About Jim

My name is Jim Dattilo, and instead of a typical bio, here are ten things about me.

1. I live in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania with my wife, Vicki, and dog, a pit bull named Cody.
2. I have Spinal Muscular Atrophy, a type of Muscular Dystrophy. It’s similar to ALS in symptoms but not progression.
3. I work in clinical research at the University of Pennsylvania since 1999. Before that I worked for About.com as the guide to Computer Simulation Games, and before that I volunteered as a research coordinator at The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia.
4. I currently run a Dungeons & Dragons 5e campaign for two of my childhood friends. I'm also playing a Vampire: The Masquerade Elders campaign on Roll20.
5. I have loved the zombie genre since my older sister made me watch George Romero’s Night of the Living Dead when I was a teenager. As an adult, The Walking Dead rekindled that interest in the world of zombies.
6. I love coffee but not coffee shops. I have an entire cabinet dedicated to Keurig k-cups, not because I can drink it all, but I like to have a wide variety of flavors for friends and family. It’s like how people stock bars with all kinds of liquor. We also have a well-stocked bar but barely drink.
7. Favorite author: Stephen King. Favorite filmmaker: Quentin Tarantino. Favorite TV show: Highlander (which led to a special achievement in my game, A Wise Use of Time)
8. I produced a documentary with Reel9Productions called The Way to Kevin which was screened during QFest in Philadelphia in 2013 at Ritz East Theater. Having a film I helped make shown at an actual movie theater fulfilled one of my life’s dreams.
9. After reading Choose Your Own Adventure books as a kid, I always wanted to write interactive fiction. When I read Choice of the Vampire and learned that Hosted Games will publish games built in Choicescript, I immediately began writing Zombie Exodus.
10. I am working on a book series (non-interactive) based on the story in Zombie Exodus. Since I am writing the follow-up game to ZE, my book project is slow-going.

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