|
Countdown to CGE 2007 ~ July 2007 ~ 28 JUL 2007 |
Classic Gaming Expo Distinguished Guest:
DAN KITCHEN
Dan
Kitchen is a 23-year veteran of the videogame and interactive multimedia
industry. After writing a couple of Apple II text adventure games - Crystal
Caverns and Crime Stopper - for Hayden Software, he and his brother
Garry attracted the attention of Activision’s then-president Jim Levy, when they
reverse-engineered the Atari 2600 and learned how to program games for it. They
were quickly hired, and headed up their first East Coast Design Center, in New
Jersey. While at Activision, Dan’s game-playing skills against other designers
were soon matched by his programming accomplishments: Crackpots,
Double Dragon, Ghostbusters, and Kung-Fu Master.
After a career as one of the youngest successful senior designers at Activision,
he left in 1986 and co-founded Absolute Entertainment (along with Garry Kitchen
and 2 other former Activision programmers - Alex DeMeo and John Van Ryzin),
eventually becoming Executive Vice President.
Mr. Kitchen is currently the VP of Product Development at Majesco Sales, who is
a developer, publisher, and marketer of interactive entertainment software for
all major videogame platforms and handhelds.