Ken Williams (gaming)
| Ken Williams | |
|---|---|
| Born | October 30, 1954 |
| Occupation | Game programmer, entrepreneur |
| Spouse(s) | Roberta Williams |
| Children | 2 |
| Website | kensblog |
Ken Williams (born October 30, 1954) is an American retired game programmer who co-founded On-Line Systems together with his wife Roberta Williams. On-Line Systems eventually became Sierra On-Line and was ultimately renamed Sierra Entertainment. The couple were leading figures in the development of graphical adventure games. At its height, Sierra employed nearly 1,000 people prior to its acquisition in 1996.
Williams was born in October 30, 1954 and is from Simi Valley, California. Ken and Roberta's early contributions to the computer game industry were partially chronicled in the book Hackers: Heroes of the Computer Revolution. He wrote the textbook Apple II Computer Graphics, and articles for Softline.
Williams and wife Roberta co-founded On-Line Systems in 1979. Sierra's notable online service, the ImagiNation Network, was purchased by AT&T in 1994. Williams was the president of Sierra until the company was sold to CUC International in July 1996, but he remained with the company leading its strategic direction until November 1997. Vivendi (now Activision Blizzard after the Vivendi Games and Activision merger) currently holds the Sierra name.
In his role as Sierra's CEO, Williams focused on innovation: "I'm not sure how typical I am of other CEOs ...most of my time is spent looking at product ... To me, everything is about being able to build awesome product ... Any game which does not push the state of the art leaves an opportunity for a competitor's game to look better."
In Sierra's later years, the company's focus had shifted to publishing many titles from other studios, including Valve's Half-Life. Commenting on first-person shooters, Williams recalls, "By the time I decided we wanted into the genre, we were too far behind. With 20/20 hindsight, I blew it when I had the chance to buy id and didn't ... Valve was the first group I had spoken with that could put Sierra in front of id."
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