Talk:The Dreadnaught Factor

As one with first-hand knowledge and as one involved in The Dreadnaught Factor, I'll add what I know to this discussion page, and let others verify and edit the article proper. Tom Loughry designed The Dreadnaught Factor for the Mattel Intellivision console while on staff at Cheshire Engineering which was under contract with Activision.

(Side note: Cheshire Engineering was composed of the senior engineering team which had left APh Technological Consulting in 1982 over disagreements with APh's founder, Glen Hightower. APh was under contract with Matel Electronics, and produced the operating system for the Mattel Intellivision, almost all of Mattel's early Intellivision games, and a series of Mattel games for the Atari 2600.)

During that era at Activision, game designers were the primary testers for each others' games, and a designer who took a particular interest in a game would become the primary tester. I (Eric Nickell) ended up becoming the lead tester for the Intellivision version of The Dreadnaught Factor, and subsequently, the designer who adapted the game to run on the Atari 400/800/5200 platforms. ("Adapted" is a process which involves a complete redesign of the basic game play elements to rewrite the game for a different game system. For example, the Intellivision version of The Dreadnaught Factor is a top-scroller, while for technical reasons, the Atari 400/800/5200 version is a side-scroller. While both were written in assembler, they were written for different microprocessors.)

Tom Loughry went on to produce several games for Electronic Arts, and now resides in Crescent City, CA.

ESNickell (talk) 03:43, 17 June 2008 (UTC)


 * This is all good stuff, but we need reliable sources in order to put this in the article. Thanks for your input, though. Xihr (talk) 08:41, 17 June 2008 (UTC)