Pong debuted 50 years ago this month in 1972, introducing millions to the hypnotic pleasure of electronic tennis. The simple, seductive game kick-started the $200bn global games industry. Six Secrets salutes Pong creator Allan Alcorn in this edition and profiles some of today’s modern game designers who are applying their secretive skills to cutting-edge games.
CIA games
Ex-CIA intelligence analyst Volko Ruhnke doesn’t just play spy games, he creates them. Ruhnke designs the board games Agency analysts use to sharpen their skills in tracking narcotics kingpins and terrorist leaders. Volko’s also a Russia expert who relaxes by designing games for non-CIA players as well. His journey to the Agency - via the US Army - is a cerebral tale of Fight Club for the mind.
Cryptographer Elonka Dunin studied astronomy at UCLA and joined the US Air Force where she worked on U-2 spy planes. She preferred gaming, however, and for two decades Elonka created multiplayer and mobile games like CyberStrike, Tiny Heroes, and One Epic Knight. After 9/11, she helped teach spies about the codes al-Qaeda may have used but Elonka’s still working on her biggest challenge yet.
Host your private holiday party at the hottest venue in Manhattan! Great dates available in Nov, Dec & Jan!
Party at the most dazzling venue in NYC, enjoy premium food and cocktails, and put your spy skills to the test! Everyone leaves with an inspiring personal profile from a former Head of Training at MI6.
The legendary Allan Alcorn not only created one of the world’s first video games but the Atari engineer behind Pong also hired a teenaged Steve Jobs for his first formal job. Alcorn is still a pioneer in the field and co-founder of the ‘Hack the Future’ hackathon for kids. So what cool technology is he excited about now and what’s next for the tech genius?
There’s nothing Stranger Things’ Hellfire Club loves more than a powerful game of Dungeons & Dragons. The role-playing game sparked the ‘Satanic panic’ when it was introduced during the Cold War and its turbulent past includes an epic feud between D&D co-creators and game wizards Dave Arneson and Gary Gygax. It's all fun and games until someone rolls a 1.
Jim Sanborn grew up reading John le Carré novels and socializing with spies, so when the CIA asked if he was interested in creating a sculpture for their HQ it was a ‘no brainer’, the artist said. He wanted to ‘play games’ with the CIA and NSA, so he spent months researching code to embed in Kryptos (the Greek word for ‘hidden’). More than 30 years later, are the world’s biggest brains finally ready to crack it?
Get a FREE copy of a hot thriller, spy story, or crime novel every Monday with a special Story Mondays ticket to SPYSCAPE HQ. Next Monday it's Prisoners of the Castle by New York Times bestselling author Ben Macintyre - the definitive true story of one of history’s most notorious prisons - and the remarkable cast of POWs who tried relentlessly to escape their captors. Don't miss your FREE copy when you experience SPYSCAPE HQ next Monday.
When cyberspy Chris Lewis retired from Britain’s GCHQ after 22 years, he was determined to build an escape room with ‘Easter eggs’ for GCHQ operatives and amateur codebreakers. Lewis opened Mission Intercept in 2021, a WWII-themed room challenging teams to ID, locate, and intercept an enemy agent before D-Day. Heady stuff, but you may want to sharpen your skills before the clock starts ticking on Lewis’ challenge.
