Insolvency practitioners David Ruben & Partners have confirmed, in a phone conversation with Gamasutra, that the three trading subsidiaries of noted UK developer Argonaut Games, plc. have been placed into administration, as of 3.15pm GMT today.
The three subsidiaries are
Kung Fu Chaos developer Just Add Monsters, mobile developer Morpheme and core development studio Argonaut Software Ltd. Holding company Argonaut Games has not itself filed for bankruptcy, although officials have recently requested the suspension of the company’s shares on the London Stock Exchange, commenting at the time: "In the absence of... development agreements being immediately secured, the group's existing cash resources will provide funding for only an extremely limited period and Argonaut may not be able to continue to trade."
Argonaut, headed by Jez San, has been involved in a number of important software and hardware projects in its eighteen year history, including the development of the Super FX chip for Nintendo, as well as software titles such as
Starglider,
Starfox,
Croc, and
Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets. Unfortunately, recent titles such as the much-delayed
Malice and the EA-published
Catwoman have been much less successful, with the company showing signs of trouble as early as August, when it issued a profits warning downgrading the company’s full year guidance to a £6 million ($11M) loss.
A further announcement concerning the company’s fate is expected to take place on Monday.
