Kenneth Alan Lobb (also credited as Ken Lobb, KAL, and K. Lobb) is an American video game designer formerly employed by Taxan USA Corp., Namco Hometek, and Nintendo of America, and currently employed by Xbox Game Studios as Creative Director.Archived at Ghostarchive and the Wayback Machine: He is best known as co-creator of the Killer Instinct series.
Career Lobb graduated from DeVry University in 1982 and attempted to secure a job in the video game industry unsuccessfully, blaming the video game crash of 1983. Lobb claimed that he applied to Atari Inc. around this time but never heard back. Lobb subsequently began working at AMD, specifically on programmable ROM.
Lobb was introduced to the management of Taxan USA via the owner of a video game store he frequented in Northern California. Lobb did not apply for a role with Taxan but instead had casual conversations with the company management about video games and this sparked their interest in hiring him, unbeknownst to Lobb until they invited him to play the newly released R-Type at their company office. Subsequently Lobb was employed as Product Manager of Taxan USA between October 1988 and January 1991, where he worked alongside Japanese developer KID on various NES games made for the U.S. market. After Taxan closed down in early 1991, Lobb was then employed by Namco Hometek until 1993, where he was Head of Product Development.Archived at Ghostarchive and the Wayback Machine: The same year Lobb began working at Nintendo of America, where he worked on several games, including GoldenEye 007. While at Nintendo Lobb worked as Head of Game Development for Nintendo of America. Shortly after the resignation of Minoru Arakawa from Nintendo in January 2002, Lobb left to join Microsoft Game Studios. Lobb commented in a 2007 interview with IGN that had Arakawa not left the company he would have been less likely to leave.
A weapon in GoldenEye 007, the Klobb - aka the vz. 61 Škorpion - was named after him due to last-minute copyright issues, and became notorious amongst gamers for its lackluster abilities. Despite this, Lobb stated that it "ended up having a nice impact on me, personally".
Works
Year Title Role Platform Developer 1990 Burai Fighter Designer NES KID Low G Man G.I. Joe Producer 1991 Rolling Thunder 2 Hometek Team Sega Genesis Namco 1992 G.I. Joe: The Atlantis Factor Producer (uncredited) NES KID Kick Master Producer Splatterhouse 2 Special Thanks Sega Genesis Now Production Wings 2: Aces High Producer SNES Malibu Interactive Super Batter Up Special Thanks Namco 1993 Splatterhouse 3 Sega Genesis Now Production 1994 Super Punch-Out!! SNES Nintendo Donkey Kong Country Killer Instinct Game design, character voices Arcade Rare 1996 Killer Instinct 2 Character voices, additional design, special thanks Cruis'n USA Special Thanks N64 Williams Donkey Kong Country 3: Dixie Kong's Double Trouble! SNES Rare 1997 Tetrisphere Product coordinator N64 H2O Entertainment Donkey Kong Land III Special Thanks Game Boy Rare GoldenEye 007 NOA Treehouse Staff N64 Diddy Kong Racing NOA Thanks To Cruis'n World NOA Producer Eurocom Blast Corps NOA Staff Rare 1998 Banjo-Kazooie NOA Big Thanks 1999 Star Wars Episode I: Racer Thanks to NOA N64Game Boy Color) LucasArts R-Type DX Special Thanks Game Boy Color Bits Studios The New Tetris N64 H2O EntertainmentBlue Planet Software NBA 3 on 3 Featuring Kobe Bryant Game Boy Color Left Field Productions Mickey's Racing Adventure NOA Thanks Rare Ken Griffey Jr.'s Slugfest Special Thanks N64Game Boy Color Angel StudiosSoftware Creations Jet Force Gemini NOA Thanks To N64 Rare Duke Nukem: Zero Hour Special Thanks Eurocom Donkey Kong 64 Rare Conker's Pocket Tales NOA Special Thanks Game Boy Color Command & Conquer Executive producer N64 Looking Glass Studios 2000 Perfect Dark NOA Staff Rare Alice in Wonderland NOA Special Thanks Game Boy Color Digital Eclipse Software 2003 Voodoo Vince Special Thanks Xbox Beep Industries 2004 Fable: The Lost Chapters Big Blue Box Studios 2007 Shadowrun Xbox 360 FASA Interactive 2010 Crackdown 2 Designer Ruffian Games 2013 Killer Instinct Supervisor, voice of Chief Thunder Xbox One Double Helix Games 2015 Ori and the Blind Forest Special Thanks Xbox 360Xbox OneWindows Moon Studios 2016 Quantum Break Partner creative director Xbox OneWindows Remedy Entertainment
References
External links Ken Lobb's profile at MobyGames