Top 100 Women in Games: Tamsin Nunley

Not many people can boast that their career involves a rock star and an interplanetary traveller – but Tamsin Nunley can.

I’d been working at aridiculouslytiny animation outfit in London. Basically, it was two of us in a cupboard off Tottenham Court Road,” Nunley recounts.

Bizarrely, the other person was Dave Rowntree from Blur – the company was a side project of his – and one of our first jobs was for some promo stuff for the Mars lander Beagle 2 that they’ve just rediscovered.”

After three years, Nunley wanted something new – and a fondness for handheld gaming brought her to the games industry.

She scored a role at Lionhead, her work for which she still expresses pride over (and which still features on her showreel), as well as many life-long friends and her partner, Neil.

While the role didn’t excite her at first, after her first day at the studio, she says she never looked back.

After positions at firms including Headstrong Games and Zynga, Nunley co-founded mobile game developer JiggeryPokery in 2013.

Looking forwards, it’s mobile that has Nunley excited – the App Store and the future of touchscreen devices are two developments she is watching with close anticipation.

She adds her hope that the ‘bickering’ over topics like gender and F2P eventually subsides, and each person and game is judged ‘on its own merits’.

My ultimate goal is always to bring the player a moment of happiness and escape,” she says.

That’s what it all boils down to.”

Nunley will soon be due her own moment of happiness – she is due to become a mum for the first time in April, and as such expects a change of pace for the next few months.

I’ll probably be at least partially back on the game dev horsebeforetoo long, though,” she adds.