This is a list of notable video game designers, past and present, in alphabetical order. The people in this list designed either computer games, console games, arcade games or some other type of video game.
Allen Adham, Lead Designer of World of Warcraft.
Michel Ancel, creator of Rayman and Beyond Good & Evil.
Ralph Baer, "Father of Video Games", created Chase (1967), the first game played in a television set.
Clive Barker, creator of Undying and Jericho.
Doug Barnett, designer/writer/artist Lords of the Rising Sun, Star Rank Boxing, Ghostbusters II and Return to Zork.
Richard Bartle, co-author of MUD, the first multi-user dungeon.
Chris Beatrice: Caesar and Lords of the Realm.
Marc Blank: co-designer of Zork, co-founder of Infocom
Cliff Bleszinski: former member of Epic Games lead designer of Gears of War and Gears of War 2 and level designer of Unreal series.
Ed Boon: co-creator of the Mortal Kombat fighting game series.
Brenda Brathwaite: designer, writer and level designer on Wizardry series, creator of Train and Siochan Leat.
Bill Budge: Raster Blaster and Pinball Construction Set
Danielle Bunten: M.U.L.E., The Seven Cities of Gold
Tim Cain, main designer of Fallout and Arcanum, founder of Troika Games
Rich Carlson, co-designer of Strange Adventures in Infinite Space and Weird Worlds: Return to Infinite Space, co-founder of Digital Eel
John Carmack, co-designer of "Doom"
Mark Cerny, worked on many games, such as Crash Bandicoot, Spyro, and Ratchet and Clank, lead architect of the PlayStation 4, creator of Knack
Eric Chahi, developer and designer of Another World, and Heart of Darkness.
Doug Church: Ultima Underworld, Ultima Underworld 2 and System Shock
Lori and Corey Cole: Quest for Glory series, Mixed-Up Fairy Tales, Castle of Dr. Brain and Shannara
Michael Condrey: senior development director, Dead Space, co-founder, Sledgehammer Games
Chris Crawford: Eastern Front (1941), Balance of Power, founder of the Computer Game Developers' Conference, pioneer of interactive storytelling
Don Daglow: designer of Dungeon, Intellivision Utopia, Earl Weaver Baseball, Neverwinter Nights
Patrice Désilets, creator of Assassin's Creed.
Dino Dini: designer of Kick Off, Kick Off 2, Player Manager, GOAL!, Dino Dini's Soccer
Jakub Dvorsky: designer of Samorost and Machinarium.
Brian Fargo: founder of Interplay Entertainment, InXile Entertainment and developer of Bard's Tale and Wasteland
Steve Fawkner: founder of Infinite Interactive and designer of the Warlords (game series) and the Puzzle Quest series
Steve Feak: developer of DotA Allstars and lead designer of League of Legends
Kelton Flinn: designer of Air Warrior and many other pioneering online games, co-founder of Kesmai
David Fox: designer of Zak McKracken and the Alien Mindbenders
Nina Freeman: Indie designer known for games with themes of sexuality and self-reflection.
František Fuka: developed games for Sinclair ZX Spectrum such as Tetris 2
Tokuro Fujiwara: developed games for Capcom such as Ghosts 'n Goblins
Toby Gard: designer in Tomb Raider, and creator of Lara Croft
Richard Garfield: designer of many great games including Magic: The Gathering
Richard Garriott (a.k.a. Lord British): creator of the Ultima series and founder of Origin Systems
Andy Gavin, founder of Naughty Dog, creator of Crash Bandicoot
Nasir Gebelli: founder of Sirius Software and Gebelli Software, programmer of Apple II and Squaresoft games, including first three Final Fantasy games
Ron Gilbert: designer of Maniac Mansion and the first two Monkey Island games
Julian Gollop, designer of Chaos, Laser Squad and X-COM: UFO Defense.
