Joel Billings is an American

video 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, controller, keyboard, or motion sensing device to generate visual feedback. This fee ...

designer A designer is a person who plans the form or structure of something before it is made, by preparing drawings or plans. In practice, anyone who creates tangible or intangible objects, products, processes, laws, games, graphics, services, or exp ...

and producer. He is the founder of the computer game company

Strategic Simulations Strategic Simulations, Inc. (SSI) was a video game developer and publisher with over 100 titles to its credit from its founding in 1979 to its dissolution in 1994. The company was especially noted for its numerous wargames, its official compu ...

(SSI). He was also the company's president.Seiken, Jeff (July 05, 1990).
Computer War Games Test Strategic Skills
, ''

Philadelphia Inquirer ''The Philadelphia Inquirer'' is a daily newspaper headquartered in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The newspaper's circulation is the largest in both the U.S. state of Pennsylvania and the Delaware Valley metropolitan region of Southeastern Penns ...

''.

Career

Joel Billings wanted to work with

Avalon Hill Avalon Hill Games Inc. is a game company that publishes wargames and strategic board games. It has also published miniature wargaming rules, role-playing games and sports simulations. It is a subsidiary of Hasbro, and operates under the company ...

to publish his computer game '' Computer Bismarck'' but they turned him down, so instead he decided to found a new company and publish the game himself. Billings started SSI in 1979 just after finishing college, with a $1000 initial investment. The first product was ''Computer Bismarck'', which he co-wrote. Designed for the

TRS-80 The TRS-80 Micro Computer System (TRS-80, later renamed the Model I to distinguish it from successors) is a desktop microcomputer launched in 1977 and sold by Tandy Corporation through their Radio Shack stores. The name is an abbreviation of '' ...

and Apple II home computers, it is viewed as the first computer war game ever published. It sold 7000 copies, considered reasonably successful for its time.Seiken, Jeff (October 6, 1990). "War simulations let you take charge", '' Austin American Statesman'', p. 22. The company was an industry leader for years in

war games A wargame is a strategy game in which two or more players command opposing armed forces in a realistic simulation of an armed conflict. Wargaming may be played for recreation, to train military officers in the art of strategic thinking, or to s ...

and role-playing video games. In 1987 Billings acquired the rights to the ''

Dungeons & Dragons ''Dungeons & Dragons'' (commonly abbreviated as ''D&D'' or ''DnD'') is a fantasy tabletop role-playing game (RPG) originally designed by Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson. The game was first published in 1974 by Tactical Studies Rules, Inc. (TS ...

'' role-playing games from TSR, which led to the creation of the

Gold Box Gold box may refer to: * Decorative boxes made in gold *'' Gold Box'', a series of video games of 1988 to 1992 * Gold box (phreaking), a phreaking box to create a bridge between two telephone lines {{disam ...

D&D game series, one of the best selling video game franchises of the 1980s and 1990s. After a year of losses tied to delays in the new

Dark Sun ''Dark Sun'' is an original ''Dungeons & Dragons'' (D&D) campaign setting set in the fictional, post-apocalyptic desert world of Athas. ''Dark Sun'' featured an innovative metaplot, influential art work, dark themes, and a genre-bending take o ...

game engine, Billings sold the company to Mindscape in 1994. In 2001 Billings started a game development company called 2 By 3 Games with former SSI

game programmer A game programmer is a software engineer, programmer, or computer scientist who primarily develops codebases for video games or related software, such as game development tools. Game programming has many specialized disciplines, all of which f ...

s Gary Grigsby and Keith Brors. In December 2013, Billings donated several SSI video games, such as ''Computer Bismarck'', including the

source code In computing, source code, or simply code, is any collection of code, with or without comments, written using a human-readable programming language, usually as plain text. The source code of a program is specially designed to facilitate the w ...

for preservation to the ICHEG.

References

External links

2 By 3 Games official site

Joel Billings
at MobyGames American company founders American video game designers American video game producers Living people Place of birth missing (living people) Video game businesspeople Year of birth missing (living people) {{D&D-stub