David Crane

David Crane started his career at Atari making games including Outlaw, Slot Machine and Canyon Bomber for the Atari 2600. He was also instrumental in the design of the Atari 800 computer’s operating system, designing the Display Processor Chip (DPC), which was awarded a patent for its unique video memory system.

 

In 1979, Crane co-founded Activision with Alan Miller, Jim Levy, Bob Whitehead and Larry Kaplan. At Activision, Crane was best known as the designer of Pitfall!,which is credited as being the very first platform game. Pitfall! stayed at the top of the Billboard charts for 64 weeks and was named video game of the year in 1982

 

In 1986, Crane left Activision to form Absolute Entertainment with Garry Kitchen. He was best known for his successful and innovative NES titles, Amazing Tennis, whose components are modeled after real people Crane played tennis with and A Boy and His Blob, following the adventures of the protagonist and his companion, a shape-shifting, jellybean eating “blob.” The game developed enough of a following that in 2009 it was remade as a Nintendo® Wii™ game.

 

In 1995, Crane and Kitchen co-founded Skyworks® Technologies, a privately held multimedia developer specializing in casual games. Their portfolio of online games has been played by more than one billion players around the world. Skyworks® currently has several iPhone games in the App store, such as Arcade Bowling, Boardwalk Games, Arcade Hoops, and Field Goal Frenzy. The company pioneered the concept of advergaming, with clients including The Lifesavers Company, Proctor and Gamble, Sony, CBS, ESPN, Kraft, Ford and BMW.