Andrew Gower, designer of RuneScape
Brian 'Psychochild' Green, designer of Meridian 59
Stefano Gualeni: creator and designer of the Tony Tough series, writer and designer for Dangerous Heaven
Dean 'Rocket' Hall, creator of DayZ
Jon Hare: designer/director of Sensible Soccer series, Cannon Fodder series and Wizball series, co-founder of Sensible Software
Stieg Hedlund: Diablo, Diablo II, StarCraft
William Higinbotham: Tennis for Two (1958)
Yuji Horii: Square Enix - Dragon Quest series, Chrono Trigger
Todd Howard: Bethesda Softworks - Elder Scrolls series, Fallout 3, Fallout New Vegas
Casey Hudson: Bioware - Mass Effect series, Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic
IceFrog: developer of Defense of the Ancients and lead designer of Dota 2
Koji Igarashi: Konami - current producer of the Castlevania series
Tomonobu Itagaki: Tecmo Team Ninja - former designer of the Dead or Alive (DOA) games and Ninja Gaiden
Shigesato Itoi: creator of the EarthBound/Mother series
Tōru Iwatani: creator Pac-Man for Namco
David Jaffe: creator of God of War and designer on the Twisted Metal series
Jennell Jaquays: leader of game design for Coleco in the 1980s and, more recently, designer & level designer for Quake 2, Quake III Arena and Quake III: Team Arena
Eugene Jarvis, creator of Defender, Robotron: 2084, Target: Terror and The Fast and The Furious
Jane Jensen, creator of Gabriel Knight series, Gray Matter
Soren Johnson: co-designer of Civilization III and lead designer for Civilization IV
David Jones: creator of Lemmings and Grand Theft Auto series, and founded DMA Design (now known as Rockstar North).
Jens Bergensten,
Iikka Keränen, co-designer of Strange Adventures in Infinite Space and Weird Worlds: Return to Infinite Space, co-founder of Digital Eel
Rieko Kodama: Sega - Phantasy Star series, Skies of Arcadia
Hideo Kojima: Konami - Metal Gear series, Snatcher and Policenauts
Jarek Kolář: designer of Vietcong.
Marc Laidlaw, designer/writer at Valve on the Half-Life games
Ken Levine, creator of BioShock and Thief: The Dark Project Series
Ken Lobb, creator of GoldenEye 007
Ed Logg, creator of Asteroids, Centipede and Gauntlet
Gilman Louie, creator of "Falcon (video game series)", Super Tetris, Battle Trek, Delta Squadron and Starship Simulator
Al Lowe, creator of the Leisure Suit Larry series
Gregg Mayles: designer for the Banjo-Kazooie series and Viva Piñata
American McGee: American McGee's Alice, Doom, Quake, American McGee's Grimm
Edmund McMillen: independent game artist and designer for Gish, Aether, and others
Stephen Marley: designer/writer of Martian Gothic: Unification
Colin McComb: designer for Planescape: Torment
Brad McQuaid: developer of EverQuest
Jordan Mechner: Karateka and Prince of Persia series
Sid Meier: Civilization series, Railroad Tycoon. Founded MicroProse and Firaxis.
Steve Meretzky: designer/writer of numerous Infocom titles, including Planetfall, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, A Mind Forever Voyaging and Leather Goddesses of Phobos
Shinji Mikami: of Capcom - the Resident Evil series
Robyn and Rand Miller: brothers who designed Myst and some of its sequels.
Jeff Minter: founder of Llamasoft.
Shigeru Miyamoto: Nintendo EAD - Donkey Kong, Mario, Legend of Zelda & many others
Tetsuya Mizuguchi: Q Entertainment (formally with Sega UGA) - Lumines, Rez, Space Channel 5 & others
Peter Molyneux: created Populous, Syndicate and Black and White, Fable, founded Bullfrog Software and Lionhead Studios
Brian Moriarty: designer/writer of Trinity and Loom
David Mullich: The Prisoner, I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream, director or producer of many others
Yuji Naka: (Sega Sonic Team) - Sonic the Hedgehog, Phantasy Star Online, Nights into Dreams... & others
Gabe Newell: founded Valve Corporation
Garry Newman: designer of Garry's Mod
Toshihiro Nishikado: Space Invaders
Tetsuya Nomura: Square Enix - Final Fantasy, Kingdom Hearts
Yoshiki Okamoto: Game Republic, Capcom, Konami - Street Fighter (series) & others
Henrique Olifiers: designer of media convergence games such as My Big Brother, Herois e vampiros and Conquista de Titã. Also co-founder of Finalboss.com, a Latin American gaming news portal.
Scott Orr: designer of original version of Madden NFL, many other design credits
Tommy Palm: Candy Crush Saga
Alexey Pajitnov: Tetris
Rob Pardo: Lead Designer on World of Warcraft, Warcraft III
David Perry: MDK, Earthworm Jim and more
Markus Persson: Minecraft, 0x10c
Sandy Petersen: Lightspeed, Doom, Rise of Rome and more
Simon Phipps: Rick Dangerous, ShadowMan, Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone and others.
