The Story of Populous

Writing an editor for this primitive 'graphic engine' seemed like a lot of work so Glenn wrote a simple routine to pile his graphics into landscapes. This worked by raising a point of the landscape, moving in a random direction and raising another one, repeated several thousand times. The landscapes weren't too convincing so he made it possible to raise points with the mouse. This created nicer landscapes but, more importantly, was kind of fun in a therapeutic way. Glenn had no idea at all what kind of game this could possibly be used for. He showed it to the rest of the company, and after a lot of brainstorming with the others in the pub, and excellent coding from Molyneux, the game that started the whole 'God Game' genre was born.

Darran Thomas, 27, completed a degree in Illustration, where he specialised in computer animation, while also working as a freelance designer on multimedia business presentations. He always had a interest in computing, especially games, and soon discovered that he could make a career out of computer art and animation. He joined Bullfrog as a junior artist and, like most trades, had to work his way up. In his four and a half years at Bullfrog, he's worked on Magic Carpet 2, Dungeon Keeper, Populous 3 and was most recently lead artist on Theme Park World. His other interests include playing lead guitar, weight training and rugby.

Jeremy, 24, first discovered computers when his school finally managed to successfully assemble a Sinclair ZX80, and he never looked back. He spent several years writing databases and other business utilities, but always wanted to write games, and all through university tinkered with game ideas and demos.

After graduating from Cambridge with first class Honours, he went straight to Bullfrog. As part of the Theme Hospital team, he helped bring the game to completion, including producing a number of playable and non-playable demos. A keen musician, Jeremy also plays bass guitar and composes in-game music.