Acclaim Entertainment was an American video game publisher from Long Island, active from 1987 until filing for Chapter 7 bankruptcy on September 1, 2004.
Through a series of acquisitions between 1990 and 2002, Acclaim built itself a large portfolio of subsidiaries acting in the fields of development and publishing.
The company was founded in 1991 by Jeff Spangenberg, previously lead designer for Punk Development, and originally located in Santa Clara, California.
[5] The company specialized in the development of arcade game ports and movie tie-ins, including Out Run, Mortal Kombat and FIFA Soccer.
[13] The following year, the company was joined by Steve Ruddy, who began working on Commodore 64 conversions of games like Mystery of the Nile and Kinetik.
[13] Subsequently, further employees, including the Follin brothers and Mike Ager, followed after Ruddy and joined Software Creations.
[13] Successful titles produced or ported by Software Creations include Bubble Bobble (1987), Bionic Commando (1988), and Tin Star (1994).
[13] After developing ports of Ghouls 'n Ghosts and LED Storm in 1989, Software Creations moved into custom-built offices located within Manchester.
[17] Exclaim was set to acquire and reinstantiate Acclaim's two UK studios, namely Manchester and Cheltenham, and re-employ their roughly 160.
[18] Exclaim's opening was expected on October 11,[19] however, Cousen's ownership over the two studios was challenged by Acclaim's liquidator, Allan Mendelsohn, leaving the UK staff in a state of limbo.
The company was founded as Sculptured Software by George Metos, Bryan Brandenburg, Peter Adams, Mike Macris and Bob Burgener,[23] and incorporated on July 12, 1985.
[25] Acclaim agreed to acquire Sculptured Software on October 9, 1995, and closed the deal the following day.
[28][29] The renaming reflected a major change in the management which involved the former Sculptured Software being overseen by the president of Iguana Entertainment.
[31] Through the closure, 70 employees were laid off and an unannounced title was canceled, while the remaining staff and the development of a third installment in the Legends of Wrestling series were shifted to Acclaim Studios Austin.
[34] The company was founded in February 1988 by brothers Darren and Jason Falcus, at the time aged 19 and 18,[35] under the name Optimus Software.
the Extra-Terrestrial, Back to the Future, ThunderCats, and Who Framed Roger Rabbit, as well as publishing software game titles (under the Enteractive trademark) for the Nintendo Entertainment System, including games about The Karate Kid, Jaws, and Major League Baseball.
[citation needed] Flying Edge was a division of Acclaim that was founded in 1992 to publish games on Sega consoles.
[citation needed] Arena Entertainment was a division formed under Mirrorsoft in 1991, to publish games on Sega platforms.