The company was founded in 1982 by Fritz Schäfer out of his parents' house in Mulartshütte (Roetgen) to sell his chess simulation game Boss (later renamed Grandmaster), which he developed the year before.

In the early 1980s, chess computers had become popular in Germany, with such device being sold for prices ranging between several hundred and over 1,000 Deutsche Mark (DM).

This changed when, in 1981, Commodore International released the VIC-20, a new computer that used the same processor as the PET (the MOS Technology 6502) but was additionally fitted with a video chip capable of presenting high-resolution colour graphics.

Commodore International had released several software modules for the VIC-20, none of which covered a chess programme, wherefore Schäfer decided to create a VIC-20 conversion of Boss, which he would try to sell.

Sales for Boss quickly gained traction and attracted a wide variety of customers, including computer scientist Konrad Zuse.

Schuster took the chess computers seriously and was able to beat them with ease, but used a more foolhardy approach with Boss, which led him to almost losing the game and therefore calling for a draw.

Subsequently, Boss was renamed Grandmaster (alternatively spelt Grand Master) and started being licensed and sold internationally.

Because publishers of C16 games were rare in Germany and because Schäfer had been in contact with the manager of the German branch of Commodore International, Kingsoft was contracted to create these pamphlets.

Kingsoft ported several of its games to the platform, including Grandmaster, Galaxy, Tom and Ghost Town, which were bundled as the Plus Paket 16 ("Plus Package 16") and sold for DM 39.

[1][2] Following onto their success with C16 game sales, in 1987, Kingsoft moved from Schäfer's parents' house to proper offices in Aachen, including a warehouse space.

This service, as well as a raised rent for the new location and higher wages for the company's staff, put Kingsoft in a financially critical state, only recovering out of the need to stay independent.

On 8 March 1995, American game company Electronic Arts (EA) announced that they had acquired Kingsoft for an undisclosed sum.

[1][2][3] Sometime later, Schäfer briefly attempted to revive the Kingsoft name for Busy Bags, a casual game he was developing for the Android and iOS smartphone operating systems, but found that nobody at EA was willing to provide him with a definite answer regarding the rights to the name.