Conversations with a Spook: William Colby, the Spy Who Played Computer Games

In March 1996, I interviewed William Colby, former Director of Central Intelligence, for a profile in the Princeton Alumni Weekly (Colby was Class of '40). Only a month later, however, Colby died in a boating accident in Maryland. Due to Colby's death, PAW never ran the article on the venerable and controversial spymaster. The profile appears here for the first time.

William Colby, the Spy Who Played Computer Games

Seasoned by decades of espionage work during hot and cold wars, William Colby ’40 knew he had to be thoroughly prepared before embarking on his latest assignment in the wilderness of mirrors. A professional would do no less. So Colby, Director of Central Intelligence from 1973 to 1976, started playing computer games.

“I looked at ‘Return to Zork,’” recalled Colby. “I went through enough of it to understand how it worked.”

Colby’s Zork play helped him understand the intricacies of interactive entertainment while he served as a consultant on the development of Spycraft: The Great Game, a $49.95 computer game marketed by Activision Inc. of Los Angeles, which also markets the Zork series of adventure/role-playing CD-ROM games.

The project teamed Colby with former KGB major general Oleg Kalugin, whom Colby knew from the post-Cold War conference circuit. Kalugin gained fame in the Gorbachev era when he resigned from the KGB and switched to the pro-democracy side in Russia. Starting two years ago, they shared their espionage experiences with writer James Adams, who worked the material into a script.

“The basic thrust of the project was two things,” explained Colby. “First, that it’s time for Russians and Americans to work together on intelligence matters. There are common enemies and problems. We wanted to look at the future rather than the past. Second, we wanted to be somewhat realistic about what intelligence is all about.” The game revolves around the assassination of a Russian presidential candidate.

Colby picked up the theme from there: “You, as the CIA case officer, are chosen to find out who did it, because the U.S. President is next on the hit list. You work with the Russians on it.” The search involves drug trafficking, nuclear weapons, and other perils. Besides briefing Adams on spycraft, Colby and Kalugin both stepped in front of the film cameras to appear in the game. Colby’s part came naturally to him: “My role is as a senior counselor to the player. I tell him he’s wrong, or suggest he try different things.”

The chance to educate game fans to the realities of espionage attracted Colby to the project when an agent (the Hollywood kind) approached him on behalf of Activision. “It seemed like a way to get to a new audience that didn’t know about intelligence,” said Colby. “I want the general public to understand and support that we need good intelligence and we can find new allies.” While it has what Colby terms the “bang-bang” elements─eliminating double agents, rescuing hostages─Spycraft confronts players with the intellectual and ethical challenges facing spies.

“You have to know who’s telling the truth and who is lying,” he said. Colby faced all of the challenges in his long career, starting with his work as an OSS agent in Nazi-occupied France and Norway in World War II. He served in Sweden, Italy, and Vietnam from 1951to 1962, when Allen W. Dulles ’14 [2006 note: Dulles was a member of the Princeton Class of 1914] was Director of Central Intelligence (Colby noted, “He would have loved the game. He was very much a hands-on intelligence officer”). He was chief of the CIA’s Far East Division from 1963 to 1968, and director of the agency from 1973 to 1976. Since then he has served as a consultant, lecturer and lawyer, and written the books Honorable Men and Lost Victory.

Colby sent his former employer early outlines and scripts of Spycraft, following the terms of a contract he signed with the CIA to let the agency examine anything he writes on intelligence matters. “They finally said, go ahead. I know what I can say and can’t say,” he explained. “the only thing they look for is does this reveal any secrets we should be keeping.”

Activision reports strong sales of Spycraft, and in April Colby took part in an online chat session on Activision’s Web site to answer questions about the project. Colby is already thinking about material for a sequel that’s under discussion. After all, the great game never really ends.