American McGee
| American McGee | |
|---|---|
American McGee in 2004.
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| Born |
American James McGee December 13, 1972 Dallas, Texas |
| Occupation | Game designer |
| Known for | American McGee's Alice, Alice: Madness Returns, Doom II, Quake |
| Website | www |
American McGee (born December 13, 1972) is an American game designer. He is perhaps best known as the designer of American McGee's Alice.
American James McGee was born to an eccentric mother who was a house painter. He met his biological father only once, at his 13th birthday party. In explaining where his name came from, American has said that his mother was a hippie and was inspired by a woman she knew in college that named her child "America". McGee was highly creative and was gifted in mathematics and science. He also took an early interest in computer programming, eventually getting accepted to a magnet school for computer science.
"Yes, my mother named me that. She claims a woman she knew in college, who named her daughter 'America', inspired the name. She also tells me that she was thinking of naming me 'Obnard'. She was and always has been a very eccentric and creative person."
McGee had a number of stepfathers when growing up until his mother finally settled into a relationship with a transgender woman. One day when American was sixteen, he came home from school only to find the house empty and abandoned. The only things left were his bed, his books, his clothes and his Commodore 64 computer. His mother had sold the house to pay for two plane tickets and the fee for her girlfriend's sex change operation, leaving him on his own. He packed up his computer, dropped out of high school and took a variety of odd jobs, finally settling on a Volkswagen repair shop.
At the age of twenty-one, American was already an automobile and gaming enthusiast. He moved to an apartment complex where he met John Carmack. They became friends, and Carmack offered American a job at id Software as Tech Support answering phone calls. He was later promoted to level designer after John Romero had been skipping work and no other level designers were available at the time. American McGee, along with Kevin Cloud and Tim Willits, were part of id Software's second generation and had worked on such games as Doom, Doom II, Quake and Quake II as level designer, programmer music production, and sound effects developer.
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