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[buck naked]

Just saw it posted on GamingGroove that Billy 'Wicked' Wilson, founder of Voodoo Extreme back in the mid-90s died at 9.50pm last night.

From a 3DFX fansite to one of the best PC gaming news sources, through the explosion of the first person shooter genre and online deathmatch, Quake vs. Unreal engine flame wars and the rise and rise of nVidia. Making millions out of the dot.com boom and burning bridges through its collapse.

Voodoo Extreme was my homepage from 1997 to 2002... I wasted half of my youth on those message boards.

My condolences to his son, Dax his ex-wife Aimee and the whole Utah fam damily.

http://www.gaminggroove.com/

 

[Kung Fu Jedi]

I saw this a few mintues ago as well. Sad news. VE was never the same after he left, and he certainly put his mark on the game scene online. No word on the cause of death. He will be missed.

 

[Ferrarisimo]

I had to search to find this post--don't know why it's buried and not teeming with responses.

If I had to point to any one event in recent years as the catalyst for where I am today, it would be the day I first saw Voodoo Extreme in late 1997. Billy had some weird issues, and I never thought his crass humor was funny, but he helped me out very early on, and I'm appreciative of that.

He made blogging popular 7 years before the word "blog" was even invented. Click below and reminisce.

http://web.archive.org/web/19980112231215/http://voodooextreme.com/

Edit: I just realized that this was posted in OT. I think it should be moved to Gaming.

 

[ArcadeStickMonk]

GG just lists that he passed from being ill. Anyone know exactly what happened?

 

[demon]

-edit- nm, bad joke

 

[SKluck]

Sad. He was a major asshole though.

VE was my bread and butter for gaming news until IGN bought em. Now I honestly don't even pay attention to gaming news. Shack and whatever else were never as good IMO.

Remember all the legal bullshit? Voodoo Extreme, then VE. Then VE3D. Billy was such a dick. Thing I remember that stands out is in one of his daily blahs he talked about being excited for something and mentioning "big soapy tits". Seemed rather low rent for a mainstream gaming news site at the time.

Sucks to die young though.

Looks like he was at an LDS Hospital... Didn't know he was mormon, don't they believe in not taking medicine or drugs or anything like that? Would make sense why he died so young without any major diseases.

Though that would make "LDS Hospital" a bit of an oxymoron as well.

 

[Seth C]

Woah, really sad. I met Billy at E3 in 1998.

 

[Ferrarisimo]

GG just lists that he passed from being ill. Anyone know exactly what happened?

Liver failure.

 

[buck naked]

He lived in Utah and his family was mormon, a LDS hospital isn't suprising.

Billy made some mistakes, but he was always accessible and he looked out for a lot of little guys.