Jonathan Blow

Verified Timeline

Lore & Background

Blow became interested in game programming while at middle school. He studied computer science and English at the University of California, Berkeley, but dropped out to start a game company. After the company closed following the dot-com crash, Blow worked as a game development contractor. He co-founded the Experimental Gameplay Workshop and wrote a monthly technical column for Game Developer magazine. Blow gained prominence in 2008 with Braid. He used its financial success to fund his next game, The Witness, and formed a company called Thekla Inc. After a lengthy development period, The Witness was released in 2016, and like Braid was critically and financially successful. During its development, Blow became frustrated with C++, the programming language Thekla used to create the game. He began designing and creating a new programming language. Full-time work on the language, code-named Jai, and a new game implemented in it began after the release of The Witness. A compiler for the Jai language is currently in beta release. Blow's games are known for being artistic and challenging. They are made with custom game engines, and have larger budgets and longer development times than most independently funded games. Blow was featured in Indie Game: The Movie, and is known for his strong opinions about the gaming industry. Since the 2020s, Blow has come under criticism based on his political opinions.

In Their Own Story

The monitor glows softly against the dark room, illuminating lines of code that control the flow of time. Jonathan sits motionless, watching a character leap across a gap only to rewind the moment before impact. He adjusts a variable, testing if the mechanic feels fair or frustrating. The silence is broken only by the hum of the computer and the click of keys as he refines the puzzle one last time.

Reader's Guide

Blow estimated he spent more than $180,000 of his own money to develop Braid. Braid was released in August 2008 to universal acclaim, was 'an immediate sensation', and made Blow a millionaire. In 2014 Blow stated sales of Braid had earned more than $4 million, which he used to fund The Witness (2016).

Did You Know?

• Blow learned to program in BASIC on a TRS-80 Color Computer during his childhood.
• He dropped out of UC Berkeley with less than one semester to go.
• He co-founded the Experimental Gameplay Workshop at the Game Developers Conference in 2002.
• Blow wrote a monthly technical column called The Inner Product for Game Developer magazine.