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Role-playing game designer From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Jim Bambra (born 1956)[1] is a British designer and reviewer of fantasy roleplaying games (RPG), and a former company director. He is particularly known for his contributions to Dungeons & Dragons, Fighting Fantasy, Warhammer, and Star Wars: The Roleplaying Game which was based on the Star Wars films. Later he became head of design at MicroProse, then managing director of Pivotal Games, a publisher of video games including Conflict: Desert Storm.
Jim Bambra | |
---|---|
Born | 1956 (age 67–68) |
Nationality | British |
Occupation | Game designer |
Jim Bambra worked on game design and materials for various companies during the 1980s and early 1990s, including TSR (publisher of Dungeons & Dragons), Games Workshop (Warhammer),[2] and West End Games (Star Wars RPG).[citation needed]
In 1983, Bambra wrote "The Beginner’s Guide to Roleplaying Games" (with Paul Ruiz), published in Imagine magazine Issue 6 (Sept 1983),[3] explaining what an RPG is and accompanied by a comic strip, "The Adventures of Nic Novice". He was a reviewer and writer for Imagine magazine 1983-1985,[4] and reviewer for White Dwarf and Dragon magazines during the late 1980s and early 1990s.[citation needed]
In 1989, Bambra co-wrote the Fighting Fantasy gamebook Dead of Night for Puffins, a Penguin inprint, with Stephen Hand.
During the 1990s he was Head of Design at MicroProse, where he worked on projects including Fields of Glory, Grand Prix, Special Forces, various X-COM products, and Gunship.[5]
In 1996 Bambra founded Pumpkin Studios, which achieved success with Warzone 2100, a computer game with a post-nuclear scenario. This company closed in 2000 after Eidos Interactive cancelled its then current project, Saboteur, a PlayStation video game.[6]
In 2003 he became managing director at Pivotal Games Ltd,[5] a videogame development company based in Bath and owned by SCi Ltd. During his period at the firm it published the series of Conflict: videogames, the most successful of which was Conflict: Desert Storm.[7] He remained as director until 2008, when SCi closed down the company.[8] Between 2005 and 2009 he was also a board member of The Independent Games Developers Association Ltd.[9]
Jim Bambra produced the following gamebooks and materials for roleplaying games, many in collaboration with other authors:
Echoes of the Jedi: Episode IV of Star Wars: Dawn of Defiance was dedicated to "Jim Bambra and all the unsung authors of the early Star Wars Expanded Universe".[13]