Martin Alper, former head of Virgin Interactive Entertainment.
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Former Virgin Interactive Entertainment video game pioneer Martin Alper dies at 72

Martin Alper, the former president of the now defunct Virgin Interactive and a video game pioneer, died over the weekend. He was remembered by numerous video game designers who worked for him at Virgin Interactive Entertainment, which was once one of the biggest companies in the game industry.

Alper, who was 72, played an important role in the careers of many famous game developers, including Command & Conquer studio Westwood Studios and Shiny Entertainment, creator of The Matrix and Earthworm Jim. He ultimately built a large video game publishing house in Irvine, Calif.

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Written by

Dean Takahashi

Dean Takahashi is editorial director for GamesBeat. He has been a tech journalist since 1988, and he has covered games as a beat since 1996. He was lead writer for GamesBeat at VentureBeat from 2008 to April 2025. Prior to that, he wrote for the San Jose Mercury News, the Red Herring, the Wall Street Journal, the Los Angeles Times, and the Dallas Times-Herald. He is the author of two books, "Opening the Xbox" and "The Xbox 360 Uncloaked." He organizes the annual GamesBeat Next, GamesBeat Summit and GamesBeat Insider Series: Hollywood and Games conferences and is a frequent speaker at gaming and tech events. He lives in the San Francisco Bay Area.