Creator and producer of Knightmare.

That may be all you need to know. But if not, here's a chronology.

Quotations below are from Tim Child's History of Knightmare on Knightmare.com unless otherwise indicated.1970: Tim joins Anglia Television, having worked as a TV news reporter at Westward Television, and before that as a Fleet Street journalist.

1982: Tim Child, as "a junior producer of sorts", first worked in the Anglia TV studios on Magdalen Street where he would later make Knightmare. He came to do "a special one-off preview of Crufts Dog Show for a 6 o'clock current affairs and news magazine". Describing the experience at the 2014 Knightmare Convention, in the same studio, he recalled hay bales and canine urination.
Spring 1985: Tim, 'a journalist, reporter and occasional development producer for Anglia TV in Norwich, had a silly idea ... if adventure gaming was possible in a machine as limited as a Spectrum, then the graphic power of modern television could capitalise on the idea and revolutionise the genre. The idea for Knightmare was born.'

Autumn 1985: 'The first of Tim Child's chromakey experiments took place. A group of Anglia TV scenic technicians were recorded, walking around in one of David Rowe's dungeon scenes.'

Early 1986: The recording of 'a full 15 minute pilot to show to Children's ITV ... Dungeon Doom [also known as Dungeon Danger]. Hugo Myatt introduced the show and the guinea-pig team consisted of Tim Child's nephew, the two daughters of an Anglia colleague, and one of their school chums.'

27-28 January 1987: a second pilot, now named Knightmare, was filmed in Anglia TV Studio A. Hugo Myatt returned as the Dungeon Master Treguard. The ITV Children's Committee commissioned a series of eight programmes.

Monday 7 September 1987: Knightmare Series 1 began on Children's ITV. Tim formed an independent production company, Broadsword, to produce future series.

1988: the first official Knightmare book, co-written by Tim Child and Dave Morris, is published. It is subtitled Can you beat the challenge?

5 May 1990: The Satellite Game, a sci-fi adventure gameshow produced by Tim, started on BSB. It ran for one series of 38 episodes.

December 1991: Tim was a guest on Children's BBC discussion show Take Two.

Summer 1992: following the filming of Knightmare Series 6, Tim assists with the filming of Lords of the Game, a Knightmare-based pilot for the USA. Unlike France and Spain, America does not pick up a full series.
4 January 1993: Cyberzone, a VR gameshow produced by Tim, started on BBC2. It ran for one series of 10 episodes.
17th January 1993: TimeBusters, a time travel adventure gameshow produced by Tim, started on BBC2. It ran for three series of 37 episodes. According to Tim, it was 'nicknamed TIM-BUSTERS by the Broadsword crew - because one series almost killed me'.

1993/1994: Tim had two meetings with the controller of ITV children's programming, Dawn Airey, where he 'fought the Knightmare corner as best [he] could. Dawn came to a decision which blended caution with risk. Knightmare would have its eighth season, albeit at a shorter programme run, and it would be transmit back-to-back in the autumn schedules against its new stable-mate (and potential successor), Broadsword's new show, Virtually Impossible.'

11 November 1994: Knightmare Series 8 Episode 10 was transmitted: the final TV episode of Knightmare to date.

18 November 1994: Virtually Impossible started on CITV. Following a breakdown in editorial negotations, neither Knightmare nor Virtually Impossible was recommissioned.

1995: 'There was a brief flurry of meetings with Children's BBC ... that could have seen Knightmare cross to the public broadcast sector, but these fell down because of a variety of issues, including copyright problems.
To get around these, a format rewrite entitled The Sword [of] The Sorcerer was produced [and written about in Knightmare newsletter The Quest], but BBC programme research was also pointing at the prospect of less viewers and a younger audience. There was much negotiation; much enthusiasm, but no commission.'

Thereafter, Tim focused on his 'spin-off creation, Televirtual, which [became] one of the UK's most successful entertainment technology companies'.
July 2001: Tim released information about TimeGate, a fantasy adventure gameshow developed jointly by Televirtual and Fremantle-Thames Media. A trailer was later posted online. Tim later reported that about £20,000 was spent on TimeGate. Unfortunately, the format was not picked up by any broadcaster.

