Ignition Entertainment Limited,

doing business as A trade name, trading name, or business name is a pseudonym used by companies that do not operate under their registered company name. The term for this type of alternative name is fictitious business name. Registering the fictitious name with ...

UTV Ignition Games, was a video game publisher of Indian media conglomerate UTV Software Communications. After

The Walt Disney Company The Walt Disney Company, commonly referred to as simply Disney, is an American multinational mass media and entertainment conglomerate headquartered at the Walt Disney Studios complex in Burbank, California. Disney was founded on October 16 ...

acquired UTV Software Communications as a wholly owned subsidiary for The Walt Disney Company India, UTV Ignition Games assets were liquidated.

History

UTV Ignition Games originated as a British video game publisher in September 2001 called Valecombe Limited and was located in

Waltham Abbey Waltham Abbey is a suburban town and civil parish in the Epping Forest District of Essex, within the London metropolitan area, metropolitan and urban area of London, England, East London, north-east of Charing Cross. It lies on the Greenwich ...

. The company was renamed Ignition Entertainment on 30 March 2002. It was created from a selection of smaller developers and publishers, such as

Archer Maclean Archer Donald Maclean (28 January 1962 – 17 December 2022) was a British video game programmer. He was the author of '' Dropzone'' which he developed for the Atari 8-bit computers and was ported to other systems. Maclean also developed the Com ...

's Awesome Studios (also known as Awesome Developments and Awesome Games). In 2007, the company was acquired by UTV Software Communications and opened two new branches: Ignition Tokyo in Japan and Ignition Florida in the United States. Focused on the production of games for the

PlayStation Portable The PlayStation Portable (PSP) is a handheld game console developed and marketed by Sony Interactive Entertainment, Sony Computer Entertainment. It was first released in Japan on December 12, 2004, in North America on March 24, 2005, and in PA ...

and

Nintendo DS The is a foldable handheld game console produced by Nintendo, released globally across 2004 and 2005. The DS, an initialism for "Developers' System" or "Dual Screen", introduced distinctive new features to handheld games: two LCD screens worki ...

, the company has produced a selection of budget titles for the

Game Boy Advance The (GBA) is a 32-bit handheld game console, manufactured by Nintendo, which was released in Japan on March 21, 2001, and to international markets that June. It was later released in mainland China in 2004, under the name iQue Game Boy Advanc ...

: '' Pool Paradise'' from Awesome Studios as well as the

game '' Zoo Keeper''. The company also published

SNK is a Japanese video gaming and interactive entertainment company. It was founded in 1978 as by Eikichi Kawasaki and began by developing arcade games. SNK is known for its Neo Geo arcade system on which the company established many franchises ...

's full lineup in Europe which includes the ''

Metal Slug is a Japanese multimedia franchise and run and gun video game series originally created by Nazca Corporation before merging with SNK in 1996 after the completion of the first game in the series. Spin-off games include a third-person shoo ...

'' series, ''

Samurai Shodown ''Samurai Shodown'', known in Japan as is a fighting game series by SNK. The series began in 1993 and is known for being one of the earliest in the genre with a primary focus on weapon-based combat. Plot The stories in the series take place i ...

'' series as well as ''

The King of Fighters ''The King of Fighters'' (''KOF'') is a series of fighting games by SNK that began with the release of ''The King of Fighters '94'' in 1994. The series was initially developed for SNK's Neo Geo (system), Neo Geo MVS arcade hardware and received ...

'' series. In 2005, the company had several games planned, including '' Mercury'', '' The King of Fighters Neowave'' and ''Pool Paradise International''. The company had acquired the rights to the tactical role-playing game ''Spectral Force Genesis''. The game was released later that year in North America and Europe. On 20 April 2007, the company announced the completion of their acquisition by UTV Software Communications, a media conglomerate based in

India India, officially the Republic of India, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, seventh-largest country by area; the List of countries by population (United Nations), most populous country since ...

. On 17 December 2007, they announced the opening of two development studios – Ignition Florida, and Ignition Tokyo. Both studios were said to be working on proprietary intellectual property for next-generation platforms. The Tokyo studio was composed of former members of

Clover Studio was a Japanese video game developer founded by Capcom. The studio developed the PlayStation 2 port of '' Viewtiful Joe'', both versions of '' Viewtiful Joe 2'' for the GameCube and PlayStation 2, and the PS2 titles '' Ōkami'' and '' God Hand'' ...

and

Capcom is a Japanese video game company. It has created a number of critically acclaimed and List of best-selling video game franchises, multi-million-selling game franchises, with its most commercially successful being ''Resident Evil'', ''Monster ...

, worked on the game '' El Shaddai: Ascension of the Metatron''. On 21 April 2009, Ignition announced that they would be publishing '' Muramasa: The Demon Blade'' for the Wii in North America. On 22 October, they announced they would be publishing ''

Arc Rise Fantasia ''Arc Rise Fantasia'' is a 2009 role-playing video game co-developed by Imageepoch and Marvelous Entertainment for the Wii. It was published in Japan by Marvelous Entertainment in 2009 and in North America by Ignition Entertainment in 2010. A pl ...

''. Ignition Entertainment also published ''

The King of Fighters XII (''KOF XII'') is a 2009 arcade video game produced by SNK Playmore and the twelfth installment in ''The King of Fighters'' series of fighting games, following '' The King of Fighters XI'' (2005). Built on Taito Type X2 hardware, home ports were ...

'' in North America and Europe for

Xbox 360 The Xbox 360 is a home video game console developed by Microsoft. As the successor to the Xbox (console), original Xbox, it is the second console in the Xbox#Consoles, Xbox series. It was officially unveiled on MTV on May 12, 2005, with detail ...

and

PlayStation 3 The PlayStation 3 (PS3) is a home video game console developed and marketed by Sony Computer Entertainment (SCE). It is the successor to the PlayStation 2, and both are part of the PlayStation brand of consoles. The PS3 was first released on ...

during Summer 2009. On 2 November 2010, sources at UTV confirmed the closing of the Florida-based studio. Staff were given opportunities to relocate to Texas or find other work. This announcement followed the widespread allegations of sexual harassment by former boss Paul Steed and mismanagement of company funds. The title they were producing, ''

Reich ( ; ) is a German word whose meaning is analogous to the English word " realm". The terms and are respectively used in German in reference to empires and kingdoms. In English usage, the term " Reich" often refers to Nazi Germany, also ca ...

'', had completed 2 of 9 major levels' costing roughly US$23 million. Despite major setbacks, the London office continued on in a more limited scope. Leaked footage of ''Reich'' was uploaded to

YouTube YouTube is an American social media and online video sharing platform owned by Google. YouTube was founded on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim who were three former employees of PayPal. Headquartered in ...

in November 2010 by an unknown source.

Games published

Cancelled

* ''Reich'' * ''WarDevil / Project Kane''

References

{{Authority control Defunct video game companies of the United Kingdom Video game companies established in 2002 Video game companies disestablished in 2012 Video game publishers 2002 establishments in the United Kingdom Defunct companies based in London The Walt Disney Company subsidiaries UTV Software Communications