Ted Price: founder of Insomniac Games
Rick Raymer: Clue, Scooby Doo: Mystery of the Fun Park Phantom and others cod series
Frédérick Raynal, creator of Alone in the Dark, Little Big Adventure and Toy Commander
Tommy Refenes: Super Meat Boy
Brian Reynolds: Civilization II, Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri, Rise of Nations and FrontierVille
Scott Rogers: Maximo: Ghosts to Glory, Maximo vs. Army of Zin, God of War, Pac-Man World and author of the book Level Up! The Guide to Great Video Game Design and Swipe This! The Guide to Great Touchscreen Game Design
Ken Rolston: The Elder Scrolls (Morrowind and Oblivion)
John Romero: Doom and Quake lead designer and level designer, Daikatana producer, co-founder of id Software, Ion Storm, Loot Drop, and Monkeystone Games
Richard Rouse III: designer/writer of The Suffering games and author of the book Game Design: Theory and Practice
Jason Rubin, co-founder of Naughty Dog, creator of Crash Bandicoot
Hironobu Sakaguchi: Mistwalker (formally with Square Co.) Final Fantasy series and Chrono Trigger
Masahiro Sakurai: creator of Kirby, designer of the Super Smash Bros. series, founder of Sora Ltd.
Kevin Saunders, lead designer of Torment: Tides of Numenera and Neverwinter Nights 2: Mask of the Betrayer
Chris Sawyer, creator of the Transport Tycoon and Rollercoaster Tycoon series.
Josh Sawyer: Neverwinter Nights 2, Icewind Dale series, Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance series
Tim Schafer, designer of Grim Fandango and Psychonauts
Jesse Schell, best known for Toontown Online and Pixie Hollow (video game); author of The Art of Game Design: A Book of Lenses
Glen Schofield, creator of Dead Space, co-founder of Sledgehammer Games
Jeremiah Slaczka, creative director of 5TH Cell, designer of Scribblenauts and Drawn to Life
Warren Spector: System Shock, Thief series, Deus Ex
Goichi Suda: designer of Killer7
Yu Suzuki, Sega-AM2 designer of many classics that became genres, such as Afterburner, Hang-On, Virtua Racing, Virtua Fighter series, Ferrari F355 Challenge and the Shenmue series.
Kim Swift, project lead for Portal
David Sirlin, lead designer for Super Street Fighter II Turbo HD Remix
Satoshi Tajiri: creator of Pokémon games
Toshiro Tsuchida: Front Mission series
John Tobias: co-creator of the Mortal Kombat fighting game series.
Chris Taylor, pioneered the use of both 3D units and terrain in the RTS game Total Annihilation.
Deborah Todd: veteran game designer and writer for Humongous Entertainment, 20th Century Fox, Houghton Mifflin, Disney Interactive and author of Game Design: From Blue Sky to Green Light
Andy Tudor: design lead on the Need for Speed "SHIFT" franchise
Fumito Ueda: creator of Ico and Shadow of the Colossus
Jon Van Caneghem: Might and Magic and Heroes of Might and Magic series
Daniel Vávra: designer of Mafia: The City of Lost Heaven.
Jordan Weisman: founder of FASA Corporation, co-creator of BattleTech and MechWarrior
Richard Vander Wende: co-designer/director of Riven
Christopher Weaver: founder of Bethesda Softworks, co-designer of Gridiron!, engine designer of the original "John Madden Football" and "Wayne Gretzky Hockey" and producer of the early "The Elder Scrolls" series
Roberta Williams: designer of King's Quest and other series, pioneered graphic adventure game genre, co-founded Sierra Entertainment
Tim Willits: designer on id software titles The Ultimate Doom, Quake, Quake II, Quake III Arena, Quake III: Team Arena and Doom 3
Gary Winnick: designer of Maniac Mansion and Thimbleweed Park
Will Wright: game designer of SimCity series, The Sims series and Spore, co-founder of Maxis
Robin Walker: creator of Team Fortress a popular Quake mod. Also responsible for design, code, and management on various Valve products and is lead developer of Team Fortress 2, alongside John Cook.
Kazunori Yamauchi: Polyphony Digital - Gran Turismo
Gunpei Yokoi: creator and designer of the Game Boy, Metroid and Kid Icarus.
List of video game designers Wikipedia (Text) CC BY-SA