Rockstar North, (previously DMA Design Ltd.), the developer of such successful franchises as Grand Theft Auto and Manhunt is one of the top video game developers in the whole world. The Rockstar North Studio is a thriving creative community of developers from a variety of backgrounds and nationalities.
The Rockstar North Studio is based out of modern, spacious, purpose-built studios in the heart of Edinburgh. They develop original stunningly awesome titles and are as mentioned earlier the proud developer of the incredibly successful Grand Theft Auto series. Rockstar North work closely with publishing partner Rockstar Games and have since 1999 been part of the Rockstar family of developers. Rockstar North is an entirely owned subsidiary company of Take Two Interactive Software Inc.
History of Rockstar North
DMA Design was in 1988 founded by David Jones, Russell Kay, Steve Hammond and Mike Dailly in Dundee, Scotland. The name DMA came from the Amiga programming manuals (where it was short for “Direct Memory Access”) and the meaning of the initials were later ‘retrofitted’ so that they briefly stood for Direct Mind Access. One company founder also jokingly refered to the initials as if they ment “Doesn’t Mean Anything”.
Prior to the release of succesful Grand Theft Auto series, DMA Design had a big hit with the Lemmings. Lemmings was also the company’s major breakthrough. Lemmings have sold over 20 million copies to date.
Late 1990s
In 1997, DMA was bought by British publisher Gremlin Interactive, with Jones becoming Creative Director of both companies. Gremlin published two DMA titles – the UK release of Body Harvest and the PC version of Wild Metal Country, a tank combat game with a complex control scheme and realistic physics. In 1999 Gremlin was acquired by French publisher Infogrames for £24 million. Complicating this sale was the pre-existing deal between DMA and BMG Interactive, which had published the first version of Grand Theft Auto, and by 1999 itself had gone through some complex financial moves, becoming Rockstar Games, an internal label of publisher Take-Two Interactive.
Infogrames sold DMA Design to Take-Two. Rockstar published the Dreamcast version of Wild Metal Country (retitled simply Wild Metal) and Grand Theft Auto 2 for the PC, PlayStation and Dreamcast. Prior to DMA becoming part of Rockstar, Jones left, setting up a new development studio in Dundee as a subsidiary of Rage Software. Through a management buy-out, this later became Real Time Worlds.
DMA had several announced projects that were subsequently cancelled in mid-development: Nintendo 64 ports of Wild Metal Country and the original GTA; Clan Wars (a real-time 3D castle building and siege game set in medieval Scotland); Attack! (a caveman-themed platformer for the N64); and a port of Epic Games’ PC hit Unreal for the Nintendo 64 disk drive.
By the time of 2002, after the release of Grand Theft Auto 3, that for the first time brought the GTA game into 3D, Rockstar finally renamed DMA Design to the now so well know name, Rockstar North.
Full list of released games:
As DMA Design
- Menace (1988) (Amiga, ST and PC)
- Ballistix (1989) (ports to MSDOS, C64, TG16)
- Blood Money (1989) (Amiga, MS-DOS, ST and C64)
- Lemmings (1990) (Amiga, CDTV, MS-DOS, ST, Spectrum, CD-I, Lynx)
- Oh No! More Lemmings (1991) (Amiga, ST, MS-DOS)
- Walker (1993) (Amiga)
- Hired Guns (1993) (Amiga, MS-DOS)
- Holiday Lemmings 1993 (1993) (Amiga, MS-DOS)
- Lemmings 2: The Tribes (1993) (Amiga, MS-DOS, SNES)
- The Lemmings Chronicles (1994) (Amiga, MS-DOS, 3DO) (“All New World of Lemmings” in Europe)
- Holiday Lemmings 1994 (1994) (MS-DOS)
- Uniracers (1994) (SNES) (Unirally in Europe)
- Grand Theft Auto (1997) (MS-DOS, PC, PSX, GBC)
- Body Harvest (1998) (N64)
- Space Station Silicon Valley (1998) (N64)
- Grand Theft Auto: London, 1969 (1999) (PC, PSX) – Expansion Pack for GTA
- Grand Theft Auto: London, 1961 (1999) (PC) – Free Expansion Pack for GTA: London 1969
- Tanktics (1999)
- Wild Metal Country (1999) (PC, Dreamcast)
- Grand Theft Auto 2 (1999) (PC, PSX, Dreamcast, GBC)
- Grand Theft Auto III (2001) (PS2, Xbox, PC)
As Rockstar North
- Grand Theft Auto: Vice City (2002) (PS2, PC, Xbox)
- Manhunt (2003) (PS2, PC, Xbox)
- Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas (2004) (PS2, PC, Xbox)
- Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories (2005) (PSP, PS2) (with Rockstar Leeds)
- Grand Theft Auto: Vice City Stories (2006) (PSP, PS2) (with Rockstar Leeds)
- Manhunt 2 (2007) (PC, PS2, PSP, Wii) (with Rockstar London, Rockstar Leeds and Rockstar Toronto)
- Grand Theft Auto IV (2008) (PS3, Xbox 360, PC[6]) (With Rockstar Toronto for the PC)
- Grand Theft Auto IV: The Lost and Damned (2009) (Xbox 360)
- Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars (2009) (iPhone, iPod Touch, DS, PSP) (with Rockstar Leeds)
- Grand Theft Auto: The Ballad of Gay Tony (2009) (Xbox 360)
- Agent (2010) (PS3)
