Broderbund is one of the foundation stones of the software industry, a company that shaped how games looked, sold and taught. Founded by the Carlston siblings in 1980, it published a teenager named Jordan Mechner, whose rotoscoped Karateka and Prince of Persia gave video game characters a grace and weight nobody had seen before. It published Cyan's Myst, which became the best-selling PC game of the entire decade. And it taught a generation of children geography by sending them chasing Carmen Sandiego around the globe.
This is the studio's story: the beautiful movement of Mechner's games, the strange still worlds of Myst, and the early classics that helped invent home software. Here is the map.
The essential Broderbund
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Jordan Mechner and the art of movement
More than any studio of its era, Broderbund cared how games moved. Jordan Mechner's work, from Karateka through Prince of Persia to the extraordinary The Last Express, was built on rotoscoped animation that gave characters real human weight. That obsession with motion and cinema set Broderbund apart from rivals chasing raw speed or spectacle, and it produced some of the most beautiful games of the 1980s and 1990s.
The Jordan Mechner games
Rotoscoped grace, from Karateka to the Orient Express
The Myst worlds
The islands that sold ten million copies
The classics and Carmen Sandiego
Where home software grew up
A short history of Broderbund
- 1980The Carlston siblings found Broderbund; it becomes a pillar of the early software industry.
- 1983Lode Runner and Choplifter make Broderbund a name in early home computer games.
- 1985Where in the World Is Carmen Sandiego? helps invent modern educational gaming.
- 1989Jordan Mechner's Prince of Persia redefines animation in games with rotoscope.
- 1993Myst launches and becomes the best-selling PC game of the 1990s.
- 1997The Last Express delivers Mechner's real-time masterpiece aboard the Orient Express.
- 1998Broderbund merges with The Learning Company, ending its independent run.
The people who built Broderbund
The animator, the founder and the makers of Myst. Follow any of them to their full catalogue.
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It gave gaming its most graceful animation and its best-selling mystery, and taught a generation to love learning. That was Broderbund.
Frequently asked
What is Broderbund best known for?
Publishing Prince of Persia and Karateka by Jordan Mechner, the best-selling adventure Myst and its sequel Riven, the educational Carmen Sandiego series, and early classics like Lode Runner and Choplifter.
Did Broderbund make Myst?
Myst was developed by the Miller brothers at Cyan and published by Broderbund in 1993. It became the best-selling PC game of the 1990s and one of the most influential adventure games ever made.
Who created Prince of Persia?
Jordan Mechner created Prince of Persia at Broderbund, released in 1989. He pioneered the use of rotoscoped animation, tracing filmed movement, to give the game its distinctive fluid motion. He also made Karateka and The Last Express.
What happened to Broderbund?
Broderbund merged with The Learning Company in 1998. Its franchises and legacy, especially Prince of Persia and Carmen Sandiego, live on under later owners.