Jeff Spangenberg

Jeffery Spangenberg (born April 21, 1968, San Francisco, California, U.S.) is a video game producer and entrepreneur who founded video game developers Punk Development, Iguana Entertainment, Retro Studios, and Topheavy Studios.

Biography

In 1991 Spangenberg founded his own company in Santa Clara, Iguana Entertainment and hired 20 staff, including friends of his.[1][2] Iguana, who would later move to Austin, Texas due to the elevated costs of living in Silicon Valley, wound up bought by Acclaim Entertainment in 1995, and Spangenberg was promoted to an executive position in which he overlooked all of Acclaim's software studios.[1] Spangenberg would end up fired from Acclaim in 1998, leading him to sue the company for breach of contract and fraud.[3] The suit was later settled in 2000.[4]

Spangenberg launched a new company, Retro Studios, from his home on October 1998, using funds he generated with his previous ventures.[5] He then approached Nintendo of America to establish a partnership. Nintendo accepted to fund the studio, hoping the new developer could provide games aimed at mature audiences for their upcoming console, the GameCube, just like Iguana did with the Nintendo 64 title Turok: Dinosaur Hunter.[6][7] The studio immediately began work on four projects for the GameCube, Retro's game engine impressed producer Shigeru Miyamoto, who suggested that Retro could use it to develop a new title in the Metroid series. All titles were eventually cancelled so Retro could focus all their effort onto Metroid Prime.[8] On May 2, 2002, months before Prime was released, Nintendo acquired Retro Studios from Spangenberg, and reclassified the company as a first party developer and division of Nintendo.

Spangenberg then created Topheavy Studios, who developed The Guy Game, released in 2004.[9] The game would result in a lawsuit from one of the featured women who was underage, leading to a temporary injunction prohibiting the further production of copies of the game.[10][11]

Credits

Programming

Producer

References
  1. IGN Staff (October 19, 2000). "Making Games Fun Again". ign.com. Retrieved August 11, 2018.
  2. "A Retrospective: The Story of Retro Studios". ign.com. December 17, 2004. Retrieved August 11, 2018.
  3. Iguana founder sues after firing, Austin Business Journal
  4. 10-K SEC Filing, filed by ACCLAIM ENTERTAINMENT INC on 11/29/2000.
  5. Iguana founder goes Retro with new company , Austin Business Journal
  6. Hester, Blake (May 29, 2018). "The rocky story of Retro Studios before Metroid Prime". Polygon. Archived from the original on December 9, 2018. Retrieved December 7, 2018.
  7. Wade, Kenneth Kyle (December 17, 2004). "A Retrospective: The Story of Retro Studios". IGN. Archived from the original on November 8, 2018. Retrieved December 7, 2018.
  8. Varney, Allen (April 6, 2006). "Metroid Primed". The Escapist. Archived from the original on March 17, 2012. Retrieved September 16, 2007.
  9. TOPHEAVY Studios' and Gathering's, 'The Guy Game' in Stores Now
  10. Thorsen, Tor (December 23, 2004). "Topless teen sues over 'The Guy Game'". CNET. CBS Interactive. Retrieved October 30, 2016.
  11. "The Guy Game banned, goes straight to video". GameSpot. Retrieved January 2, 2017.
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