to Microsoft earlier this year but he continues to run the studio, which is based in Guildford.

'Terrifying prospect'

He is one of the most respected figures in the games business, credited with inventing the "god game" genre thanks to the title Populous released in 1989.

He said: "I was trying to make The Movies while at the same time worrying whether we would have money to continue."

The game did not sell as well as anticipated but was a critical hit.

He is currently working on a sequel to Xbox role playing game Fable and an as-yet unnamed title, both of which will be released on the Xbox 360.

He was in Brighton to deliver a speech on his history with game design.

He told the audience that designers could one day be "as recognisable as film directors" and that games could not now be developed successfully without professional designers.

He said that if a designer wanted to change his mind about something "you are spending $2m or $3m" on a game costing upwards of $20m or $30m.

He said that was a "terrifying prospect".

Emphasising how the game industry had changed over the last 10 years he said that in his earlier career design documents for games were non-existent but the design document for Fable 2 ran to 1,000 pages.

He admitted he had "over-promised" on games to journalists in the past.

Two years ago Mr Molyneux famously apologised to games fans for promising features in Fable which never materialised in the finished product.

He said he had a new policy of not talking too much about a title before it was released.

The developer also encouraged other designers to use the "community of game fans" as a resource.

"Listen to what they have to say about a game, what they want from a game," he said.

But he also warned not to take their requests for "strange features" too seriously.