David Whatley (born 1966) is the former president and CEO of
Simutronics
Simutronics is an American online games company whose products include '' GemStone IV'' and ''DragonRealms''. It was founded in 1987 by David Whatley, with husband and wife Tom & Susan Zelinski. The company is located in St. Louis, Missouri. ...
Corporation, a multiplayer game company in
St. Charles, Missouri
Saint Charles (commonly abbreviated St. Charles) is a city in, and the county seat of, St. Charles County, Missouri, United States. The population was 70,493 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, making St. Charles the List of cities in ...
. He was the co-founder of the company in 1987, and has been a key developer on all of the company's products, including the ''
GemStone
A gemstone (also called a fine gem, jewel, precious stone, semiprecious stone, or simply gem) is a piece of mineral crystal which, when cut or polished, is used to make jewellery, jewelry or other adornments. Certain Rock (geology), rocks (such ...
'' series, ''DragonRealms'', ''Modus Operandi'', ''Alliance of Heroes'', and ''
CyberStrike'', which won the Online Game of the Year award from ''
Computer Gaming World
''Computer Gaming World'' (CGW) was an American Video game journalism, computer game magazine that was published between 1981 and 2006. One of the few magazines of the era to survive the video game crash of 1983, it was sold to Ziff Davis in 199 ...
'' magazine in 1993.
Early years
Whatley was born August 10, 1966, in St. Louis, Missouri, the youngest of three children to Oscie Whatley, a day lily hybridizer, and Dorothy Whatley, who ran a miniatures store. Whatley attended
McCluer North High School
McCluer North High School (founded 1971) is a public school in Florissant, Missouri, United States in the St. Louis metropolitan area. The McCluer North campus is centrally located in the Ferguson-Florissant School District. Located in a resid ...
, graduating in 1984, and was involved in the early
BBS culture, writing the FRPBBS software for his privately owned company, Deep Pan Software. He briefly attended the University of Missouri, St. Louis, in 1985, majoring in communications, but left early to found his own software company.
Simutronics
A passionate gamer, in 1987, at the age of 20, he co-founded
Simutronics
Simutronics is an American online games company whose products include '' GemStone IV'' and ''DragonRealms''. It was founded in 1987 by David Whatley, with husband and wife Tom & Susan Zelinski. The company is located in St. Louis, Missouri. ...
with Tom and Susan Zelinski, and ran the company from his bedroom in his parents' home. Whatley was president, CEO, and chairman of the board.
The company grew rapidly to the point of grossing $5 million per year, and made the ''
Inc.'' 500 list in 1999.
Business relationships were developed with every major online service available at the time, including General Electric's
GEnie
GEnie (General Electric Network for Information Exchange) was an online service provider, online service created by a General Electric business, GEIS (now GXS Inc., GXS), that ran from 1985 through the end of 1999. In 1994, GEnie claimed around ...
to
America Online
AOL (formerly a company known as AOL Inc. and originally known as America Online) is an American web portal and online service provider based in New York City, and a brand marketed by Yahoo! Inc. (2017–present), Yahoo! Inc.
The service tra ...
,
Prodigy
Prodigy, Prodigies or The Prodigy may refer to:
* Child prodigy, a child who produces meaningful output to the level of an adult expert performer
** Chess prodigy, a child who can beat experienced adult players at chess
Arts, entertainment, and m ...
, and
CompuServe
CompuServe, Inc. (CompuServe Information Service, Inc., also known by its initialism CIS or later CSi) was an American Internet company that provided the first major commercial online service provider, online service. It opened in 1969 as a times ...
. Other partners have included Time Warner, Sony, and Universal Studios.
Simutronics games were the #1 third-party content on America Online, breaking industry records with 2 million user hours per month. Simutronics' flagship product ''GemStone'' is the longest-running product line of its type in the world, with customers who have been with the company since 1988. Whatley innovated the concept of online 3D action games, developing the ''
CyberStrike'' 3D multiplayer game in 1993. The first of its type, it caused ''
Computer Gaming World
''Computer Gaming World'' (CGW) was an American Video game journalism, computer game magazine that was published between 1981 and 2006. One of the few magazines of the era to survive the video game crash of 1983, it was sold to Ziff Davis in 199 ...
