Realtime Games Software Ltd. is a defunct British video game developer. It was founded in 1984 by three Leeds University students, Ian Oliver, Andrew Onions and Graeme Baird.
Their first game, 3D Tank Duel, was a wireframe graphics game in the style of the Battlezone arcade machine, written for the ZX Spectrum. This was followed up with Starstrike 3D, a game based on the Star Wars arcade machine. Throughout its existence, the company continued to innovate in the world of 3D graphics, with their most notable release being Carrier Command. The company was also involved in porting Elite to the PC and Starglider to the ZX Spectrum.
Realtime's early output was self-published, though later they took the more traditional route to market with their games mainly being published by Rainbird.
Graeme Baird subsequently went to work for Psygnosis, while Ian Oliver founded Cross Products to produce game development systems for consoles, in a joint venture with Andy Craven of nearby Vektor Grafix.
Famous quotes containing the word games:
“In 1600 the specialization of games and pastimes did not extend beyond infancy; after the age of three or four it decreased and disappeared. From then on the child played the same games as the adult, either with other children or with adults. . . . Conversely, adults used to play games which today only children play.”
—Philippe Ariés (20th century)