Bernie Stolar
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Bernard "Bernie" Stolar is an American businessman who worked in the video game industry for several important companies. His career started at Atari where he worked initially in the coin-op arcade division and eventually moved over to the home division in charge of platforms like Atari Lynx. He served as President of the company. He also founded Pacific Novelty, an arcade cabinet manufacturer that produced four games: Shark Attack, Thief, NATO Defense, and The Amazing Adventures of Mr. F. Lea.
Before the U.S. release of the PlayStation home console, Sony made Stolar the first president of SCEA and placed him in charge of the PlayStation platform. Stolar implemented a "no-RPG" policy. Seeing as RPGs at the time were almost all 2D, they didn't sell well in North America and, in Stolar's opinion, failed to demonstrate the full capabilities of the PlayStation.
The PlayStation sold well during its first holiday season in the U.S., and Bernie, after being released from Sony, accepted an opportunity to helm Sega of America and manage the Sega Saturn. Stolar, while more liberal with licensing than he was with Sony, decided against introducing many of the most popular Saturn titles, citing limited appeal in North America and inability to show off the Saturn.
This was dubbed the "five star game policy", and backfired tremendously. Not only did it anger players, who were deprived of much of the Saturn's Japanese catalog[1][2], it also put off third-party developers and publishers; most notably, Victor Ireland of Working Designs later stated that Stolar was the sole reason why his company dropped the Saturn. "When Bernie Stolar came to Sega very shortly thereafter we made the switch to Sony, because he made it intolerable to be at Sega, just like he made it intolerable to even try to be at Sony." [3]
As the system struggled in North America, Stolar pressed for development of a new console, one which would eventually become the Dreamcast.
Stolar is remembered for remarking at the 1997 E3 that the "Saturn is not our future" and also for stating that "there is no more Tekken" during a televised interview. Namco had already confirmed support for Sega's console starting with Soul Calibur. The Tekken line was Stolar's stab against Sony and its next generation plans, although Namco later confirmed that the PlayStation 2 would receive Tekken games.
Insider reports suggest that Stolar overruled his Japanese superiors by pricing the Dreamcast for launch at $199. Reportedly, Sega Japan wanted to set the price at $249 to generate profits immediately. The launch of the Dreamcast was the most successful commercial console launch in the history of gaming selling over US$300mln of hardware and software in its first week of launch. Before the Dreamcast's American launch, Stolar was relieved of his duties as President from Sega of America, receiving a $5 million dollar severance package.
In late 2005, Stolar became an advisor and director at Adscape Media, an in-game advertising company. His support contributed to securing venture capital in early 2006, establishing key relationships with game producers, and the company's eventual acquisition by Google in early 2007.[1] Stolar has been serving as Google's Game Evangelist since the sale of the company.
On October 5, 2006, Oasys Mobile, Inc. announced that Stolar would assume the role of Lead Director.
