Jordan Weisman is an American game designer, author, and serial entrepreneur who has founded four major game design companies, each in a different game genre and segment of the industry.
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Biography
Weisman graduated from Francis W. Parker High School, in Chicago, Illinois. He went to the Merchant Marine Academy and briefly attended University of Illinois at Chicago, before leaving school to pursue his business interests.
In 1980 he founded role playing game publisher FASA Corporation (short for the Freedonia Aeronautics & Space Administration, named after the Marx brother's fictional country in Duck Soup) with partner L. Ross Babcock. After starting out producing supplements for the RPG Traveller, FASA produced several successful franchises including BattleTech and Shadowrun.
In 1988, using funding from FASA and from a Japanese investor, Jordan founded Environmental Simulations Project — later re-named Virtual Worlds Entertainment — a company that produced the BattleTech Centers. Working with Incredible Technologies, VWE created the world's first immersive networked location-based virtual reality gaming centers. VWE was a critical but not commercial success.
In 1995, Weisman founded FASA Interactive to personally take over the development and production of the hit MechWarrior PC games. The franchise is one of the top-selling PC games of all time, with sales of over 9 million units worldwide. In 1999, Microsoft acquired FASA Interactive and moved the 40-person development team to Redmond, Washington. As part of the deal Weisman became Creative Director for Microsoft's entertainment division.
In 2000, he founded WizKids, which produced the games Mage Knight, Heroclix, and Pirates of the Spanish Main. WizKids grew rapidly and went from start-up to over $30M in annual sales in just two years. The company focused on miniatures games that use a combat dial (also invented by Weisman) and are easy to learn for younger players. WizKids was sold to Topps in 2004.
Whilst working at Microsoft Weisman developed the alternative reality game, "The Beast", to promote the Steven Spielberg film A.I.[1]
In 2003 he founded 42 Entertainment, a design company in the new field of the alternate reality games (ARGs). 42 has created multiple ARGs, including, I Love Bees to promote the Xbox game Halo 2, and Year Zero, to promote the Nine Inch Nails album Year Zero.
In 2006, Cathy's book, an interactive novel written by Sean Stewart, Cathy Brigg and Jordan Weisman was published by Running Press.
Then in 2007 Weisman founded Smith & Tinker[2] (named after the characters in the Wizard of Oz). Smith & Tinker has licensed the electronic entertainment rights to Crimson Skies, Shadowrun, MechWarrior and other FASA properties that had belonged to Microsoft.[3]
Also in 2007 Weisman co-founded the start-up Fyreball with Pete Parsons (formally of Bungie Studios and currently serves on the Board of Advisors along with Ed Fries). [4] The company is now operating under the name Meteor Solutions[5]
On May 27, 2009 Weisman's Smith & Tinker announced their first game had been released to public beta.[6] Nanovor is an online battle game targeted to 7 - 12 year olds. In support of the game, Smith & Tinker is releasing episodic cartoons[7], graphic novels, comic books, figurines and more.
On June 9, 2009 Weisman and J.C. Hutchins released Personal Effects: Dark Art (Griffin). On the same day Weisman along with Russ Bullock announced that the MechWarrior franchise would be seeing a relaunch. [8]
Jordan is currently an Adjunct Professor in the Interactive Media Division at the USC School of Cinema-Television.
Design credits
Weisman's design credits in paper RPG game design include:
- Aerotech 2, Revised Ed. (BattleTech) (2004)
- MechWarrior: Dark Age (2002)
- Earthdawn (1993)
- Shadowrun (1989)
- MechWarrior: The Battletech Role Playing Game (1986)
- Star Trek III: Starship Combat Game Box Set (1984)
He also served as production manager and/or graphic designer on a long series of titles, and is co-author with Sean Stewart of Cathy's Book, a young-adult novel with ARG components.
References
- ^ [1]
- ^ http://www.smithandtinker.com/about/founders/jordan-weisman/
- ^ "Smith & Tinker is pleased to announce that it has licensed from Microsoft the electronic entertainment rights for Mr. Weisman's previous creations...". 2007-10-15. http://www.smithandtinker.com/news. Retrieved 2008-02-07.
- ^ http://blog.seattlepi.nwsource.com/venture/archives/127291.asp
- ^ http://www.meteorsolutions.com/
- ^ "Connect, Collect & Battle with Nanovor". 2009-05-27. http://www.smithandtinker.com/news/connect-collect-and-battle-with-nanovor.php.
- ^ http://www.youtube.com/nanovor
- ^ "MechWarrior Q&A - The First Details". 2009-07-09.
External links
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