LET'S PLAY... VIDEO GAME PIONEER - OR MURDERER?

Do you ever wonder where you might've ended up if your life had taken a few different turns? In every person there exists the capacity for both greatness and catastrophe. Why, just a few bad days and any one of us could become a serial killer!

Here are ten photographs of ten men who either helped build the video games industry as we know it - or were responsible for the deaths of countless innocent people.

Can you tell the video game pioneers from the murderers? Put your powers of deduction to the test, as we play... Video Game Pioneer - or Murderer?!

WILLY HIGINBOTHAM

Here's something for you to consider: was William "Willy" Higinboth an American physicist, who in 1958 developed Tennis for Two - one of the very first video games - to run on an oscilloscope at the Brookhaven National Laboratory in upstate New York?

Or was he actually a serial killer, who dissolved his victims in a drum of hydrochloric acid, earning him the nickname "Acid Willy"?

Take a good, long look at his photo. Not so easy is it?

PRESS REVEAL TO FIND OUT IF WILLIAM HIGINBOTHAM WAS A MURDERER:

Not a murderer.

STEVE RUSSELL

That Space War was the first modern-style video game is an undisputed fact. Developed in 1962 and running on a PDP-1 minicomputer, it is one of the most important and influential games ever created.

​Its creator Steve Russell should rightly be heralded - if he did indeed create the game, and wasn't in actual fact a brutal killer, who drowned four high school cheerleaders during a week-long reign of terror in a small Midwestern town.

​Again: look at the photo before making your choice.

PRESS REVEAL TO FIND OUT IF STEVE RUSSELL WAS A MURDERER:

Not a murderer

RALPH H. BAER

Ralph Baer is known either as "The Father of Videogames" for his creation of the first ever home video game console, the Magnavox Odyssey, or "The Step-Father of Six Murder Victims" for a senseless bloodbath in his Masuchessets home, from which there were no survivors.

Look into his eyes: are those the eyes of a video gaming pioneer... or the soulless black pits of a cold-blooded killer?

PRESS REVEAL TO FIND OUT IF RALPH BAER WAS A MURDERER:

Not a murderer.

TED DABNEY

As one of. the co-founders of Atari, Ted Dabney is considered one of the unsung heroes in the history of gaming.

Unless Ted Dabney was actually a would-be presidential assassin, whose botched attempt on the life of President Eisenhower ended in tragedy when - cornered in an Atlanta launderette - he shot two policemen, before turning the gun on himself.

There he is in one of the only known photographs of him. That in itself should be a clue as to this why this individual has gone down in infamy...

PRESS REVEAL TO FIND OUT IF TED DABNEY WAS A MURDERER:

Not a murderer.

NOLAN BUSHNELL

The other Atari co-founder, Nolan Bushnell also founded the Chuck E. Cheese restaurant chain.

Well, unless you're being spun another untruth with this statement.

Was Nolan Bushnell actually the man responsible for poisoning over thirty Chuck E. Cheese customers, in a twisted revenge attack on his former employer, who had fired him for punching a co-worker - by sneaking into the kitchens and lacing the food with strychnine?

​It's time to choose!

PRESS REVEAL TO FIND OUT IF NOLAN BUSHNELL WAS A MURDERER:

Not a murderer.

TOMOHIRO NISHIKADO

The creator of Space Invaders, or a ruthless enforcer for an organised crime syndicate, linked to over two dozen gangland killings, which he would commit while singing "Op, op, op, op - Oppa Gangland Style!"? 

You decide. 

PRESS REVEAL TO FIND OUT IF TOMOHIRO NISHIKADO WAS A MURDERER:

Not a murderer.

ROY TRUBSHAW

Two statements, but only one is true:

1) Roy Trubshaw created MUD - the Multi User Dungeon, the predecessor to every MMO you've ever played.

2) Roy Trubshaw created a MVD - the Multi Victim Dungeon, a basement slaughterhouse, beneath his parents' house, into which he lured seven young men to their deaths.

PRESS REVEAL TO FIND OUT IF ROY TRUBSHAW WAS A MURDERER:

Not a murderer.

WILLIE CROWTHER

As a keen caver and programmer, William "Willie" Crowther combined his passions to create Colossal Cave Adventure - the first ever text adventure game.

Or did Crowther embark on another sort of "cave adventure", orchestrating three ritual killings as the high priest of a subterranean black magic sex cult?

See if you can work it out from his photograph...

PRESS REVEAL TO FIND OUT IF WILLIE CROWTHER WAS A MURDERER:

Not a murderer.

ED LOGG

Ed Logg might've been one of the most influential arcade game designers of all time - creating Centipede, Asteroids, Gauntlet. 

Equally, Ed Logg could've been better known as "The Lumberjack" - a serial killer in the Boston area in the late-1970s, finally identified by the distinctive leather gauntlet he would wear while strangling his victims with an asteroid tied to a centipede.

PRESS REVEAL TO FIND OUT IF ED LOGG WAS A MURDERER:

Not a murderer.

HOWARD SCOTT WARSHAW

Howard Scott Warshaw represented both the best and the worst of the Atari 2600 years - creating both Yars' Revenge, and the doomed E.T. for the console.

Or did Howard Scott Warshaw merely represent the worst of humanity, as the leader of a paramilitary cult, who buried his 200,000 victims in a mass grave in New Mexico?

Look at the photo. You must decide immediately, before he kills again (or doesn't - if he isn't in actual fact a murderer).

PRESS REVEAL TO FIND OUT IF HOWARD SCOTT WARSHAW WAS A MURDERER:

Not a murderer.