Stevie Case

Early Life and Education

Stevana Case was raised in Olathe, Kansas. Her parents were a science teacher and a social worker, and she had a younger brother named Andy. Her early interest in video games began in second grade with titles like Lode Runner and Joust on an Apple IIe computer her father bought.

Case attended Olathe East High School from 1991 to 1994, where she served as student government president. In 1995, she was one of the plaintiffs in the court case Case v. Unified School District No. 233. The students and parents successfully challenged the district's ban of a book from the school library. Demonstrating an early interest in politics, she ran for the Kansas Legislature at seventeen years old. She later attended the University of Kansas, initially with the hope of getting into law school.

Rise as a Professional Quake Player

While studying political science as a freshman at the University of Kansas, Case enjoyed playing Doom and Doom II with friends. Her interest in competitive Quake was sparked by her then-boyfriend, Tom Kimzey, who played under the name Entropy. She joined his team, Impulse 9, and began competing under the alias KillCreek, a name taken from a Lawrence, Kansas band whose member she was friends with. Impulse 9 competed in the Quake league Clanring and won its T1 championship event in 1996.

After establishing herself, Case traveled to Dallas in 1997 to meet developers. She played a Quake deathmatch against the game's designer, John Romero, and lost a close game. Romero later put up a web page jokingly insulting her skill, which prompted Case to publicly demand a rematch. In the best-of-three rematch, she initially struggled but rallied to win the first round 25–19 and went on to defeat Romero. As a result, Romero agreed to set up a web page praising her.

This victory when she was twenty years old brought her widespread publicity. She gained a sponsor from computer mouse manufacturer SpaceTec IMC that same year, and her win was covered by Rolling Stone. Angel Munoz, founder of the Cyberathlete Professional League, convinced Case to join his league in July 1997, making her its first signed professional gamer. She eventually became one of the league's original founders. Case also competed in the first all-female Quake tournament in 1997, finishing second behind Kornelia Takacs. With the stability of sponsors and a $1000 monthly stipend from the CPL, Case decided to drop out of university and move to Dallas mid-year, stating that while she loved political science, she was not excited about the day-to-day reality of politics or law.

Transition into Game Design and Development

While playing professionally, Case looked toward game design as a career, feeling that the pressure of playing the same game daily did not suit her. She stated she did freelance game design work from her Dallas home for two years after university, using free design tools. One of her first credited level designs was for Sin Mission Pack: Wages of Sin in 1999. She and friends set up a small studio called Primitive Earthling Games and created a Quake II add-on called Vengeance, which was submitted to WizardWorks but never released due to publishing delays.

Between 1998 and 2000, Case authored three strategy guide books for Prima Games for Jazz Jackrabbit 2, Buck Bumble, and Daikatana. She also contributed to their Quake II strategy guide. Her professional design career began in earnest in the summer of 1997 when she was hired as a video game tester at Ion Storm. In November 1998, after many developers left the troubled Daikatana project, Romero offered her a job as a level designer, which she accepted. At Ion Storm, she helped design levels for Daikatana and Anachronox.

It was during this time that Case and Romero began dating. According to accounts, she radically reinvented her appearance around this period. Her public profile grew significantly. She appeared on the March 2000 cover of PC Accelerator and was featured as one of the Next Game Gods in the November 2000 issue of PC Gamer. An interview in the Los Angeles Times led to an offer from Playboy, and an online nude pictorial was released in May 2000. Reflecting on this period, Case said making games helped her live by her own rules and find happiness.

Case maintained her involvement with the CPL, transitioning into the role of Master of Ceremonies and joining its board of directors in 1999. She left Ion Storm in January 2001 to follow Romero to his new venture.

Mobile Games and Management

In August 2001, Romero founded Monkeystone Games, a mobile game development company born from his desire to move away from long computer game development cycles. Case joined the company as a producer. She worked on Monkeystone's first game, Hyperspace Delivery Boy!, for which she also created the music and sound effects. She received credits on other titles, including the N-Gage port of Red Faction.

After leaving Monkeystone, Case became a senior project manager for Warner Bros. Online's mobile group, managing the production of mobile games. However, she soon decided to transition out of game development entirely.

Executive Career in Sales and Business

Case decided to leave the game development industry due to the intense harassment, hate, sexism, and abuse she experienced in the public spotlight. She stated that people sent her hate email constantly and the negative aspects drowned out the benefits of connection. An opportunity arose when a contact offered her a potential junior sales position.

After leaving Warner Bros., she worked in sales and business development at Tira Wireless. She then held a position as director of product management at Spleak Media Network. In September 2008, she was vice president of business development and sales for the online commerce company fatfoogoo. She later served as Senior Director of Business Development at Live Gamer and joined PlaySpan in 2010 as vice president of sales. PlaySpan was acquired by Visa in 2011.

On March 1, 2010, NewWorld, the former parent company of the CPL, announced a two-year agreement with Case to produce a podcast called Stevie FTW. The last episode was uploaded in March 2011. In 2014, she became vice president of growth at the San Francisco-based startup Layer. She joined Twilio in 2016 as an account executive and was promoted over the years to vice president of sales. In 2022, Case was appointed chief revenue officer at the software security and compliance company Vanta. She is also a participant in the nonprofit SheEO, which supports female entrepreneurs, and the female investor group 37 Angels.

Personal Life and Relationships

Case dated fellow University of Kansas student and Quake player Tom Kimzey, also known as Entropy, until the spring of 1997. She also dated game developer Tom Mustaine. Soon after her famous Quake victory over John Romero, she and Romero began dating. They moved in together in 1999, but their relationship ended in May 2003.

Case later married a director of product development at THQ and had a child with him. In a 2016 interview, she stated that she had been a single parent with full custody of her child for eight years.