25 November 2002: via a press release from Televirtual, Tim announced that 'Televirtual is to re-format the cult TV adventure game series KNIGHTMARE ... and re-create it as a LIVE TV event.' He explained that 'We have only just reclaimed full ownership of the [Knightmare] format, which was jointly owned by ourselves and Anglia (now Granada Media), since 1986. The full rights recently reverted to us, and whereas it was financially impractical to carry the burden of reformatting under shared ownership, that is no longer the case.'

27 November 2002: Tim Child joined the Knightmare.com discussion forum as beveryafraid, also known as BVA. He has made over 60 posts to date.

December 2002: Tim was seen on Challenge in a mini-documentary about Knightmare, prior to Challenge's repeats of the series. The channel would interview Tim again for its First Ever Eps season in 2013.
2004: Following the release of several images and clips, Televirtual released a full pilot of Knightmare VR, a CGI gameshow based on Knightmare, online and on DVD. It benefited from £40,000 National Lottery funded media development grant.

The pilot's narrator, retrospectively named Garstang, was voiced by Tim and subsequently appeared in a separate video on the Televirual website. Plans to make him a news announcer on the Knightmare.com homepage did not come to fruition.

May 2005: Tim announced on the Knightmare.com forum that 'the Knightmare [VR] development material has been removed from view on the Televirtual website. That's because, after a long period of expensive software development, we've been forced to concentrate on moving the RAP system into production, and trying to relaunch a classic 20th century kids' TV show isn't the quickest way to do that.

To date there has been no real interest expressed from any UK broadcaster. No one is clamouring to schedule a revised Knightmare in either form. I do have interest from abroad, but without a UK budget, we could not service it.

So is this finally the end for Knightmare? I really couldn't say. Somehow it keeps coming back. Maybe it's just sleeping?'

March 2006: in a Knightmare.com forum post entitled 'Moving On', Tim suggested that he was taking his focus away from Knightmare in favour of 'a new kind of on-line entertainment. Not Television - as we know, or knew it. Not a video game either'. Tim shared a link to Jabberwacky, part of his artificial intelligence work.

September 2006: this year's contest for the Loebner Prize in Artificial Intelligence takes place at UCL in London, organised by Tim Child and Huma Shah.

March 2008: Another Knightmare.com forum post from Tim, 'SOMETHING STIRS', stated that 'it does look as though you will have something to talk about in 2008, and perhaps something to beguile you in 2009'. No further details were released. Tim provided a link to a separate project, Intermedialab.

2007: Tim appeared on the BBC Four documentary series Children's TV on Trial, talking about Knightmare.

2012: Tim appeared in James Aukett's Knightmare 25th anniversary documentary.

April 2013: How We Made Knightmare, an article from The Guardian, gave Tim another chance to share insights into Knightmare. He was interviewed by Ben Child, his son.

July 2013: via his new production company, DungeonMaster, Tim directed and produced a one-off episode of Knightmare for YouTube's Geek Week. It was filmed at EPIC Studios in Norwich, the former Anglia TV studios were Knightmare was filmed. The episode was released the following month.

Also in July 2013, Tim posted on the Knightmare.com forum in character as Lord Fear, to 'answer all your questions, as you agonise over the future of Knightmare, and what the intervention of Google/YouTube portents'.

December 2013: Tim was a guest and speaker at AdventureX. He was part of talks about Knightmare and puzzle game theory.

May 2014: Tim was a guest and speaker at the first Knightmare Convention, organised by Knightmare.com and held at EPIC Studios.

2017: Tim appeared in an episode of Red Bull TV's documentary series Screenland, filmed before, during and after a performance of Knightmare Live in July 2016.

Tim's middle name has been reported as Maurice, which was revealed as Lord Fear's middle name in Knightmare VR.

Tim is married to Susan, who worked with him on Knightmare.

[Previous version: 2017-07-23 12:29:46]

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Tim Child was the producer of Knightmare, heading up the company Broadsword. Knightmare is often credited as being Child's brainchild (excuse the pun!), as he conceived the idea and directed Dungeon Doom, the pilot of Knightmare.

He remained integral to Knightmare's creation, and as well as creating lots of ideas for things such as floor puzzles and characters, also allowed his idea to be exported overseas - thus creating El Rescate del Talisman and Le Chevalier du Labyrinthe. He also had some input into the failed Lords of the Game and KMVR projects (KMVR was, in fact, almost entirely his creation).

Child's voice can be heard in KMVR, as he voices Be Very Afraid and an Ogre.

After Broadsword split into two companies, Broadsword Interactive and Televirtual, Child remained head of Televirtual - and is head to this day.

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