Peter King, simply put, created fun mods for video games.
He had started doing this at around the age of ten.
At the time, Takayuki had been actively promoting the open-sourcing of game engines on PC platforms.
This initiative allowed any nonprofit group to modify Gamestar's video games.
If a mod was impressive enough, it could even be rewarded by the company—and might one day be turned into official content, complete with profit sharing.
In fact, the Dead or Alive: Xtreme Beach Volleyball costume design contest was also a kind of modding opportunity.
Thanks to Takayuki's push over the years, more and more players became interested in creating their own game content.
They loved this refreshing approach to gameplay.
Gamestar's BattleNet platform saw its Creative Workshop area receiving more and more traffic.
Many players flooded in—some to create, some to share, and others simply to enjoy the brilliant mods made by fellow players.
Peter King's father was a programmer at an internet company. Both of his parents were busy and rarely had time to care for him.
By some twist of fate, they tossed him a thick programming book when he was in first grade.
At home, Peter had no companionship—only that book.
Perhaps Peter really had some exceptional talent, like Aya Tsukino and other dazzling prodigies.
Or maybe he simply inherited strong programming genes from his parents.
He picked up coding incredibly fast. Whenever he got stuck, his parents were happy to help—they were, after all, professionals themselves.
By the age of nine, Peter could already handle simple programming fluently. He even began helping his father debug projects brought home from work.
But eventually, he found bug-fixing boring.
There was no real fun in it.
Then he discovered the Creative Workshop for PC games—and it was like stumbling into a new world.
On the BattleNet platform, there were tons of open-source games.
These games were free to modify for anyone with ideas and creativity.
Peter was ecstatic. He dove into these games, creating his own fun.
His first mod added a new boss to Dead Cells.
But his early work was rough. The design was clumsy and lacked polish, and barely anyone downloaded it.
No one knew it was made by a child. Some even mocked it harshly, saying the design was awful.
Peter didn't let that get to him. He immediately began improving his mod.
He worked to bring it up to community standards.
In just a week, he revamped his Dead Cells mod—refining the boss's animations and visual design.
It was during this time that Takayuki happened to notice him.
At first, Takayuki only saw him as a promising modder—but didn't give it much thought.
There were plenty of other excellent mods in the Creative Workshop, after all.
Still, Peter's ability to iterate and polish a full mod in a week was impressive.
Back then, Takayuki assumed Peter was a seasoned designer or programmer casually experimenting with Dead Cells modding.
Later, Peter's updated boss mod received much better feedback.
At that point, he began to truly enjoy the creative thrill of making games.
Before long, mod development consumed most of his time.
While other kids played together outside, Peter preferred to stay home, furiously crafting new content.
Eventually, he hit a bottleneck.
He simply couldn't handle every aspect—3D modeling, art, programming, sound design—on his own.
His energy had limits.
He needed help.
So, he started pitching his ideas—and, more effectively, offering money.
Growing up in a tech-savvy household, Peter never lacked for allowance.
He could easily offer hundreds of dollars to recruit small, talented collaborators to help with his projects.
In no time, he recruited several high school students.
Some worked on sound design. Some did visuals. Peter handled everything else and led the team.
That's when his leadership skills began to shine.
He was around 14.
At that point, he had his own team.
Thanks to his extensive modding experience, he had also earned his first real payday.
It came from Gamestar Electronic Entertainment.
Not because one of his mods was groundbreaking—but because he had managed to consistently publish one high-quality, 10+ hour playable mod every month for several years.
His production rate alone left other modders in awe.
Gamestar rewarded his hard work by crowning him the BattleNet Creative King, and awarded him $100,000 in prize money.
With that, Peter finally had a stable, loyal team.
And he didn't hesitate to pay them well.
After all, money wasn't a problem for him.
And if cash could attract more talented people, he was happy to spend it.
Then, around age 18, Peter and his team finally created a mod that stunned even Takayuki.
It was a StarCraft mod.
With a team of about 20—average age under 18—they built a full-blown RPG within the StarCraft framework.
The protagonists were the iconic characters from StarCraft's lore:
Jim Raynor, the Terran hero, and his complex romance with the now-Zerg queen Kerrigan
Tychus, the lone ranger, adventuring across the galaxy
Mengsk, rising to power as the emperor of the Terran Dominion, and his eventual descent into tyranny
Zeratul, the Dark Templar warrior, growing his faction's strength
Artanis, the Protoss leader, striving to assert his influence in the new galactic order
And of course, the Zerg, with their own storylines...
The mod had an enormous scope—comparable to a full commercial game.
With so many characters, the total playtime easily exceeded 100 hours, and never felt repetitive.