Mark Cerny

Mark Cerny
Cerny in 2018
Born
Mark Evan Cerny

(1964-08-24) August 24, 1964 (age 59)
NationalityAmerican
Occupations
  • Video game designer
  • producer
  • programmer
  • consultant
  • media proprietor
OrganizationCerny Games
SpouseKatsura Cerny
AwardsIGDA Lifetime Achievement (2004)
AIAS Hall of Fame Award (2010)

Mark Evan Cerny (/ˈsərni/ SUR-ni; born August 24, 1964)[1] is an American video game designer, programmer, producer and media proprietor.

Raised in the San Francisco Bay Area, Cerny attended UC Berkeley before dropping out to pursue a career in video games. In his early years, he spent time at Atari, Sega, Crystal Dynamics and Universal Interactive Studios before becoming an independent consultant under his own company Cerny Games in 1998. While at Sega, he established Sega Technical Institute, working on games including Sonic the Hedgehog 2 (1992).[2]

Cerny has since frequently collaborated with Sony Interactive Entertainment as a consultant, including being the lead designer for hardware of several PlayStation consoles, being called the architect of the PlayStation Vita, PS4 and PS5.[3][4][5] He has also consulted with Naughty Dog and Insomniac Games since their creation in the 1990s, as well as other Sony first-party studios like Sucker Punch Productions. He has also developed several games, notably the arcade game Marble Madness and the Knack series, and credited on many more for his consulting work.

In 2004, he was the recipient of the Lifetime Achievement Award from the International Game Developers Association, and was inducted into the Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences Hall of Fame in 2010.

  1. ^ "FamilySearch.org". FamilySearch.
  2. ^ Cite error: The named reference sega was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  3. ^ Leadbetter, Richard (September 21, 2013). "Mark Cerny: lead architect of... PlayStation Vita?". Eurogamer.net. Retrieved October 12, 2023.
  4. ^ Ivan, Tom (February 13, 2020). "Who is Mark Cerny, the man behind PS5?". VGC. Retrieved October 12, 2023.
  5. ^ Wojnar, Jason (July 6, 2021). "Who Is Mark Cerny, The PS4 & PS5 Architect?". TheGamer. Retrieved October 12, 2023.