John Harris (software developer)
Encyclopedia
John D. Harris is a well-known computer programmer, hacker, and author of some classical 1980s Atari
computer games.
A lot of work carried out early in John's career is considered as groundbreaking in the industry. This is a fact which is interesting, because unlike other developers who were writing new games, based on new ideas, John's work mostly consisted of taking games which already existed and rebuilding them for a machine he had become obsessed with, the Atari 2600.
His love for this particular machine eventually led him to creating some of the greatest games which were made available to the public, perhaps most of all, Frogger, which by the end of development had been written from scratch, twice. The reason for this is that his entire back catalogue of development tools and libraries he had developed were stolen at a game developer conference at which he was presenting. This actually pushed John into a period of depression, with which modern hackers / developers are unable to relate. The delay in writing the game also led to complications between Harris and his employer, Ken Williams (Director of Sierra On-Line).
During John's time at Sierra, he became one of the most influential young developers in America, at 24 years of age he was earning a 6 figure income off the back of royalties for games which Sierra were marketing for him. As time went on John's increasingly worrying relationship with Sierra began to get worse, the cutting of royalties and the lack of recognition for his work soon became a catalyst which led to him leaving the company to work at Synapse (despite many offers of employment from new startup EA games).
Atari
Atari is a corporate and brand name owned by several entities since its inception in 1972. It is currently owned by Atari Interactive, a wholly owned subsidiary of the French publisher Atari, SA . The original Atari, Inc. was founded in 1972 by Nolan Bushnell and Ted Dabney. It was a pioneer in...
computer games.
A lot of work carried out early in John's career is considered as groundbreaking in the industry. This is a fact which is interesting, because unlike other developers who were writing new games, based on new ideas, John's work mostly consisted of taking games which already existed and rebuilding them for a machine he had become obsessed with, the Atari 2600.
His love for this particular machine eventually led him to creating some of the greatest games which were made available to the public, perhaps most of all, Frogger, which by the end of development had been written from scratch, twice. The reason for this is that his entire back catalogue of development tools and libraries he had developed were stolen at a game developer conference at which he was presenting. This actually pushed John into a period of depression, with which modern hackers / developers are unable to relate. The delay in writing the game also led to complications between Harris and his employer, Ken Williams (Director of Sierra On-Line).
During John's time at Sierra, he became one of the most influential young developers in America, at 24 years of age he was earning a 6 figure income off the back of royalties for games which Sierra were marketing for him. As time went on John's increasingly worrying relationship with Sierra began to get worse, the cutting of royalties and the lack of recognition for his work soon became a catalyst which led to him leaving the company to work at Synapse (despite many offers of employment from new startup EA games).
Atari 8-bit
- JawbreakerJawbreaker (video game)Jawbreaker is a video game programmed by John Harris and released in 1981 for the Atari 400/800 by On-line Systems. It is essentially a Pac-Man clone, in that a small yellow set of jaws is moved around the map to pick up small dots while avoiding the "jawbreakers" which roll around the map. If the...
, Sierra On-Line, 1981 - FroggerFroggerFrogger is an arcade game introduced in 1981. It was developed by Konami, and licensed for worldwide distribution by Sega/Gremlin. The object of the game is to direct frogs to their homes one by one. To do this, each frog must avoid cars while crossing a busy road and navigate a river full of...
, Sierra On-Line, 1982 - Mousekattack
- Maneuvering
- Bankster
- MAE
Employment
- Pulsar Interactive Corp., 1997–2003
- Tachyon Studios, Inc.
- Atari
- Synapse
- Sierra On-Line