Creative software, classic graphics, warm sound, and old-school craftsmanship.

1 Mile Up Software is the direct result of resurrecting a retro arcade scrolling shooter called River Run, a labor of love nearly completed way, way, way back in 1996. It then sat dormant on shelves, hard drives, SSDs, and even in the clouds for exactly 30 years. Still, it paved the way toward an early career rich in graphics, multimedia, and interactive entertainment in the fun, booming '90s!

AquaScape followed, another project especially close to my heart and, again, shaped by a hobbyist point of view. This deeply configurable 2.5D aquarium built with OpenGL became my flagship product for an entire decade and made its way onto a million PCs and deep into family lives, where it often felt like much more than just software on a PC - one comment from the 2000s that's stayed with me read: "When the computer running AquaScape crashed, it felt like a beloved family pet had been lost."

1 Mile Up Software is currently a one-man studio led by me, Steve Barber, in Denver, Colorado, and shaped by a long hands-on history in software, pixel art, music, multimedia, and web development. I tend to build things at the atomic level, right down to the pixel and byte, with an engineer's approach - the kind of '90s brute-force, straight-line procedural engineering that defined the era - whether that means programming, art, music, or the fine details that give a project its personality.

Today, 1 Mile Up Software is focused on releasing River Run, reviving and remastering past projects including a Fireworks simulator, exploring the new world of app and mobile development, and continuing a long tradition of building software dedicated to both fun and quality - full of personality, depth, and hands-on craftsmanship from days gone by.