Edward John Boon (born February 22, 1964) is an American video

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 ...

, voice actor, and director who was employed for over 15 years at Midway Games and since 2011 has worked for

Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment (WBIE; also known as Warner Bros. Games or WB Games) is an American video game publisher based in Burbank, California, and part of the newly-formed Global Streaming and Interactive Entertainment unit of ...

in its daughter company

NetherRealm Studios NetherRealm Studios (stylized as NetheЯRealm Studios) is an American video game developer based in Chicago and owned by Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment. Led by video game industry veteran and ''Mortal Kombat'' co-creator Ed Boon, the s ...

. Boon is best known for the widely popular ''

Mortal Kombat ''Mortal Kombat'' is an American media franchise centered on a series of video games originally developed by Midway Games in 1992. The development of the first game was originally based on an idea that Ed Boon and John Tobias had of making a v ...

'' series, which he created with

John Tobias John Tobias (born August 24, 1969) is an American comic book artist, graphic designer, video game designer and writer. Tobias is best known for creating the ''Mortal Kombat'' series along with Ed Boon, to whom he pitched the game concept. Tobia ...

, and the ''

Injustice Injustice is a quality relating to unfairness or undeserved outcomes. The term may be applied in reference to a particular event or situation, or to a larger status quo. In Western philosophy and jurisprudence, injustice is very commonly—but n ...

'' series.

Life and career

Boon was born and raised in

Chicago (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name ...

Illinois Illinois ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern United States. Its largest metropolitan areas include the Chicago metropolitan area, and the Metro East section, of Greater St. Louis. Other smaller metropolita ...

, on February 22, 1964 and graduated from high school at

Loyola Academy Loyola Academy is a private, Catholic, co-educational college preparatory high school run by the USA Midwest Province of the Society of Jesus in Wilmette, Illinois, a northern suburb of Chicago, and in the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Chicago ...

Wilmette Wilmette is a village in New Trier Township, Cook County, Illinois, United States. Bordering Lake Michigan and Evanston, Illinois, it is located north of Chicago's downtown district. Wilmette had a population of 27,087 at the 2010 census. The ...

. He earned a

Bachelor of Science A Bachelor of Science (BS, BSc, SB, or ScB; from the Latin ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for programs that generally last three to five years. The first university to admit a student to the degree of Bachelor of Science was the University of ...

degree in

mathematics Mathematics is an area of knowledge that includes the topics of numbers, formulas and related structures, shapes and the spaces in which they are contained, and quantities and their changes. These topics are represented in modern mathematics ...

and

computer science Computer science is the study of computation, automation, and information. Computer science spans theoretical disciplines (such as algorithms, theory of computation, information theory, and automation) to Applied science, practical discipli ...

from

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign The University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (U of I, Illinois, University of Illinois, or UIUC) is a public land-grant research university in Illinois in the twin cities of Champaign and Urbana. It is the flagship institution of the Univ ...

. After graduation, he was employed by Williams Entertainment in their

pinball Pinball games are a family of games in which a ball is propelled into a specially designed table where it bounces off various obstacles, scoring points either en route or when it comes to rest. Historically the board was studded with nails call ...

department, working on approximately 20 pinball games over the next two years. During this time, he was called the Mortal Master, an early indicator towards a future creation. He is the co-creator of the ''

fighting game A fighting game, also known as a versus fighting game, is a video game genre, genre of video game that involves combat between two or more players. Fighting game combat often features mechanics such as Blocking (martial arts), blocking, grappli ...

series, along with

, and served as the series' lead programmer, with Tobias the lead designer, until their partnership dissolved with Tobias' departure from Midway in 2000. Boon named series characters Sonya and

Tanya Tanya may refer to: * Tanya (Judaism),an early work of Hasidic philosophy by Rabbi Shneur Zalman of Liadi. * Tanya (name), a given name and list of people with the name * Tanya or Lara Saint Paul (born 1946) * List of Mortal Kombat characters#Tany ...

after his sisters Sonia and Tania, while another character,

Noob Saibot Noob Saibot is a fictional character in the ''Mortal Kombat'' fighting game franchise by Midway Games and NetherRealm Studios. Initially introduced as a black silhouette of the series' other male ninjas and sharing their special moves, he was ...

, was named after Boon and Tobias' reversed surnames. This is also elaborated in their Twitter handles, @noobde and @therealsaibot. Programmer Mike Boon is Ed's younger brother, and has been in his team since

Mortal Kombat 4 ''Mortal Kombat 4'' is a 1997 arcade fighting game and it is the fourth main installment in the ''Mortal Kombat'' franchise and a sequel to 1995's ''Mortal Kombat 3''. developed by Midway Games. Released to arcades in 1997, ''Mortal Kombat 4'' ...

. The Boons are

Hispanic The term ''Hispanic'' ( es, hispano) refers to people, Spanish culture, cultures, or countries related to Spain, the Spanish language, or Hispanidad. The term commonly applies to countries with a cultural and historical link to Spain and to Vic ...

and Dominican by ethnicity. Boon was ranked #100 in

IGN ''IGN'' (formerly ''Imagine Games Network'') is an American video game and entertainment media website operated by IGN Entertainment Inc., a subsidiary of Ziff Davis, Inc. The company's headquarters is located in San Francisco's SoMa distri ...

's 2009 list of "Top 100 Game Creators" for his involvement in the ''Mortal Kombat'' series. He continues to be directly involved with the ''MK'' franchise and its multimedia side projects, and has also provided

voice acting Voice acting is the art of performing voice-overs to present a character or provide information to an audience. Performers are called voice actors/actresses, voice artists, dubbing artists, voice talent, voice-over artists, or voice-over talent ...

and

motion capture Motion capture (sometimes referred as mo-cap or mocap, for short) is the process of recording the movement of objects or people. It is used in military, entertainment, sports, medical applications, and for validation of computer vision and robo ...

work for the games, most notably providing the voice for the "Come here!" and "Get over here!" catchphrases uttered by

Scorpion Scorpions are predatory arachnids of the order Scorpiones. They have eight legs, and are easily recognized by a pair of grasping pincers and a narrow, segmented tail, often carried in a characteristic forward curve over the back and always end ...

in every installment of the series as well as all feature films. The 2008 edition of ''

Guinness World Records Gamer's Edition ''Guinness World Records'', known from its inception in 1955 until 1999 as ''The Guinness Book of Records'' and in previous United States editions as ''The Guinness Book of World Records'', is a reference book published annually, listing world ...

'' consequently awarded him a world record for the "longest-serving video game voice actor." In 2018 ''Mortal Kombat'' was exhibited in an arcade cabinet at the Chicago New Media 1973–1992 exhibition, curated by jonCates.

Works

Video games

Pinball

Media

References

External links

Ed Boon
on

Twitter Twitter is an online social media and social networking service owned and operated by American company Twitter, Inc., on which users post and interact with 280-character-long messages known as "tweets". Registered users can post, like, and ...

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Boon, Ed 1964 births Living people Male actors from Chicago American computer programmers American male video game actors American male voice actors American people of Dutch descent American people of English descent Pinball game designers University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign alumni American video game directors American video game programmers