'' magazine to create the new category of "Online Game of the Year" so it could be awarded to ''CyberStrike''.
In 2007, ''Inc.'' magazine again cited Simutronics, this time as one of the 5000 fastest growing companies of the year.
In 2010, Whatley announced that Simutronics would reorganize into two companies, Simutronics Games and HeroEngine, with Whatley taking over the role as president of Simutronics Games, and Neil Harris as president of
HeroEngine
HeroEngine is a 3D game engine and server technology platform originally developed by Simutronics Corporation specifically for building MMO-style games. At first developed for the company's own game ''Hero's Journey'', the engine won multipl ...
.
Critical Thought Games
In 2009, Whatley founded Critical Thought Games to develop his own line of iPhone games. His first title, ''
geoDefense'' was a critical and financial success, and has continued to be a top seller on the app store. His second title, ''
geoDefense Swarm'' went on to receive even more critical acclaim, and was named one of ''
Time
Time is the continuous progression of existence that occurs in an apparently irreversible process, irreversible succession from the past, through the present, and into the future. It is a component quantity of various measurements used to sequ ...
'' magazine's "Top 10 Video Games of 2009".
Products
* ''GemStone II'' (1988)
* ''Orb Wars'' (1988)
* ''GemStone III'' (1989)
* ''
CyberStrike'' (1994)
* ''Modus Operandi'' (1995)
* ''
DragonRealms
Simutronics is an American online games company whose products include '' GemStone IV'' and ''DragonRealms''. It was founded in 1987 by David Whatley, with husband and wife Tom & Susan Zelinski. The company is located in St. Louis, Missouri. ...
'' (1996)
* ''Hercules & Xena: Alliance of Heroes'' (1998)
* ''
CyberStrike 2
''Cyberstrike 2'' is a mech simulation video game developed by Simutronics and published by 989 Studios for Microsoft Windows. It is the sequel to '' CyberStrike''.
Development
The game was in development as early as July 1997.It was originally ...
'' (1998)
* ''
GemStone IV
''GemStone IV'' is a multiplayer text-based online role-playing video game (often known as a MUD) produced by Simutronics. Players control characters in a high fantasy game world named "Elanthia". The first playable version of the game was known ...
'' (1998)
* ''
HeroEngine
HeroEngine is a 3D game engine and server technology platform originally developed by Simutronics Corporation specifically for building MMO-style games. At first developed for the company's own game ''Hero's Journey'', the engine won multipl ...
''
* ''
geoDefense'' (2009)
* ''
geoDefense Swarm'' (2009)
* ''geoSpark'' (2010)
* ''Fantasy University'' (2010)
Public speaking
* Keynote speaker, 360 iDev Conference, San Jose 2010
* "From Zero to Time Magazine: App Success", Game Developers Conference, 2010
* "The Massively Collaborative Development Paradigm Shift", ION Game Conference, 2008, Seattle
* Austin Game Developers Conference, 2006, MMO Technology Platforms
* AAAS 2006, Virtual Worlds
* GDC 1994, Programming Commercial Virtual Reality
Writing
* "Towards Photorealism in Virtual Botany" in
GPU Gems 2: Programming Techniques for High-Performance Graphics and General-Purpose Computation'
Awards
* "Online Game of the Year" for ''CyberStrike'', by ''Computer Gaming World'' magazine, 1993
* "Best of Show" and "Most Original" for ''Hero's Journey'' at E3 2006
* "''Inc.'' 500", ''
Inc.'' magazine, 1999
* HeroEngine, "Best Development Tool", 2006
* HeroEngine, finalist for "Best Engine" from ''
Game Developer'' 2006.
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Whatley, David
1966 births
Living people
Video game developers
Businesspeople from St. Louis