James D. Sachs (born 1949) is a retired

United States Air Force The United States Air Force (USAF) is the air service branch of the United States Armed Forces, and is one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. Originally created on 1 August 1907, as a part of the United States Army Signal ...

veteran A veteran () is a person who has significant experience (and is usually adept and esteemed) and expertise in a particular occupation or field. A military veteran is a person who is no longer serving in a military. A military veteran that has ...

, video game artist and game programmer. Sachs was the lead artist on the groundbreaking

Amiga Amiga is a family of personal computers introduced by Commodore in 1985. The original model is one of a number of mid-1980s computers with 16- or 32-bit processors, 256 KB or more of RAM, mouse-based GUIs, and significantly improved graphi ...

computer game Video games, also known as computer games, are electronic games that involves interaction with a user interface or input device such as a joystick, game controller, controller, computer keyboard, keyboard, or motion sensing device to gener ...

Defender of the Crown ''Defender of the Crown'' is a strategy computer game designed by Kellyn Beck. It was Cinemaware's first game, and was originally released for the Commodore Amiga in 1986, setting a new standard for graphic quality in home computer games. In ...

'' from Cinemaware (first published in

1986 The year 1986 was designated as the International Year of Peace by the United Nations. Events January * January 1 ** Aruba gains increased autonomy from the Netherlands by separating from the Netherlands Antilles. **Spain and Portugal ente ...

). He is also the author of the

Commodore 64 The Commodore 64, also known as the C64, is an 8-bit home computer introduced in January 1982 by Commodore International (first shown at the Consumer Electronics Show, January 7–10, 1982, in Las Vegas). It has been listed in the Guinness ...

game ''

Saucer Attack ''Saucer Attack!'' is a shoot 'em up written by James D. Sachs for the Commodore 64 and published by Sachs Enterprises in 1984. The goal is to protect Washington, D.C. from invading flying saucers. Gameplay The game presents a backdrop of Wash ...

'', which was heavily pirated. He called it "the Commodore 64 game everyone had, but no one purchased". He is also the author of the CompuTrainer 3D software, Marine

Aquarium An aquarium (plural: ''aquariums'' or ''aquaria'') is a vivarium of any size having at least one transparent side in which aquatic plants or animals are kept and displayed. Fishkeepers use aquaria to keep fish, invertebrates, amphibians, aq ...

simulation screensaver '' SereneScreen Aquarium'', and of the user interfaces and start-up animations of the

Amiga CDTV The CDTV (from Commodore Dynamic Total Vision, later treated as a backronym for Compact Disc Television) is a home multimedia entertainment and video game console – convertible into a full-fledged personal computer by the addition of optional ...

and Amiga CD32. Some time after finishing development of ''Defender of the Crown'', Sachs began working on a video game adaptation of the ''

20,000 Leagues Under the Sea ''Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Seas'' (french: Vingt mille lieues sous les mers) is a classic science fiction adventure novel by French writer Jules Verne. The novel was originally serialized from March 1869 through June 1870 in Pierre-J ...

''. Unable to secure from

Disney The Walt Disney Company, commonly known as Disney (), is an American multinational mass media and entertainment conglomerate headquartered at the Walt Disney Studios complex in Burbank, California. Disney was originally founded on October ...

the rights for a game based on their 1954 film, Sachs instead based his design on the original book by

Jules Verne Jules Gabriel Verne (;''Longman Pronunciation Dictionary''. ; 8 February 1828 – 24 March 1905) was a French novelist, poet, and playwright. His collaboration with the publisher Pierre-Jules Hetzel led to the creation of the ''Voyages extraor ...

, but was ultimately unable to secure funding.

External links

James D. Sachs home page

James D. Sachs Interview - 2020
on AmigaLove.com
James D. Sachs page
on

MobyGames MobyGames is a commercial website that catalogs information on video games and the people and companies behind them via crowdsourcing. This includes nearly 300,000 games for hundreds of platforms. The site is supported by banner ads and a small ...

Interview with James D. Sachs

The same interview in French
on Obligement

on Yo Ho Video
Jim Sachs Interview - June 2009
at the

Personal Computer Museum The Personal Computer Museum was located in Brantford, Ontario, Canada, in a building formerly owned by the municipal government. The building was built with bricks reclaimed from the Brantford Opera House. Over fifty interactive personal compute ...

American computer programmers Living people 1949 births Video game artists Video game programmers {{US-compu-bio-stub