Cathryn Mataga

Cathryn Mataga (formerly William Mataga)[1][2][3][4] is a game programmer and founder of independent video game company Junglevision.[5]

Biography

Mataga designed the game Shamus in 1982,[3] which she wrote under the name William for the Atari 400 and 800 computers.[2] Much of the game's appeal was said to come from Mataga's sense of humor, such as creating a "grand rendition" of the Alfred Hitchcock theme song in the game's introduction.[6]

Steve Hales of Synapse Software, in an interview for the book Halcyon Days, states that he and Mataga convinced company founder Ihor Wolosenko to get the company into interactive fiction.[7]

Mataga developed an interactive fiction programming language known as BtZ (Better than Zork) for Brøderbund in the early 1980s.[4] Mataga worked with Hales and poet Robert Pinsky on the interactive fiction game Mindwheel (1984).[4]

Mataga was one of the programmers working at Stormfront Studios on the original Neverwinter Nights MMORPG.[8] Don Daglow credits Mataga as one of the programmers who made Daglow's assertion come true that he could make the game a success.[9]

Credited games

References

  1. ↑ "Game Designers Just Wanna Be Girls: Interview with Jamie Faye Fenton". Next Generation. June 21, 1999. Then there was the designer of the great 8-bit classic, Shamus, William Mataga. He recently wrapped-up work on a Color Game Boy version of that game and is looking for a publisher. Only he now goes by Cathryn.
  2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 Shamus Manual. 1983.
  3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 "The Classic Game Shamus".
  4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 Bateman, Selby (June 1985). "The Prose and the Parser: How Writers See Games". Compute! Gazette 3 (24).
  5. ↑ "Junglevision: Company". Junglevision.
  6. ↑ David Small, Sandy Small and George Blank, ed. (1983). "Shamus". The Creative Atari. Creative Computing Press. p. 189. ISBN 978-0916688349.
  7. ↑ Halcyon Days interview with Steve Hales
  8. ↑ http://books.google.com/books?id=6dgTAQAAIAAJ&q=%22Cathryn+Mataga%22&dq=%22Cathryn+Mataga%22&hl=en&sa=X&ei=Gjp4U8rPDtahyATtx4LYCA&ved=0CD8Q6AEwBA
  9. ↑ http://www.gamasutra.com/view/news/102180/Column_Playing_Catch_Up_Stormfront_Studios_Don_Daglow.php
  10. ↑ Charla, Chris (November 2001). "Digital Eclipse's Rayman Advance", Game Developer 8 (11): 42–48.Archived
  11. ↑ van Looy, Jan (2010). Understanding computer game culture: the cultural shaping of a new medium. Lambert Academic Pub. p. 271.
  12. ↑ Marks, Robert (2003). Everquest Companion: The Inside Lore of a Game World. McGraw-Hill.
  13. ↑ Kosek, Steven (July 21, 1985). "Poet Robert Pinsky goes hi-tech to give electronic novel a whirl", Chicago Tribune, p. 33.
  14. ↑ 14.0 14.1 "Mindwheel: An Electronic Novel". QuestBusters 2 (3): 11. March 1985.
  15. ↑ "Pinsky, Robert (Neal)." Contemporary Poets. Gale. 2001. Retrieved May 21, 2014 from HighBeam Research: http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1G2-3401600586.html

External links