The Mighty 1UP Staff Page

Have a favorite editor you're looking to contact? Or ever wonder who the people are behind the sites and magazines you love? Here's the 1UP Network Staff Page, where you can find and meet all the people responsible for creating and running all of our 1UP network properties. From the people who design our pages to the people who sell the ads to keep us in business, here are all faces behind the 1UP Network. Interested in joining our team? Check out our jobs page to see any positions we're currently hiring for.

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  Sam Kennedy

  Editorial Director, Digital Dream Kid

  Sam's been writing about games since the mid-90s. He started by launching Gaming-Age.com and then went on to work at such publications as GameFan, GameSpot, Gamers.com, EGM, and the Official U.S. PlayStation Magazine. In 2003 he launched 1UP.com and has been overseeing it since.

  Favorites: Super Metroid, Chrono Trigger, Final Fantasy VI, Castlevania: SOTN, Left 4 Dead

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  Matt Leone

  Senior Executive Editor, Let's go Bowling

  Matt once spotted a Street Fighter arcade cabinet on the back of a truck, and followed it on his bike for an hour just to see where it would go. Then he interned and freelanced for places like Gamers.com and Official Xbox Magazine before settling in at 1UP in 2003.

  Favorites: Joust, Street Fighter 2, Panzer Dragoon, God of War, Stubbs the Zombie

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  Jeremy Parish

  Executive Editor, Crusty Old Geezer

  Jeremy was writing blogs more than a decade ago, long before anyone was calling them blogs. What a gentle and innocent time that was! And now he tries to recapture those bygone days by blogging about classic videogames... which he's been doing at 1UP since the site launched... which means his job itself is practically retro.

  Favorites: Final Fantasy XII, Strider, Mega Man 2, Marathon 2: Durandal, Vagrant Story, Crackdown, Super Metroid

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  Thierry "Scooter" Nguyen

  Executive Editor, Master Of The Obvious

  When Scooter started writing about games, he had to fiddle with inane technical crap like config.sys and autoexec.bat. He plowed through college with the help of a job at Computer Gaming World, and since then has worked at publications such as the Official U.S. PlayStation Magazine, GameSpy, and GameTap, before coming back to EGM and 1UP. Now he writes less about technical crap and more about playing games and eating rice at the same time.

  Favorites: The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past, Final Fantasy IV, TIE Fighter, Half-Life 2, BioShock

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  Alice Liang

  Associate Managing Editor, Lady Calendar

  Alice is no stranger to life's funny turns. Working since it was legal, she's been a retail sales rep, waitress, hostess, secretary, teacher's aid, birthday party planner for kids, summer camp counselor, science museum guide, and movie theatre staff coordinator; yet she never dreamt she'd one day put up shop at 1UP. Alice is one of the very few native San Franciscans on staff. Go Giants!

  Favorites: The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past, Chrono Trigger, Harvest Moon, King's Quest VII, World of Warcraft

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  Justin Haywald

  Reviews Editor, Galactic Bounty Hunter

  Formerly a teacher in Okinawa, then a translator for a Japanese seafood company, Justin always dreamed of writing about games for a living. He's accomplished that goal, so now he's training to be the drummer in 1UP's Beatles tribute band.

  Favorites: Final Fantasy VI, Chrono Trigger, Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask, Tetris, World of Warcraft

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  Frank Cifaldi

  News Editor, Superman's Pal

  Frank wrote about videogames on the internet for free until a strange British man started paying him. Frank found this peculiar, but enticing enough to quit his day job over. He is the former features editor of Gamasutra, worked for the GameTap games-on-demand service, and wrote things for Edge, Wired, Nintendo Official Magazine UK, Tips & Tricks, GamesIndustry.biz, Insert Credit, and some others he's forgotten the names of. His love is real, but he is not.

  Favorites: EarthBound, Grim Fandango, The Secret of Monkey Island, Elite Beat Agents, Mega Man 2

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  Mike Nelson

  Senior Editor, MyCheats, I could be Batman

  Mike left Hawai'i after receiving his BA in English and moved to San Francisco to pursue a career in music in 2005. To make some money on the side, he started freelancing with 1UP, and was eventually hired as an intern. Having worked as a Staff Writer for nearly two years, he was promoted to Senior Editor of Cheats for The 1UP Network in November of '08, and currently oversees the content of both MyCheats and GameCheats. He also plays bass guitar in Outdoorsmen, lives with his dog, Dusty, and is the resident Star Wars and Star Trek expert.

  Favorites: Grim Fandango, TIE Fighter, Wing Commander, Icewind Dale, Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic

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  Travis Williams

  Designer, Bon Vivant

  Travis comes to 1UP from the games industry, where he worked as a 3D modeler and character animator. Over the years he's also paid his dues as a primatologist, a professional bass player, a market researcher, and a mixologist. He is secretly Canadian.

  Favorites: Planescape: Torment, Baldur's Gate 2, Diablo, Oblivion, World of Warcraft

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  Mike Cruz

  Designer, Four Fried Chickens and a Coke

  Oh, hello, I didn't see you there. You may know Mike's graphic design work from such magazines as Electronic Musician, Remix, and EGM. These days, he's member of the mighty 1UP art team. When he's not busy designing pages/logos/graphics for the site, he's hosting the at1UP podcast.

