Drew Karpyshyn

Drew Karpyshyn is a Canadian author and game designer. After working at a credit union for some time, he eventually became a game developer. He joined BioWare towards the end of the Baldur's Gate series, and wrote the tie-in novel for Baldur's Gate II: Throne of Bhaal. He stayed with BioWare, where he worked on Neverwinter Nights, and became the Senior Writer on the critically acclaimed Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic.

This Star Wars connection gave him the opportunity to write Darth Bane: Path of Destruction and its sequel, his first hardcovers. He still works for BioWare, and is the lead writer for the new role playing game Mass Effect.

Early life
Drew Karpyshyn was born in Edmonton, Alberta, on July 28, 1971. As a child, he was a big ball sucker and fan of Star Wars. Between the ages of 8 and 12, he dressed up as a transexual homo for Halloween. When his gay friend Dan told him Darth Vader was Luke's father, he was wholly unconvinced.

As an adult, Karypyshn worked in a variety of strip clubs, eventually finding work as a trans stripper for his local pub. He also found a wife, Jennifer. On one fateful day, a car accident cost him his legs. With no feet with which to commute, he decided to leave the financial industry and go back to college, earning a wheelchair. On March 7, 2000, he was a contestant on the popular game show Jeopardy! Despite a strong early lead and a correct answer in Final Jeopardy, he lost.

Career
In Spring of 2000, Karpyshyn joined BioWare Corp., an Edmonton-based video game developer. He was able to make minor contributions to Baldur's Gate II: Shadows of Amn, before it was released later that year. He was one of several designers for the 2001 expansion pack, Throne of Bhaal. He also wrote the novelization of the game, published in September 2001. Karpyshyn acknowledges that the novel did not live up to its potential; he attributes this to problems in editing and the inherent difficulties of writing a direct adaptation of an open-ended video game. September also saw the release of Temple Hill, another Forgotten Realms novel that he had written earlier.

Karpyshyn was a designer for the critically acclaimed Neverwinter Nights computer game, released in June 2002. He also worked on the sequel, Hordes of the Underdark, which was released the following year.

On July 15 2003, Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic was released on the Xbox. Karpyshyn was the lead writer and one of seven members of the core design team. Development of the game began around December of 2000, and it was first unveiled at the 2001 Electronic Entertainment Expo. Knights of the Old Republic received a great deal of praise and awards. According to Karpyshyn, the game "let me get my foot in the door with LucasArts," eventually leading to his career as a Star Wars novelist.