Matt Leacock is an American board game designer, most known for cooperative games such as
Pandemic,
Pandemic Legacy: Season 1,
Forbidden Island and
Forbidden Desert.
Early life
Leacock grew up in
Long Lake, Minnesota
Long Lake is a small city in Hennepin County, Minnesota, United States named after the lake the eastern end of town lies on. A commercial hub for the surrounding communities, Long Lake is home to many local shops and businesses. U.S. Highway 12 ...
. He studied visual communication at
Northern Illinois University
Northern Illinois University (NIU) is a public research university in DeKalb, Illinois. It was founded as Northern Illinois State Normal School on May 22, 1895, by Illinois Governor John P. Altgeld as part of an expansion of the state's system ...
.
Career
Matt designed ''Pandemic'', published in 2008 by
Z-Man Games
Z-Man Games is an American board game company, incorporated in 1999. It was named after its founder, Zev Shlasinger. The company is known for their ''Pandemic'' series of board games, as well as being the sole publisher for the English editions of ...
. Leacock had previously worked as a developer of social media and as a user experience designer, primarily in community and communications products
for
AOL and
Yahoo
Yahoo! (, styled yahoo''!'' in its logo) is an American web services provider. It is headquartered in Sunnyvale, California and operated by the namesake company Yahoo Inc., which is 90% owned by investment funds managed by Apollo Global Manage ...
. He switched to designing board games full time in July 2014.
Pandemic Legacy: Season 1, which Leacock co-designed with
Rob Daviau, has been rated very highly among board gamers and by the website
Board Game Geek on its board game rankings.
His latest games are Pandemic Fall of Rome and Forbidden Sky (both released in 2018).
Leacock is developing a tabletop game about
climate change
In common usage, climate change describes global warming—the ongoing increase in global average temperature—and its effects on Earth's climate system. Climate change in a broader sense also includes previous long-term changes to ...
, ''
Daybreak''.
Games
* ''
Pandemic'' (2008)
* ''
Roll Through the Ages: The Bronze Age'' (2008)
* ''
Pandemic: On the Brink'' (Expansion) (2009)
* ''
Forbidden Island'' (2010)
* ''
Forbidden Desert'' (2013)
* ''
Pandemic: In The Lab'' (Expansion) (2013)
* ''
Pandemic: The Cure'' (2014)
* ''
Pandemic: State of Emergency'' (Expansion) (2015)
* ''
Pandemic Legacy: Season 1'' (2015)
* ''
Thunderbirds'' (2015)
* ''
Knit Wit
Knitting is a method by which yarn is manipulated to create a textile, or fabric. It is used to create many types of garments. Knitting may be done by hand or by machine.
Knitting creates stitches: loops of yarn in a row, either flat or ...
'' (2016)
* ''
Pandemic: Reign of Cthulhu'' (2016)
* ''
Pandemic Iberia'' (2016)
* ''
Chariot Race
Chariot racing ( grc-gre, ἁρματοδρομία, harmatodromia, la, ludi circenses) was one of the most popular ancient Greek, Roman, and Byzantine sports. In Greece, chariot racing played an essential role in aristocratic funeral games from ...
'' (2016)
* ''
Space Escape
Space is the boundless three-dimensional extent in which objects and events have relative position and direction. In classical physics, physical space is often conceived in three linear dimensions, although modern physicists usually conside ...
'' (formerly ''Mole Rats in Space'') (2017)
* ''
Pandemic: Rising Tide'' (2017)
* ''
Pandemic Legacy: Season 2'' (2017)
* ''
Pandemic Fall of Rome'' (2018)
* ''
Forbidden Sky'' (2018)
* ''
Era: Medieval Age'' (2019)
* ''
Pandemic Legacy: Season 0'' (2020)
* ''
Daybreak'' (upcoming)
* ''Forbidden Jungle'' (upcoming)
Charity
According to Leacock, 5% of his design royalty for Pandemic products is donated directly to
Medecins Sans Frontieres.
References
Living people
American game designers
Year of birth missing (living people)
Place of birth missing (living people)
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