  Favorites: Gladius, Advance Wars, Phoenix Wright, Burnout Paradise, Bioshock

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  Wilbert Mui

  Web Producer, Killa Way-O

  When Wilbert is not reading comic books or ghostriding his whip, he's building 1UP's features, cover stories, launch countdowns, as well as other production duties that keeps 1UP.com looking clean on the inside, cream on the outside.

  Favorites: Radiant Silvergun, Ikaruga, Gradius V, Final Fight, Contra

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  Tina Sanchez

  Community Manager, Little Griefing Tuna

  Tina's father wanted to name her Michael, but the doctor declared, "It's a girl!" Solution? Raise a tomboy. He gave her an NES at age four and encouraged her to play every day. She discovered in a male-dominated industry, the only way to survive is to have a good sense of humor. Her cell phone number is 310-495-5412.

  Favorites: Call of Duty 4, Yoshi's Story, Marvel Ultimate Alliance, Halo 2, StarCraft

Contributors

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  Kat Bailey

  Friend to Giant Robots

  Kat began her association with 1UP.com in 2006, when she launched a community blog while living in Japan. Two years later, she was tapped to become a regular news writer, and has since gone on to manage The Grind as well. Kat is currently a freelance writer, but maintains a close relationship with 1UP, contributing regular reviews, previews, features and guides.

  Favorites: StarCraft, X-wing vs. TIE Fighter, Pokemon, Valkyrie Profile, Super Robot Taisen

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  Kris Pigna

  Lovable Curmudgeon

  After toiling through college to earn a degree in Journalism, Kris put his accumulated knowledge to the best use he could think of: writing about rumored console price cuts and leaked Xbox 360 Achievements. His student colleagues, meanwhile, are probably now covering pointless crap like business and international relations. Suckers.

  Favorites: Super Mario Bros. 3, Metal Gear Solid 3, Final Fantasy VIII, Soul Calibur, Castlevania: Symphony of the Night

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  Steve Watts

  Fickle Fanboy

  Steve began writing about videogames with a humble Mega Man fan site. After leaving, he continued to blog about games and other entertainment topics on Newsvine, which has since made him the de facto writer about the show Lost for parent company MSNBC. He jumped at the chance to submit writing samples for 1UP News and has been working the daily grind ever since.

  Favorites: Mega Man 2, Chrono Trigger, Final Fantasy Tactics, Team Fortress 2, Super Mario Galaxy

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  Chris Pereira

  The Smoking Man

  After writing about Digimon didn't pan out long-term, Chris turned to writing about videogames before becoming a teenager. With an encyclopedic knowledge of The X-Files at hand, Chris has worked his way up from running his own amateur sites to his dream job of writing for 1UP.

  Favorites: Diablo 2, Halo 2, Morrowind, Unreal Tournament, Phantasy Star Online

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  Dustin Quillen

  Building a Plastic Instrument Fort

  After years of wandering the internet, dispensing videogame knowledge like a geekier version of Sam Jackson in Pulp Fiction, Dustin finally landed a dream gig writing for 1UP.com. Other dreams of his that currently remain unrealized: Playing Rock Band drums in an actual rock band, writing and starring in a Broadway musical adaptation of Predator, and learning to breathe underwater.

  Favorites: Super Mario Bros. 3, Rock Band 2, World of Warcraft, Pokemon, Oddworld: Abe's Oddysee

1UP Tech

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  Michael Zacks

  Software Engineering Manager, will code for tater-tots

  In the 3rd grade, Michael's teacher handed out brand new math workbooks and announced a contest to see who could do the most pages over the weekend. Michael spent a lazy, happy contented weekend, finishing the entire workbook. He handily won the contest and has been solving problems ever since. If only talking to girls was that easy...

  Favorites: World of Warcraft, Wizard101, Galaga, DAOC

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  Eric Faulk-West

  System Administrator, Can you help me? I forgot my password...

  When he was 10 years old, Eric began fixing the family radio (this was before there were televisions). He has never stopped. We put other things in front of him, and he fixes them too. When he slows down we feed him Big Macs.

  Favorites: Kick the Can, Parcheesi, That one game with the hoop and the stick.

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  Erick Meline

  Manager of Production Operations, Professional Pixel Pusher

  Realizing a career in organic chemistry could only lead to trouble, Erick decided early on to put his powers to good rather than evil by pursuing a dual degree program in Computer Science and Applied Graphics. This, fueled by his passion for video games, lead to the writing of a number of simple web based games and gaming related web sites in the very early days of the Web, and lead to a Web designer/developer career. After nearly ten years in the dot com industry, Erick joined 1Up in 2006 as the in-house pixel pusher, i.e. Front-end Developer and has served in that role ever since. Besides computer geekery, Erick's hobbies include maintaining a coral reef aquarium, driving WAY too fast, and searching for the few elusive pieces remaining to fill the holes in one of the most complete Atari 2600 game collections in the country.

  Favorites: Defender, Joust, Tempest, Doom, Quake