Will Wright is best known for creating The Sims, and therefore much of his life prior to the year 2000 has been forgotten or is ignored. Sure, you might reference SimCity and hardcore fans might cite SimAnt as a niche favourite (yes, that’s♒ real), but before he started designing video games, Wright was a keen architect and engineer. These pa🅠ssions led him to BattleBots, the US version of robot-fighting game show Robot Wars, which his creation was subsequently banned from.
Fir🧸st, let’s take a step back. Why was the guy who created The Sims on BattleBots anyway? Well, he’s a geek. Like everyone who’s clever enough to make a video game, he wants to understand how thi𓃲ngs work, and for Wright that started with physical, tangible things like robots. He studied architecture and mechanical engineering at university, and loves building things.
While knowing ho𒁃w to build a robot and how to build a video game are very different skillsets, there’s crossover in terms of the passions behind them. They both require creativity, rational thinking, and a dedication to just building things from practically nothing. It’s just that one discipline requires that you build things from nuts and bolts, and the other, lines of code.
When his daughter Cassidy was old enough, they began building robots together. Then they started competing in local Batt𓂃leBots tournaments before it became a TV show. If you haven’t heard of BattleBots or Robot Wars, firstly I recommend you look it up. There are a load of old Robot Wars episodes on YouTube, and, being the original and starring Liverpool’s finest, Craig Charles, it’s the best place to start your automaton fighting education. But if you can’t be bothered with that, it’s basically groups of amateur robot makers building their most killiest contraptions and pitting them against one another in a brutal arena. Most robots, even the victors, emerge limping and torn to shreds after each brutal bout of battling.
In a game dominated by robots called ‘Evis♐cerator’ and ‘Death Machine’, the Wrights’ Kitty Puff Puff was a breath of fresh air. At least until she started dominating the competition.
You see, the Wrights’ strategy was for Kitty Puff Puff to attach a piece of gauze to its opponent, and then manoeuvre in circles around it to wrap it up completely. They would continue this until their opponent was rendered motionless. It’s a very different strategy in a game po𒊎pulated by robots wielding axes, pincers, and other metal-puncturing, engine-destroying weapons, but clearly an effective one. So effective, that the tactic – known as gauzing – was b𝓡anned by the organiser.
This was way before the TV show took off, and maybe even before its progenitor Robot Wars had launched. Proper grassroots backyard robot fighting. Wright was an OG robot warrior, and was arguably oneඣ of the best to ever do it. There are only a handful of techniques banned in the competition, and he and his daughter pioneered one of them.
Wright’s passion for building clearly bled into his game design philosophy. SimCity and TheSims are games that the player builds, he just gives you the tools to do so. When you think about it, the connection to Wright’s mechanical and structural background is obvious. He studied architecture, and he made a game where the player creates their own architecture. He gives you the tools to exp💎lore his passions. I love The Sims, and its inspirations from Wright’s personal interests are clear. I’m just hoping he makes a Robot Wars video game soon, instead of prattling about on the Blockchain.