David Bishop has worked on numerous gaming classics covering a wide range of formats and genres over the past four decades. People will have experienced some of his titles or recognised his name without necessarily realising why, but David was there from the early days, and he continues to bring his expertise to gaming some 40 years later. Somewhat surprisingly (as you’ll learn), it was his love of playing chess that gave him that first opportunity, and where it took him is a fascinating story. Exploding puzzlers, spooky houses, spice mining and Disney classics are all part of David’s portfolio, as we are about to discover…
When did you first get into computer games? How did that happen?
I was a student at Aston University, and I spent a lot of time playing bridge, and I carried on playing after I left uni with three friends of mine. One time, I said that we should all meet up in London in this games store in Oxford Street called The Games Centre. I turned up early and they were all running late, so I went around the store, and they had a whole row of chess computers lined up, so I started playing, making a move, and then going to the next computer because they were quite slow to respond back then. I had a nice chat with the guy who worked there and said, ‘It must be fun to work in a place like this,’ but thought nothing more of it.
Did your friends turn up?
My friends still hadn’t arrived, but the guy who owned the shop came walking through to the backdoor, which led to some stairs up to his office, and the shop assistant yelled to him, ‘This guy wants a job!’ which I hadn’t said at all, but before I knew it I was whisked upstairs by the owner called Graham Levine
