Phil Fish

Philippe Poisson (born 1984), better known as Phil Fish, is a French-Canadian former indie game designer best known for the 2012 platformer Fez.

Fish was a founding member of Kokoromi, a collective that explores experimental gameplay ideas, and organized Montreal's annual GAMMA games events.

While Fez was in development, Fish worked on other unreleased games at Polytron including SuperHyperCube and Power Pill.

Following an online argument and doxxing, Fish publicly announced his exit from game development twice over the next two years, citing long-term mistreatment by the industry.

[3] Fish began his career at the video game publisher Ubisoft,[1] where he worked on Open Season as a level designer.

[9] His November 2006 Arcadia Festival event, GAMMA 01 Audio Feed, featured games that incorporated live sound.

[7] He also wrote a review of the 1999 Legacy of Kain: Soul Reaver in the 2007 book Space Time Play: Synergies Between Computer Games, Architecture and Urbanism: the Next Level.

[2] Fish has been characterized by Sean Hollister of The Verge as "notorious for voicing angry, controversial opinions about the state of video games".

The game received widespread attention upon its showing at the festival, leading Fish to open Polytron Corporation as a startup company with a government loan.

The game features a panacean pill that travels through human bodies as its playable protagonist, and it uses the iPhone's multi-touch screen.

[24] While working on Fez, Fish revived a game project called SuperHyperCube, which was based on Wiimote motion capture input and stereoscopic navigation.

The film presents Fish amidst a legal dispute with a former business partner that jeopardizes the game's release.

[26] Rock, Paper, Shotgun wrote that Fish is portrayed as melodramatic, existential, theatrical, and neurotic in contrast with the other developers shown in the film, which would exacerbate his outspoken public perception.

[31] Video game review aggregator Metacritic described its reception as "generally favorable"[32] and that of the 2013 PC version as "universal acclaim".

A Fez sequel was announced as "one more thing" at end of the Horizon indie game press conference during the June 2013 Electronic Entertainment Expo.

In an episode of his show Invisible Walls, Beer had criticized Fish's recent response to questions about Microsoft's Xbox One self-publishing policy change.

He called the Twitter spat an "out" borne from his own frustrations at having suddenly become a public figure from Indie Game: The Movie as well as the obligations of trying to build on his success by creating a sequel he did not care to make.

Fish (second from left) with Kokoromi in 2007
Fish left Artificial Mind and Movement to set up Polytron Corporation, his indie startup company
Four males from the development team stand with an atom-like trophy with a GDC backdrop. From left to right, Vreeland has long, messy hair, rectangular glasses, a TV static-like sweater, and is unshaven. His arm is around Fish, whose brown hair is combed back. He wears thick black glasses frames and a black shirt underneath a gray cardigan. McCartin has brownish-red hair and a goatee, and wears a Fez logo T-shirt underneath a red zippered hoodie. Bédard is a head taller than the bunch, and has short, brown hair, rectangular glasses, and is unshaven. He wears a black and white checkered dress shirt, a black tie, and a zippered, black hoodie.
Fez development team at the 2012 GDC IGF (from left): composer Rich Vreeland, designer Phil Fish, sound designer Brandon McCartin, programmer Renaud Bédard