Jason Jones

Jason Jones (born June 1, 1971) is an American video game developer and programmer who co-founded the video game studio Bungie with Alex Seropian in 1991. Jones began programming on Apple computers in high school, assembling a multiplayer game called Minotaur: The Labyrinths of Crete. While attending the University of Chicago, Jones met Seropian and the two formed a partnership to publish Minotaur. Following the modest success of Minotaur, Jones programmed Bungie's next game, Pathways into Darkness, and worked on code, level design and story development for Bungie's Marathon and Myth series. For Bungie's next projects, Halo: Combat Evolved and Halo 2, Jones took on a more managerial role as project lead. He served as director on the 2014 video game Destiny. Early life Jones became interested in programming in high school, and learned Applesoft BASIC and 6502 Assembly on an Apple II series computer. When Apple released its Macintosh line, Jones's family purchased a Macintosh 128K, but Jones never programmed much for it. After high school Jones got a job programming for a computer-aided design company on PCs, before going to college the next year. In his off time Jones said that all he ever did on the Apple II was write games, "and it seemed logical to continue that on the Mac," he said. "The first thing I did on the Mac was to port a modem game I'd written called Minotaur from 6502 Assembly on the Apple II into MPW C on the Mac. I was still finishing that when I came to college. By that time, I knew I wanted to write games." Career Jones met Alex Seropian in his second year at the University of Chicago. In 1991 Seropian had founded Bungie and published his own game, Operation: Desert Storm. Seropian was looking for another game to publish, and they decided to work together to finish Minotaur. While Seropian did design and marketing, Jones finished the programming. Minotaur: The Labyrinths of Crete shipped in April 1992; while the game sold only around 2,500 copies (it required a then-rare modem for network play), it developed a devoted following. After publishing Minotaur, Jones and Seropian formed a partnership; "What I liked about him was that he never wasted any money", Jones said of his partner.