Raw Thrills co-founder Eugene Jarvis is to be honoured with the Academy of Interactive Arts and Sciences’ Pioneer Award.
The AIAS Pioneer Award is presented to individuals whose career-spanning work has “helped shape and define the interactive entertainment industry through the creation of a technological approach or the introduction of a new genre.”
The award will be presented to Jarvis by his former colleague at Midway Games and current senior creative director at social games company Zynga, Mark Turmell, during the 17th DICE Awards on February 6 in Las Vegas.
“Eugene is simply the quintessential American game designer,” said Turmell. “I joined Midway so I could work with Eugene and I apply his teachings to my own games every single day. I learned more from my time with him than during my other 30 years of game making combined.
Jarvis joined Atari in 1977 before joining pinball specialist Williams two years later, where he led the company’s first video game project, Defender, which became one of the top grossing video games of the early 1980s.
He then formed Vid Kidz with Larry DeMar in 1981, producing the sequel to Defender, Stargate. Throughout the 1980s Jarvis developed major video titles and then began developing games for Midway during the following decade.
His next venture, Raw Thrills, produced Target: Terror and The Fast and the Furious in 2004 before merging with Big Buck Hunter creator Play Mechanix in 2006.
“His games have taught a generation of game developers how to innovate and succeed; the design elements and his approach to tuning are timeless,” added Turmell.
