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This week sees British developer Argonaut Games celebrating its 44th birthday. For the past four decades, the studio has built one of the most varied and unique portfolios in gaming history, ranging from bedroom-programmed releases and handheld adventures to major film licences and some of Nintendo's biggest franchises.
Originally formed in 1982 by then-teenager Jez San, Argonaut Software (as it was known) cut its teeth with 3D space blasters Starglider (1986) and Starglider 2 (1988) for the Atari ST and Amiga platforms. The success of San's 3D coding abilities would see the studio hired for numerous 3D projects, including film licence Days of Thunder (1990) for Mindscape, the Game Boy port of Race Drivin' (1990) for THQ, and further flight sims Birds of Prey (1992) and X (1992) for Electronic Arts and Nintendo, respectively.
In the early '90s, in collaboration with Nintendo, Argonaut developed the Super FX RISC chip, leading to SNES releases Star Fox (1993), Vortex (1994) and Stunt Race FX (1994), which remain some of the studio's biggest-selling and most groundbreaking releases to date. (In 2017, Argonaut would work alongside Nintendo once again, bringing the unreleased Star Fox 2 to fruition on Super Nintendo Classic.)
Throughout the '90s and into the '00s, Argonaut continued to ply its trade in myriad genres for a variety of platforms and publishers. This era saw Argonaut develop Creature Shock (1994), FX Fighter (1995), and Alien Odyssey (1995) for PC, Buck Bumble (1998) for Nintendo 64, and launch a new "mascot franchise" with Croc: Legend of the Gobbos (1997) for PlayStation.
In the '00s, Argonaut settled into the licensing game, producing more titles based on multimedia franchises. In a single year, the studio produced The Emperor's New Groove and Aladdin in Nasira's Revenge for Disney Interactive, and Alien: Resurrection for Fox.
This was followed by phenomenally successful tie-ins for Harry Potter And The Philosopher's Stone and Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets. After the release of several LEGO: Bionicle titles, as well as the dubious movie tie-in Catwoman (2004), Argonaut's production heads, Jamie Walker and Sefton Hill, left the team to form Rocksteady Games. Argonaut Games was dissolved in 2007.
The story doesn't end there, however, as Argonaut would resurface in 2024, with founder Jez San returning to operate the company as management for its former wares. Since its resurrection, the studio has produced a remaster of Croc: Legend of the Gobbos, and also released Game Boy Color ports Croc: 25th Anniversary Edition and Croc 2: 25th Anniversary Edition through boutique outlet ModRetro.
The studio is currently working with Titanium Games on a remaster of Croc 2: Kingdom of the Gobbos for modern platforms, though no release date has been set.
Additionally, look out for some fun Easter Eggs in the birthday video, including references to San's birthday, the date Argonaut was formed, and what appears to be a reference to the goofy 1980s Saturday morning show Get Fresh! No sign of Gilbert the Alien. Thank God.