Anne Westfall is an American
video game programmer and software developer, known for 1983's ''
Archon: The Light and the Dark'', originally written for the
Atari 8-bit computers. Westfall and her spouse, fellow game developer
Jon Freeman, together founded
Free Fall Associates.
Career
Westfall began computer programming at the age of 30.
Before moving into the video game industry, Westfall worked as a programmer for a civil engineering firm Morton Technology, where she developed the first microcomputer-based program designed to help lay out subdivisions.
In 1981, Westfall and her husband, Jon, left
Epyx
Epyx, Inc. was a video game developer and video game publisher active in the late 1970s and 1980s. The company was founded in 1978 as Automated Simulations by Jim Connelley and Jon Freeman, publishing a series of tactical combat games. The Epyx ...
, the
video game developer
A video game developer is a software developer specializing in video game development – the process and related disciplines of creating video games. A game developer can range from one person who undertakes all tasks to a large business with em ...
and
publisher
Publishing is the activities of making information, literature, music, software, and other content, physical or digital, available to the public for sale or free of charge. Traditionally, the term publishing refers to the creation and distribu ...
her husband co-founded just three years earlier. Westfall cited a desire to learn
assembly language
In computing, assembly language (alternatively assembler language or symbolic machine code), often referred to simply as assembly and commonly abbreviated as ASM or asm, is any low-level programming language with a very strong correspondence bet ...
and to work on the
Atari 800
The Atari 8-bit computers, formally launched as the Atari Home Computer System, are a series of home computers introduced by Atari, Inc., in 1979 with the Atari 400 and Atari 800. The architecture is designed around the 8-bit MOS Technology 6502 ...
as one reason for their departure from Epyx.
Together with game designer
Paul Reiche III, they started
Free Fall Associates to make
computer games
A video game or computer game is an electronic game that involves interaction with a user interface or input device (such as a joystick, game controller, controller, computer keyboard, keyboard, or motion sensing device) to generate visual fe ...
free of the politics existing at the now larger Epyx.
Together with Jon and Reiche, she helped develop the two award-winning and highly acclaimed games ''
Archon
''Archon'' (, plural: , ''árchontes'') is a Greek word that means "ruler", frequently used as the title of a specific public office. It is the masculine present participle of the verb stem , meaning "to be first, to rule", derived from the same ...
'' and ''
Archon II'', handling the brunt of the programming work. It took six months to develop this game, and many of the game details were held constant from the original idea.
For six years, Westfall was on the
board of directors
A board of directors is a governing body that supervises the activities of a business, a nonprofit organization, or a government agency.
The powers, duties, and responsibilities of a board of directors are determined by government regulatio ...
of the
Computer Game Developers Conference.
Personal
Westfall met Jon at the
West Coast Computer Faire in 1980 while demonstrating her surveying program she wrote for the
TRS-80
The TRS-80 Micro Computer System (TRS-80, later renamed the Model I to distinguish it from successors) is a desktop microcomputer developed by American company Tandy Corporation and sold through their Radio Shack stores. Launched in 1977, it is ...
. Her booth was next to that of
Automated Simulations—later Epyx—where Jon was working. After dating for about six months, Freeman convinced Westfall to move closer and come to work at his company.
See also
*
List of women in the video game industry
*
Women and video games
The relationship between women and video games has received extensive academic and media attention. Since the 1990s, female gamers have commonly been regarded as a minority. However, industry surveys have shown that over time, the gender ratio h ...
*
Women in computing
Women in computing were among the first programmers in the early 20th century, and contributed substantially to the industry. As technology and practices altered, the role of women as programmers has changed, and the recorded history of the fi ...
References
External links
MobyGames' entry on WestfallFree Fall Associates chapter of Halcyon Days: Interviews with Classic Computer and Video Game Programmers
{{DEFAULTSORT:Westfall, Anne
American video game programmers
Year of birth missing (living people)
Living people
Women video game programmers