California Games is a 1987 sports video game originally released by Epyx for the Apple II and Commodore 64, and ported to other home computers and video game consoles. Branching from their Summer Games and Winter Games series, this game consists of a collection of outdoor sports purportedly popular in California. The game was successful and spawned a sequel. Gameplay The events available vary slightly depending on the platform, but include all of the following: Half-pipe Footbag Surfing (Starring Rippin' Rick) Roller skating BMX Flying disc Development Several members of the development team moved on to other projects. Chuck Sommerville, the designer of the half-pipe game in California Games, later developed the game Chip's Challenge, while Ken Nicholson, the designer of the footbag game, was the inventor of the technology used in Microsoft's DirectX. Kevin Norman, the designer of the BMX game, went on to found the educational science software company Norman & Globus, makers of the ElectroWiz series of products. The sound design for the original version of California Games was done by Chris Grigg, member of the band Negativland. Ports Originally written for the Apple II and Commodore 64, it was eventually ported to Amiga, Apple IIGS, Atari 2600, Atari ST, MS-DOS, Genesis, Amstrad CPC, ZX Spectrum, Nintendo Entertainment System, MSX and Master System. The Atari Lynx version was the pack-in game for the system when it was launched in June 1989. An Atari XE version was planned and contracted out by Atari Corp. to Epyx in 1988 but no code was delivered by the publication deadline. Reception California Games was a commercial blockbuster. With more than 300,000 copies sold in the first nine months, it was the most-successful Epyx game, outselling each of the four previous and two subsequent titles in the company's "Games" series. CEO David Shannon Morse stated that it was the first Epyx game to appeal equally to boys and girls during playtesting. The game topped 500,000 units sold by 1989, at which time Video Games & Computer Entertainment reported that sales were "still mounting". Computer Gaming World recommended the game, calling it fun. Compute! called California Games "both inventive and charming". In a capsule review for STart, Clayton Walnum said California Games "isn't a bad package, especially since it comes free with the Lynx." He found the BMX and surfing events great fun but deemed the skateboarding event frustrating and said the foot-bag