Jane Jensen Explained

Jane Jensen
Birth Name:Jane Elizabeth Smith
Birth Date:January 28, 1963
Birth Place:Palmerton, Pennsylvania, U.S.
Education:Anderson University (BA)
Known For:Gabriel Knight series
Spouse:Robert Holmes[1]

Jane Jensen (born Jane Elizabeth Smith; January 28, 1963 in Palmerton, Pennsylvania) is an American video game designer and author. She is mostly known as the creator of the Gabriel Knight series of adventure games, and also co-founded Oberon Media and Pinkerton Road video game development companies. Jensen also writes under the name Eli Easton.

Early life

Jane Jensen was born Jane Elizabeth Smith, the youngest of seven children. She received a BA in computer science from Anderson University in Indiana and worked as a systems programmer for Hewlett-Packard.[2]

Career

Her love of both computers and creative writing eventually led her to the computer gaming industry and Sierra OnLine where she worked as a writer on and EcoQuest: The Search for Cetus.[2] After co-designing with veteran game designer Roberta Williams, Jensen designed her first solo game: , which was released in 1993. The dark, supernatural mystery was a departure for Sierra but the game was enthusiastically received, with the strength of Jensen's writing, along with the game's horror and gothic sensibilities coming in for particular praise from the gaming press[3] and earning the Computer Gaming Worlds "Adventure Game of the Year" award.[4]

Jensen followed up Gabriel Knight: Sins of the Fathers with two sequels: in 1995 and in 1999. Somewhat unusually for an adventure game series, each Gabriel Knight title was produced in an entirely different format to the others. Whereas the original was a traditional 2D animated game, the sequels were realised through full motion video and a custom built 3D engine, respectively.[5] Despite further acclaim for Jensen's design in both cases (The Beast Within too was Computer Gaming World "Game of the Year"[4]), the large expenses associated with making the sequels, coupled with the declining marketability of adventure games (especially within Sierra) meant that a fourth in the series was not commissioned.[6]

In 1997, Jensen published a novelization of the first Gabriel Knight game. A second Gabriel Knight novelization followed in 1998. In 1999, Jensen published her first non-adapted novel, Millennium Rising (later retitled Judgment Day). Her fourth book, Dante's Equation was published in 2003 and was nominated for the Philip K. Dick Award.

Jensen has been involved in designing casual online games at Oberon Media, of which she is a co-founder.[7] Her work in the hidden object/light adventure category can partially be credited with moving casual games in the direction of full adventure games in puzzle and story sophistication. Some of her more notable recent games include Deadtime Stories (2009) and Dying for Daylight (2010). After leaving Oberon in 2011, she briefly worked at Zynga.

Jensen's next big adventure game Gray Matter was developed by Wizarbox and published by dtp entertainment in 2010.[8] [9] The game, originally intended to be developed by Hungarian software house Tonuzaba, switched to another developer, French company Wizarbox in 2008: as a result, the tentative release was changed and shifted to 2010. Jensen was also a story consultant on Phoenix Online Studios' 2012 adventure game .[10]

On April 5, 2012, Jensen and her husband Robert Holmes announced the formation of Pinkerton Road, a new game development studio to be headquartered on their Lancaster, Pennsylvania farm.[11] With this announcement, a Kickstarter campaign was launched to raise funds for the studio's first year of game development.[12] In 2014, Pinkerton released their first games, and .

Since 2013, Jensen has written gay romance fiction under the pen name "Eli Easton".[13] The Lion and the Crow was written for the Goodreads M/M Romance event "Love has No Boundaries" in 2013, and later expanded and rereleased as a second edition in e-book and audiobook.[14] [15]

Personal life

Jensen owned a farm in Pennsylvania where she lived with her husband, composer Robert Holmes, who composed the music for the Gabriel Knight series and Gray Matter.[16] They have since sold the farm and are currently living in the Puget Sound area of Washington state.[17]

Works

Games

Novels

Comic books

As Eli Easton

External links

Interviews

Notes and References

  1. Web site: Moebius: Empire Rising a Great Start to Jane Jensen's New Series. Teitelbaum. Ilana. 14 May 2014. The Huffington Post. AOL. 7 December 2014. https://web.archive.org/web/20140907121858/http://www.huffingtonpost.com/ilana-teitelbaum/moebius-empire-rising-a-g_b_5313223.html. September 7, 2014 .
  2. Web site: Celebrating Computing Women Part IX. Ross. Heather Elizabeth. National Women's History Museum. 5 March 2014. dead. https://web.archive.org/web/20141006115855/http://www.nwhm.org/blog/celebrating-computing-women-part-ix/. October 6, 2014. mdy-all.
  3. https://web.archive.org/web/20080310043833/http://www.janejensen.com/presstext.html#gk1#gk1 Gabriel Knight 1 reviews
  4. http://www.mobygames.com/developer/sheet/view/developerId,2199/ Jane Jensen developer bio
  5. Book: Jane Jensen : Gabriel Knight, adventure games, hidden objects. Salter, Anastasia. April 6, 2017 . 9781501327452. New York. 960905790.
  6. http://www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/news_index.php?story=13978 Jane Jensen interview
  7. Web site: I am Jane Jensen, creator of Gabriel Knight, Gray Matter and Pinkerton Road game studio. Ask me anything.. Jensen. Jane. May 13, 2012. Reddit. December 12, 2013.
  8. https://web.archive.org/web/20101115052843/http://www.amazon.de/dp/B0023ZJMQI/ Internet Archive Wayback Machine
  9. News: INTERVIEW – In Conversation With Jane Jensen (Game Designer, Gabriel Knight Trilogy/Gray Matter). 2011-04-29. Alternative Magazine Online. 2018-03-29. en-US.
  10. Web site: Cognition: An Erica Reed Thriller by Phoenix Online Studios. Kickstarter.com. November 3, 2011.
  11. Web site: Pinkerton Road website. April 12, 2012.
  12. Web site: Pinkerton Road Kickstarter campaign. Kickstarter.com. April 12, 2012.
  13. Web site: Out. elieaston.com. Jensen. Jane. October 22, 2014. December 1, 2014. https://web.archive.org/web/20161214152209/http://elieaston.com/out/. December 14, 2016. dead.
  14. Web site: The Lion and the Crow by Eli Easton. Goodreads. January 16, 2015.
  15. Web site: The Lion and the Crow Is A Light In The Darkest Hours . October 29, 2013 . The Novel Approach . June 12, 2016.
  16. Web site: Ingrid Heyn (Adventure Classic Gaming). 2006. The music and the mystery of Robert Holmes. 17 September 2016.
  17. Web site: Robert . Holmes . Sequel . Bandcamp . 1 November 2023.
  18. Web site: Before I Wake by Eli Easton. Goodreads. 16 January 2015.

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