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GDC Looks At A Classic: Populous
Peter Molyneux is best know today for his work on the Fable series, but this storied developer has worked on a number of important video game properties over the year. Back in 1989, Molyneux created a series called Populous, a monumental hit, which is widely regarded as the first PC God game. At a session during GDC 2011, Molyneux shared his thoughts as he looked back at the creation of this influential series.
- Before getting into game development, Peter Molyneux started a business shipping baked beans to the Middle East.
- The monitor that Molyneux used while programming was broken, and he could only write lines of code that were shorter than 17 characters in length, otherwise he wouldn’t be able to read them.
- During development, the Populous team created a Populous board game using LEGO blocks. LEGO came out to look at it, but the board game never got produced.
- The team forgot to add any kind of end game or final boss sequence, and had to rush to add one after they’d already submitted the code for final testing.
- Populous proved so successful that it made up a third of EA’s revenue stream in 1989. However, a provision in the developer’s contracts meant that they wouldn’t get paid until nine months after the game’s release. Before he received any royalties, Peter Molyneux was forced to pay his mortgage using credit cards.
- During his free time, Peter Molyneux still works on a version of Populous. It’s an online version of the game that allows 256 people to play together at once. You’ll probably never see it, because EA still owns the rights to the series.
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