the general aviation gameplay of Flight Unlimited II, with more detailed physics and terrain, more planes, and a real-time weather system. Roughly half of Flight Unlimited II's team returned to work on the sequel, supported by new hires.
Stormfront Studios, Inc. was an American video game developer based in San Rafael, California. In 2007, the company had over 50 developers working on two teams, and owned all its proprietary engines, tools, and technology. As of the end of 2007, over fourteen million copies of Stormfront-developed games had been sold. Stormfront closed on March 31, 2008, due to the closure of their publisher at the time, Sierra Entertainment.
Peter Moore is a British-American business executive, best known for his former positions as Senior VP of Global Sports Marketing at Reebok, President of Sega of America, and Corporate Vice-President of Microsoft's Interactive Entertainment Business division, overseeing the Xbox and Xbox 360 game consoles. From 2007 to 2011 he was head of Electronic Arts' EA Sports game division. In 2012 he was appointed COO of Electronic Arts. He resigned from Electronic Arts in February 2017 to become CEO of Liverpool Football Club.
Donald Allan Mattrick is a Canadian businessman best known for being the former CEO of social gaming company Zynga, as well as a member of its board of directors. Previously, Mattrick was the President of the Interactive Entertainment Business at Microsoft. In this role, he was responsible for a collection of consumer businesses including Xbox 360, Xbox Live, Xbox One, Kinect, TV Music and Video services, Microsoft Mediaroom, PC and Mobile Interactive Entertainment as well as the manufacturing and supply chain for Microsoft. Prior to joining Microsoft in 2007, Mattrick served as the President of Worldwide Studios for Electronic Arts, where he worked for 15 years. At only 17, Mattrick founded Distinctive Software, which was acquired by Electronic Arts in 1991 and subsequently became EA Canada.
John Riccitiello is an American business executive who is chief executive officer (CEO) of Unity Technologies. Previously, he served as CEO, chief operating officer and president of Electronic Arts, and co-founded private equity firm Elevation Partners in 2004. Riccitiello has served on several company boards, including those of the Entertainment Software Association, the Entertainment Software Rating Board, the Haas School of Business and the USC School of Cinematic Arts.
Christopher Bryan Hecker is an American video game programmer and commentator. He is the founder of the gaming company Definition Six and best known for his engineering work on Will Wright's 2008 game Spore. Hecker is an advocate for the indie game industry and co-founder of the Indie Game Jam. He has written a number of influential articles on programming and has been an editor for Game Developer Magazine and the Journal of Graphics Tools.
Christopher Erhardt was the Head of School - US Campuses for the Academy of Interactive Entertainment (AIE) from the time the school opened until his death in December 2012. From 1998-2007 he was the Associate Dean as well as V.P.-Production at DigiPen Institute of Technology in the United States.
John Schappert is an American video game executive and entrepreneur. Schappert is best known for co-founding Tiburon Entertainment with Jason Andersen and Steve Chiang in 1994. He is the Chairman of Motorsport Games, a Motorsport Network's esport platform. Schappert is also known for his tenure as Zynga's Chief Operating Officer from 2011 to 2012. Before joining Zynga, Schappert served as the Chief Operating Officer of Electronic Arts from 2009 to 2011. He also oversaw Xbox Live and Microsoft Game Studios as a Corporate Vice President of Microsoft from 2007 to 2009. Schappert most recently founded Shiver Entertainment in 2013.
