On Monday, November 17, Rebecca Ann ‘Burger’ Heineman, a trans woman and legend in the world of video games, died at the age of 62. Heineman had recently been diagnosed with adenocarcinoma

A friend of Heineman’s confirmed the news with a post on Bluesky

“My trailblazing game industry bad-ass friend Rebecca Heineman has passed away,” wrote Heidi McDonald. “Fuck cancer.”

Heineman shared segments of her experience with cancer on Bluesky, finding humour in going bald from chemotherapy, and community in people mourning her loss, knowing that she would pass soon.

I never thought I’d get this wish. Odd seeing eulogies before I expire

— Rebecca Heineman (@burgerbecky.bsky.social) 2025-11-16T23:46:52.256Z

Rebecca Heineman was born on October 30, 1963, in Whittier, California. She began her path to game development by learning to copy Atari 2600 game cartridges as a teenager, since she could not afford to buy them. This led her to become a self-taught programmer.

“I was able to teach myself how to copy cartridges and amassed a huge video game collection. Not satisfied with copying, I reverse-engineered how the games worked,” Heineman said in Women In Gaming: 100 Professionals of Play.

As a teenager, Heineman won the first Space Invaders tournament in 1980, thereby becoming the first winner of a national US video game tournament. She really wanted the second-place prize of an Atari 800, not the first-place prize of a stand-up arcade game.

You can call me Cassandra Nova. Bring me the head of Deadpool!

— Rebecca Heineman (@burgerbecky.bsky.social) 2025-11-05T23:57:44.102Z

After the win, she began writing for Electronic Games. She was then quickly hired as a programmer for Avalon Hill, all while still in her teens. Heineman’s first published game was London Blitz.

Heineman co-founded Interplay with Brian Fargo, Jay Patel, and Troy Worrell. Here, she created and designed Bard’s Tale III, where she added female characters. 12 years ago, she started her own game company, Olde Sküül. Heineman has worked on over 250 games throughout her career and with many leading companies in the industry. The cult classic, Tass Times in Tonetown, is one of her favourites.

Heineman said she always knew her name was Rebecca, or Becky, but that coming out as transgender in the 1980s would mean the end of her career. In an interview with Xtra, the designer said, “I saw other people in the video game industry come out as trans and then their careers were ruined. So it made me keep my mouth shut.”

Heineman said the industry now is “a lot more welcoming. But there’s still work to do.” She came out in 2001, after knowing she was trans since the age of 10. “I harbored this big secret, and I didn’t want anyone to know. I wanted everyone to call me Burger because I didn’t want them to call me that other name,”  she said in an interview in 2010.

Heineman fought for trans rights and representation in the video game industry. Somehow, she also found time to create comic books and write novels. She also spoke about how she sought to rewrite history through her game design and work towards a world free from racism and misogyny.

 

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