Daniel James (born 1971, London), is a British- Canadian

video game developer A video game developer is a broad term for 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 ...

based in San Francisco. He is a co-founder and CEO of Three Rings Design, the company behind the MMOGs ''

Yohoho! Puzzle Pirates ''Puzzle Pirates'' (also known as ''Yohoho! Puzzle Pirates'') is a massively multiplayer online game developed by Three Rings Design (Later owned by Grey Havens LLC). The player takes the role of a pirate, adventuring on the high seas and pillagin ...

'', '' Bang! Howdy'', ''

Whirled Whirled is a virtual world website and video game created by Three Rings Design. Its Open Beta stage was announced at the Game Developers Conference in 2007. It makes use of Adobe Flash as an applet embedded into the website while also having p ...

'' and '' Spiral Knights''.

Biography

James was born in 1971 in London, the only child of Allan James, a filmmake

who worked on titles such as '' Out of Africa (film), Out of Africa'' and ''

Superman Superman is a superhero who appears in American comic books published by DC Comics. The character was created by writer Jerry Siegel and artist Joe Shuster, and debuted in the comic book ''Action Comics'' #1 (cover-dated June 1938 and publi ...

'', and Hope James, an interior designer and art teacher. James attended

Holland Park School Holland Park School is a coeducational secondary school and sixth form in Holland Park, London, England. In 2013, it has attained academy status. Opened in 1958, the school became the flagship for comprehensive education, and at one time had ove ...

and

Ealing, Hammersmith and West London College West London College, legally known as the Ealing, Hammersmith and West London College is a large further and higher education college in West London, England, formed in 2002 by the merger between Ealing Tertiary College and Hammersmith and West ...

, and got involved with MUDs early, playing Essex MUD at the age of 12, in 1982. While still at university, he worked as a god on Avalon: The Legend Lives and co-founded the Avalon dial-up service in 1990, moving services to the internet in 1994, the same year that he graduated from the

University of Leeds , mottoeng = And knowledge will be increased , established = 1831 – Leeds School of Medicine1874 – Yorkshire College of Science1884 - Yorkshire College1887 – affiliated to the federal Victoria University1904 – University of Leeds , ...

, with a degree in Computer Science and Philosophy. In 1995, he founded another company, Sense Internet. In 1998, he moved to the United States to work for

Sierra Online Sierra Entertainment, Inc. (formerly On-Line Systems and Sierra On-Line, Inc.) was an American video game developer and publisher founded in 1979 by Ken and Roberta Williams. The company is known for pioneering the graphic adventure game genre ...

, as a designer on Middle-earth Online. While in the United States, he met Michael Bayne and they founded Three Rings Design to create ''

Puzzle Pirates ''Puzzle Pirates'' (also known as ''Yohoho! Puzzle Pirates'') is a massively multiplayer online game developed by Three Rings Design (Later owned by Grey Havens LLC). The player takes the role of a pirate, adventuring on the high seas and pillagi ...

''. It was launched in 2003. It has been followed by ''

Bang Howdy ''Bang! Howdy'' is an online free-to-play, hybrid turn based and real time strategy game created by American company Three Rings Design. It was originally released on December 1, 2006 after public beta testing by Grey Havens, a non-profit organiz ...

'', ''

Corpse Craft ''Corpse Craft: Incident at Weardd Academy'' is a Flash and web browser game developed by Grey Havens and released on their game portal Whirled in 2008. A version for the iPad was released on December 1, 2010. Gameplay The game is a combination ...

'' and '' Spiral Knights'', in partnership with SEGA. In March 2011 Three Rings announced a partnership with the BBC to create an online game based on Doctor Who. He is a member of the

IGDA The International Game Developers Association (IGDA) is a nonprofit professional association whose stated mission is to "support and empower game developers around the world in achieving fulfilling and sustainable careers." The IGDA is incorpo ...

Online Games An online game is a video game that is either partially or primarily played through the Internet or any other computer network available. Online games are ubiquitous on modern gaming platforms, including PCs, consoles and mobile devices, and sp ...

SIG, and a frequent speaker or moderator at industry conferences such as

E³ E3 (short for Electronic Entertainment Expo or Electronic Entertainment Experience in 2021) is a trade event for the video game industry. The Entertainment Software Association (ESA) organizes and presents E3, which many developers, publisher ...

, GDC, and the

Austin Games Conference Austin is the capital city of the U.S. state of Texas, as well as the seat and largest city of Travis County, with portions extending into Hays and Williamson counties. Incorporated on December 27, 1839, it is the 11th-most-populous ci ...

The First Church of the Grey Goo

According to

ICANN The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN ) is an American multistakeholder group and nonprofit organization responsible for coordinating the maintenance and procedures of several databases related to the namespac ...

WhoIs WHOIS (pronounced as the phrase "who is") is a query and response protocol that is widely used for querying databases that store the registered users or assignees of an Internet resource, such as a domain name, an IP address block or an autonomou ...

James & Three Rings Design are the registrant for the website of The First Church of the Grey Goo. The site proclaims and praises the inevitability of nanomachines replacing mankind as "prophesied" by

Bill Joy William Nelson Joy (born November 8, 1954) is an American computer engineer and venture capitalist. He co-founded Sun Microsystems in 1982 along with Scott McNealy, Vinod Khosla, and Andy Bechtolsheim, and served as Chief Scientist and CTO a ...

. It is unclear whether this site is an attempt at humor, earnest, or related to an upcoming or unreleased video game. Registration was on February 16, 2000 and expires in 2016. There have been no changes to the site since its first archiving by the

Wayback Machine The Wayback Machine is a digital archive of the World Wide Web founded by the Internet Archive, a nonprofit based in San Francisco, California. Created in 1996 and launched to the public in 2001, it allows the user to go "back in time" and s ...

on June 25, 2001. On February 11, 2020 the site's domain information has been updated, and expires in 2022.

References

Daniel James' personal website

Daniel James' blog

DreamStation interview
September 29, 2003

IGDA Online Games webpage

External links

Official Three Rings Website

Puzzle Pirates Website

Whirled Website

Spiral Knights Website
{{DEFAULTSORT:James, Daniel 1971 births Living people British video game designers Canadian video game designers Three Rings Design Alumni of the University of Leeds People educated at Holland Park School