THE MAKING OF theme PARK

When a developer – and not its games – can be described as ‘classic’, that’s when you know you’ve managed to build something special. Bullfrog Productions is a beloved name and not only among us retro gaming enthusiasts: it’s a studio whose creativity, novelty and oh-so-British approach to humour will forever live on aside the very best that gaming has and will ever have to offer. And what’s interesting is the variety on show: there’s a ‘favourite’ Bullfrog game for everyone, from the RTS of Populous or the dark future of Syndicate to its comedic god games Dungeon Keeper or Theme Hospital. Yet while its earliest foray into business games didn’t start with Theme Park, it was this addition to the company’s portfolio that really set it on the road for superstardom.

“I was pretty young at the time. I started working at Bullfrog when I was 16, and was immediately working on actually,” says Demis Hassabis, the brain behind and the simulation that powered it. Demis had already done a couple of summer internships at the Guildford-based studio, where he had done some level designing on and AI programming for . Considered to be something of a child prodigy, Demis had two main passions: chess and playing and programming videogames. While he had been playing chess internationally, it was ultimately his curiosity about artificial intelligence within gaming that has since gone on to be the defining part of his career. That all began in earnest with . “Funnily enough I wasn’t sure I wanted to work on it,” he laughs, “because I was keen to, , and the other sort of earlier games. I was more keen to do that kind of game, maybe a strategy game.”