Michael Cranford

American video game designer, professor, ethicist Michael Cranford is an American video game designer, programmer, ethicist, and educator. He is known for his work on the role-playing games The Bard's Tale (1985) and The Bard's Tale II: The Destiny Knight (1986), as well as Centauri Alliance (1990) and Dark Seed (1992). After his video game career in the 1980s and early 1990s, Cranford pursued graduate study in religion and social ethics. In 2026, he returned to video game development with Shadow Snare, a role-playing game in development for the Commodore 64. Game designer Cranford was the designer and programmer of 1985's The Bard's Tale and 1986's The Bard's Tale II: The Destiny Knight role-playing video games published by Interplay Productions. He also programmed the Apple II version of Donkey Kong, the Commodore 64 version of Super Zaxxon, as well as Maze Master (a spiritual predecessor of The Bard's Tale). His last video game was Dark Seed for Cyberdreams in 1992. He left the video game industry to pursue graduate studies, and thus was not involved in the creation of 1988's The Bard's Tale III. Almost thirty years later, however, he was approached by inXile Entertainment to as