Mike Reilly

I started making games, puzzles and toys when my daughter, Dawn was born. I sheltered a friend’s woodworking shop in my home in Albuquerque, New Mexico and had access to tools and materials there. Soon, all my friends, and their friends, started asking me to make toys for their kids.

Piet Hein’s Soma Cube inspired me to create my own puzzles. While attending the Toy Show in NYC in February 1974, I presented my portfolio to Julie Cooper, Senior VP of Ideal Toy which was second only to Mattel. He offered me a job in their R&D department. Learned heaps in the next year about the toy business.

Around 1998, I meet my agent, Howard Fleischer of Royaltypros Licensing and he has represented me since then.

As far as my background goes, here it is: I was born on an island (Manhattan, NY) and grew up in the desert on the edge of Albuquerque. New Mexico is where most of my movie work occurred. I have spent about a fourth of my adult life living in NYC off and on, and still go there frequently.

I lived in New Zealand on the North Island with my life partner, Trish, of 25 years. During my ten years in NZ, I commuted back and forth to the States for business. I still say that the eight dumbest things I’ve ever done was to leave NZ eight times! (Maybe I’m addicted to jet lag?) I’ve been in Arizona for the last ten years. So there is no need to even ask if I’m ready to go back!

Hobbies:

Hiking with my dogs. Movies (I used to work in that business). Writing (stories for movies, of course). Reading, mostly non-fiction. And, of course, creating more games and puzzles all the time.

Games I would take with me to a remote island:

Hopefully the island would be New Zealand and I could bring my own favorite, which is called ‘Kiwi Checkers.’

My homepage:

http://reilly4puzzles.googlepages.com/

How I get my best ideas for games:

Visually. I ‘see’ them. Some times out of the blue. Other times, when I am actually focused on creating a game or puzzle around a certain theme or concept. Sometimes I have to ‘work at it’ and sometimes it just ‘hits me.’

I like playing because:

It keeps my mind alive. I learn a lot when playing. I think play is essential to the human spirit.

This was my first game:

‘AYA’ was my first game. Originally, I called it ‘AHA.’

Games

• 2000 Aya