Kevin D. Saunders is an American video game designer and producer, best known for his roles in developing '' Neverwinter Nights 2: Mask of the Betrayer'' (Producer and Lead Designer), '' Neverwinter Nights 2: Storm of Zehir'' (Producer), and '' Torment: Tides of Numenera'' (Project Director).

Career

Saunders graduated with a Masters of Engineering from

Cornell University Cornell University is a private statutory land-grant research university based in Ithaca, New York. It is a member of the Ivy League. Founded in 1865 by Ezra Cornell and Andrew Dickson White, Cornell was founded with the intention to ...

, and began his career at

Nexon Nexon Co., Ltd. is a global video game publisher, listed in Japan, that specializes in online Virtual World games for PCs, consoles and mobile. Nexon is one of the world’s ten largest interactive game companies based on market capitalization a ...

, as director and lead designer on '' Nexus: The Kingdom of the Winds'' and ''

Shattered Galaxy ''Shattered Galaxy'' is a massively multiplayer online real-time strategy game (MMORTS) that was released in 2001 by KRU Interactive ., now known as Nexon Inc, after an extensive open beta period. In the US, it was published by Tri Synergy. It c ...

'', which won multiple awards at the 2001

Independent Games Festival The Independent Games Festival (IGF) is an annual festival at the Game Developers Conference (GDC), the largest annual gathering of the independent video game industry. Originally founded in 1998 to promote independent video game developers, ...

. He went on to work as a designer at

Westwood Studios Westwood Studios, Inc. was an American video game developer, based in Las Vegas, Nevada. It was founded by Brett Sperry and Louis Castle in 1985 as Brelous Software, but got changed after 2 months into Westwood Associates and was renamed to We ...

(on '' Command & Conquer Generals: Zero Hour'' and ''Lord of the Rings: The Battle for Middle-Earth''), before becoming a senior designer and producer at

Obsidian Entertainment Obsidian Entertainment, Inc. is an American video game developer based in Irvine, California. It was founded in June 2003, shortly before the closure of Black Isle Studios, by ex-Black Isle employees Feargus Urquhart, Chris Avellone, Chris Pa ...

(on '' Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic II – The Sith Lords,'' ''

Mask of the Betrayer ''Neverwinter Nights 2: Mask of the Betrayer'' is a role-playing video game developed by Obsidian Entertainment and published by Atari Interactive. It is an expansion pack for ''Neverwinter Nights 2''. It was released in Autumn 2007 for the ...

'', '' Storm of Zehir'', ''Aliens: Crucible'', and ''

Dungeon Siege III ''Dungeon Siege III'' is an action role-playing game developed by Obsidian Entertainment. It was published by Square Enix for PlayStation 3, Xbox 360 and Microsoft Windows in June 2011. It is the third full and fifth overall release in the ''D ...

'')''.'' He next joined

inXile Entertainment inXile Entertainment, Inc. is an American video game developer and a studio of Xbox Game Studios based in Tustin, California. Specializing in role-playing video games, inXile was founded in 2002 by Interplay co-founder Brian Fargo. The studio ...

, where he served in a production role on ''

Wasteland 2 ''Wasteland 2'' is a post-apocalyptic role-playing video game developed by inXile Entertainment and published by Deep Silver. It is the sequel to 1988's '' Wasteland'', and was successfully crowdfunded through Kickstarter. After the postponemen ...

'' before helping '' Torment: Tides of Numenera'' become, at the time, the most successful Kickstarter ever. He served as project director on ''Torment'' before turning to Nexon, where he served as Head of Studio on the company's Nebula project. His last game work was for Arcanity, providing story, design, and production assistance on ''Tanzia''. In addition to this work, Saunders served as Creative Director at Alelo, where he led the development of an award-winning language-learning RPG. Saunders also authored a college text on game interface design (''Game Development Essentials: Game Interface Design'').

References

External links

* American video game designers American video game producers Cornell University College of Engineering alumni Dungeons & Dragons video game designers Living people Obsidian Entertainment people Year of birth missing (living people) {{videogame-bio-stub