Kevin Buckner

Kevin Buckner started working in the game industry in the early 1980's when some computers came in kit form and most-other computers enjoyed less processing power than is evident in today's mobile phones. By the end of the decade, his programming career saw him work for a number of the big software developers of the time, most notably, Microprose Inc. where he spent two years in their US HQ followed by three years in their UK office. This era saw Kevin leading programming teams on projects such as Knights of the Sky, Gunship and F117A flight and air-combat simulators.

With the industry growing year on year, Kevin decided to transition into game production and project management; a move to Electronic Arts saw him Producing top-selling titles including the original FIFA Soccer game on the Sega Megadrive, Rugby World Cup, Syndicate, Magic Carpet and Theme Park.

The next big move for Kevin saw him leave EA for the challenge of setting up a new game publisher. As part of a management team of three, he helped launch Hasbro Interactive. Prior to the creation of the Interactive division, Hasbro had limited itself to licensing its catalog of IP to third parties. Kevin was responsible for all software development in Europe and was also actively involved in the development of the company’s products in the US and Japan. On the back of interactive products like Risk, Battleship, Monopoly, Scrabble, Frogger, Trivial Pursuit and Clue, Kevin helped lead the charge that saw HI rise to become a top-5 global publisher within two years of its creation.

In 1998, Kevin realised a life-long ambition to set up and run a game development house. Deep Red games was born and games such as Risk II, Monopoly Tycoon and Spring Break were launched to high critical acclaim around the world.

From 2002 to early 2006, Kevin branched out to provide a different service to the global industry; Design Games was a game design and project management consultancy that Kevin launched and managed. Working with publishers such as EA, Eidos, Empire and Konami, and a large array of developers and mobile content creators, start-ups and film directors, Kevin consulted to the industry's best.

In 2006, Kevin joined IR Gurus in Melbourne. He joined as Senior Producer for the Heroes Over Europe title on Xbox 360 and PS3. In recognition of his broad industry knowledge and management skills, he was quickly promoted to Head of Studio.

Late 2007 saw Kevin move to Singapore to head up the development of the Otherland MMO. Otherland is as much sci-fi as it is science fantasy; bringing many fresh ideas that have been carefully bonded to more traditional fantasy MMO concepts. Kevin returned to England in 2011 for family reasons and took up the post of VP of Development at Jagex in Cambridge, leading the business and creative development of another F2P MMO; Transformers Universe.

These career highlights provide an overview of a career that has seen Kevin succeed in multiple contexts as a Developer, Publisher and Consultant, gain experience from many disciplines including Programming, Game Design, Authoring and Management and work in many different territories around the world, including the US, Eastern Europe, the UK, Australia, and more recently, Singapore.