For Immediate Release:

Seattle, WA -- 21 March 2000

King of Dragon Pass wins award at the Independent Games Festival

King of Dragon Pass won the "Best Visual Art" award at the second annual Independent Games Festival. The results of the juried contest were announced at the Game Developers Conference in San Jose, California. King of Dragon Pass was independently developed and published by A Sharp, LLC. This unique game is set in Glorantha, the world of the award-winning roleplaying game RuneQuest and the forthcoming Hero Wars game.

"We wanted the artwork to convey the look and feel of our magical Bronze Age setting," said David Dunham, the game's producer. "We let our artists use the media they were familiar with -- watercolors, inks, acrylics, airbrushes, scratchboard -- to get high-quality hand-done artwork not found in rendered worlds." The principal artists were Stefano Gaudiano, Mike Raabe, and Damon Brown. They were assisted by a large team of pencilers and colorists. The user interface, which continues the Bronze Age motif, was created by Brian Fogel.

King of Dragon Pass breaks new ground in computer games. Hundreds of interactive short stories combine with the resource management of a turn-based strategy game to create an epic saga: the unification of Dragon Pass under its first king. Characters age and mature as the multi-generational story line develops. The game uses illustrations to bring its adventures and characters to life, immersing the player in the story and its world.

The Independent Games Festival was founded to act like the Sundance Film Festival for computer games, promoting works created by small developers without the backing of large publishers. It's sponsored by The CMP Game Media Group and Microsoft.

King of Dragon Pass runs on both Windows and Macintosh, and is available for $37.50 from A Sharp's web site http://www.a-sharp.com, or select retailers.

More information about King of Dragon Pass, including screen shots and details about purchasing original artwork, is at http://www.a-sharp.com.

More information about the Independent Games Festival and the Game Developers Conference can be found at http://www.gdconf.com/indiegames/.

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Contact: David Dunham <david@a-sharp.com>