BlueSky Software | Code Like It's 198x

In 1993 Sega Visions took its readers to “an unmarked office building about 15 miles from the San Diego Zoo”, where a dozen people had spent fifteen months putting dinosaurs on the Mega Drive. That building belonged to BlueSky Software, and its Jurassic Park was one of a long run of games the studio made for Sega of America: talking American football with Joe Montana, Sega’s World Series Baseball, a Mega Drive Shadowrun, and the robot made of spheres, Vectorman. BlueSky made games for other companies’ labels, so its name appeared in the small print on someone else’s box.

Fast facts

Based in: San Diego, California
Active: 1988 to 2001, according to public databases
Founder: George Kiss, according to Wikipedia; Sega of America’s Joe Miller later credited the Vectorman games to “George Kiss and the SOA BlueSky group in San Diego”
Main customer: Sega of America
Best known for: Joe Montana II: Sports Talk Football, World Series Baseball, Jurassic Park, Vectorman

Computer games for other people’s labels

BlueSky’s early credits are on computer games. Amiga Power‘s first issue, in May 1991, listed the “programmer” of the Amiga version of Electronic Arts’ PGA Tour Golf as Bluesky Software. For Disney Software it made two film games distributed in Europe by others: Arachnophobia, whose Italian advertisement in 1991 carried “Developed by BlueSky Software”, and Hare Raising Havoc, an “interactive cartoon” in which Roger Rabbit has to stop Baby Herman escaping before his mother notices, advertised by Infogrames in ACE in February 1992 with the same credit.

Talking football

Its Sega work began around the same time. Sega Retro credits BlueSky with the 8-bit Joe Montana Football for the Master System and Game Gear (1990), the Mega Drive conversion of Electronic Arts’ space game Starflight (1991), and then Joe Montana II: Sports Talk Football, released in America in November 1991.

Sports Talk Football sold itself on its voice. Mean Machines explained in February 1992 that “rather than tackle John Madden head-on, Sega have taken an unusual approach”: “Containing the most speech ever heard in a videogame, Sports Talk Football gives you a full commentary as you play! The effect is astounding.” BlueSky followed it with NFL Sports Talk Football ’93 (1992) and NFL Football ‘94 Starring Joe Montana (1993), and with Sega Sports’ College Football’s National Championship (1994) and its sequel (1995).

Its biggest sports hit was baseball. World Series Baseball came out on the Mega Drive in America in March 1994 under the Sega Sports label, with a large close-up view of pitcher and batter. Two years later GamePro introduced BlueSky as “the creator of the stellar World Series games”, whose “large, up-close batting view” had become the series’ trademark.

Jurassic Park and the licences

Sega also gave BlueSky its film and cartoon licences. Ariel the Little Mermaid appeared on the Mega Drive, Game Gear and Master System in 1992. Jurassic Park followed in August 1993, the game Sega Visions visited. It let the player choose between Dr Grant, on “a mission to rescue people trapped in the Visitor Center”, and a velociraptor. Its lead animator was Doug TenNapel. Retro Gamer tells how he was working on it when he was introduced to David Perry, and drew Earthworm Jim as his demo for Perry’s new studio, Shiny; TenNapel also worked as an artist on BlueSky’s The Ren & Stimpy Show Presents: Stimpy’s Invention (1993). A reworked Jurassic Park: Rampage Edition came out in 1994.

The studio also made the Mega Drive version of the role-playing game Shadowrun (1994), a different game from the Super Nintendo one, as well as the Road Runner game Desert Demolition (1995), and Spider-Man: Web of Fire (1996) for the short-lived 32X.

Vectorman

BlueSky’s best-remembered game came late in the Mega Drive’s life. Vectorman (October 1995) built its hero from separate glowing spheres, rendered from 3D models, and Computer and Video Games called it “one of the best releases of the year”. Vectorman 2 followed in November 1996; GamePro previewed it as “good news for Genesis gamers faced with a sparse lineup of fresh titles”. Joe Miller, Sega of America’s senior vice-president of product development, told Sega-16 in 2013 that both were “big favorites of mine”, done by “George Kiss and the SOA BlueSky group in San Diego”. A Vectorman 3 was planned and never released.

