Lawrence Schick ( The Secret History of Sword of the Samurai)

Sid and Arnold came up with Pirates! and Major Bill was converted. Two people at the company, Arnold Hendrick and Lawrence Schick wanted to jump into roleplaying games with a game that would eventually become Sword of the Samurai, but they hit up against resistance from company cofounder Bill Stealey.Īccording to Schick in a 1990 article from Computer Gaming World titled, The Secret History of Sword of the Samurai.Ĭlearly, only co-owner Sid Meier was going to be able to change Bill’s mind about role-playing adventure games, so we were quite pleased when Sid got interested in creating one of his own. In the middle of the Eighties, MicroProse was defined by its vehicle simulators and they were well-respected in their niche. In addition to Pirates!, Sid would have his name attached to a bunch of other games, none as successful as the 1991 ongoing strategy juggernaut, Civilization. This practice started with the release of Pirates! Sid would eventually become a legend in the gaming industry because he designed great games and MicroProse wisely began attaching his name to games. The company started with several 2D action games before jumping into the world of flight simulations and releasing titles like Spitfire Ace and F-15 Strike Eagle. This was an interest he shared with co-worker Bill Stealey and the two founded the company MicroProse in 1982.

After tinkering with it, he quickly realized that with his skills he could make video games. Sid MeierĪfter graduating from the University of Michigan with a degree in computer science in 1981, Sid Meier bought an Atari 800 computer. The game was a big hit for the storied company MicroProse and the first game they released to have the name of its even more storied designer Sid Meier attached to it.

I played it for years, even giving a presentation about it in school that involved me hauling my brand new Commodore 128 in just so I could demonstrate it properly. In 1987 a game was released for the Commodore 64 that would stick with me for the rest of my life, Sid Meier’s Pirates! It was a casual fantasy simulation of pirates and as a fan of books and movies about pirates, I could not play it enough.

Sid meier39s pirates game