Bill Kunkel, American video game designer and magazine editor, died from a heart attack he was 61.

Bill Kunkel  was the executive editor of Electronic Games Magazine in the early 1980s died from a heart attack he was 61..

(July 21, 1950 – September 4, 2011)

More recently, Kunkel was editor-in-chief of Tips & Tricks magazine from January 2007 until August 2007 when it ceased publication. His nickname is "The Game Doctor" based on a column he has written for several magazines (including both versions of Electronic Games, VG&CE, EGM, and CGW) and game sites (including HappyPuppy.com, PostalNation.net and J2Games.com).
Kunkel was a game journalist, author of numerous strategy guides, a game designer, expert witness and taught several courses in Game Design for the University of Nevada at Las Vegas (UNLV). He remained active in the industry until his death, having served as editor-in-chief of Tips & Tricks during its final year of publication (2007). He continued to be active as a member of Running With Scissors and EIC of Postal Nation (PostalNation.net) and wrote regularly for J2Games.com. He received a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Classic Gaming Expo in 1999 along with the other co-founders of the original Electronic Games magazine, Arnie Katz and Joyce Worley-Katz. The trio revived the Electronic Games title for several years in the early 90s for Sendai/Decker. As Subway Software, the trio were involved as designers on well over a dozen video and computer games, including Bart's Nightmare (Acclaim) and Batman Returns (Konami).
Dubbed "The Grandfather of video game journalism," Kunkel published his memoirs under the title Confessions of The Game Doctor (RolentaPress.com).
Kunkel is also well known for having been a ground-breaking wrestling journalist and cartoonist beginning in the 1970s.
He wrote for comics, with stories being published at DC in 1977–1978 including Superman, Madame Xanadu, and Vigilante and at Marvel, Spider-Man in 1978–1979.^[2] Starting in 1979, he wrote Richie Rich for Harvey Comics.
He was the "must-read" columnist during the early days of Pro Wrestling Torch playing a key part in turning the small newsletter into a wrestling newsletter powerhouse. Kunkel later moved to Wrestling Perspective as a featured columnist and cartoonist. Along with the Phantom of the Ring, Kunkel's work for Wrestling Perspective attracted respect and prestige to the publication.


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