After the Mega Drive

As Sega’s 16-bit market faded, BlueSky worked for other publishers on the new machines and the PC. GamePro previewed MVP Baseball ’96 and MVP College Football for Data East in June 1996, and a year later reported that, after what it called “the demise of Data East”, the baseball game had been “snapped up by Psygnosis”, which “sent MVP back to the minors for a graphical overhaul”. For Philips Media it developed Total Control Football (1996) for the PC, a game, Computer Gaming World wrote, in which “you run every aspect of an NFL franchise from the top down”.

Public sources say little about the end. According to Wikipedia, the French publisher Titus Interactive bought BlueSky in 1998, and the studio closed in March 2001 as Titus ran into financial trouble; Sega Retro also gives 2001 as the year it ended. No period report of either event has been found.

The name is easy to confuse with others. Blue Sky Productions in New Hampshire, which made Ultima Underworld and became Looking Glass, was a different company, as was the Blue Sky Software of New Jersey that sold business programs for the Commodore 64 in 1983.

Sources

Sega Visions, June/July 1993, p. 16: Jurassic Park preview (Dr Grant or a velociraptor); p. 22: the making-of feature (the office near the San Diego Zoo, a dozen people over fifteen months, Doug TenNapel).
Amiga Power issue 1, May 1991, p. 36: PGA Tour Golf review (Electronic Arts, “Programmer Bluesky Software”).
The Games Machine (Italy), September 1991, p. 95: Arachnophobia advertisement (“Published by Disney Software – Developed by BlueSky Software”).
ACE issue 47, August 1991, p. 22: Hare Raising Havoc preview. ACE issue 53, February 1992, p. 25: Infogrames advertisement (“Developed by BlueSky Software”).
Mean Machines issue 17, February 1992, p. 74: Joe Montana’s Sports Talk Football (“the most speech ever heard in a videogame”).
GamePro issue 93, June 1996, p. 45 (Vectorman 2 preview) and p. 80 (MVP Baseball ’96 and MVP College Football previews). GamePro issue 105, June 1997, p. 90 (MVP Baseball and Psygnosis).
Computer Gaming World issue 149, December 1996, p. 188: Total Control Football.
Retro Gamer issue 33, 2006, p. 29: Doug TenNapel as lead animator on BlueSky’s Jurassic Park when he met David Perry, and his Earthworm Jim demo. Issue 114, 2013, p. 12: TenNapel on Stimpy’s Invention and Jurassic Park. Issue 120, 2013, p. 12: Shadowrun on the Super Nintendo (Beam Software) and on the Mega Drive (BlueSky Software).
Computer and Video Games issue 168, November 1995, pp. 48–49: Vectorman review.
Ken Horowitz, “Interview: Joe Miller”, Sega-16, 7 February 2013 (web, secondary). https://www.sega-16.com/2013/02/interview-joe-miller/
Sega Retro (web, secondary): “List of companies in the United States” (dates and address), and the game pages for Joe Montana Football (8-bit), Starflight, Joe Montana II, NFL Sports Talk Football ’93, NFL Football ’94, Ariel the Little Mermaid, Jurassic Park, Jurassic Park: Rampage Edition, Stimpy’s Invention, Shadowrun, World Series Baseball, College Football’s National Championship I and II, Desert Demolition, Spider-Man: Web of Fire, Vectorman 2, and the lists of unreleased Mega Drive and Saturn games (Vectorman 3). https://segaretro.org/
Wikipedia, “BlueSky Software” and “Titus Interactive” (web, secondary): founding, founder, the Titus purchase and the closure. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BlueSky_Software
Compute!, December 1983, pp. 73 and 139: advertisements for Commodore 64 business software from Blue Sky Software, Voorhees, New Jersey (a different company).