When he founded Exidy, one of Kauffman first hires was his former co-worker. The Destruction Derby engineer: John MetzlerĮxidy’s first engineer, John Metzler, had been a colleague of Kauffman’s at their previous employer, Ramtek. Described by Steven Kent as “a very quiet man”, Kauffman was the CEO of Exidy for the lifetime of the company, from its formation in 1973 through to the decline of the company’s arcade business and the pivot to redemption games in the 1990s: in total, an impressive 23-year tenure. The boss: Pete KauffmanĪs with most of Exidy’s creations, it seems founder Pete Kauffman gave the green light to both Destruction Derby and Death Race. Pete Kauffman (left), Howell Ivy (middle), and Paul Jacobs (right), on the cover of a 1983 issue of RePlay. I tried to identify as many Death Race contributors as I could here’s everything I was able to find. Who worked on the game (and where are they now)?Ĭredits for early arcade games are often undocumented, their makers denied recognition for their work. Then all they needed was a new name and cabinet design, and Death Race was ready to sell. So we changed the cars to gremlins, crashed cars to crosses, and crash sounds to screams. Any other choice would be a completely new designed system, which would take too long. So image memory and analog components changes could be the only thing that could be changed to make the PCB a different game. All the PCBs at that time were dedicated and hard logic without microprocessors or programs that could be changed. I made modifications to the PCB by changing the image memories and audio circuits to create a different game utilizing the same PCB. (The company would collapse two years later.) Contractually prohibited from selling the machine themselves, but receiving little in the way of royalties, Exidy decided to change the game just enough to bring it to market as a new product.
Unfortunately, the timing of the deal coincided with Chicago running out of, er, coin. Or at least that’s how it was supposed to go. Image from The Golden Age Arcade Historian.
Chicago Coin flyer for Demolition Derby, “the most unique game ever made”.
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