Hotgen Studios

These were my bosses. After 20 years HotGen is now no more - in 2016 they became part of the SkyRocket Toys empire, and then the studio location got closed down at the end of 2019.

Hotgen went through a series of phases. Early on it worked on traditional video games like Worlds Scariest Police Chases 2 for the PC and Sony PlayStation 2, but that title didn't make it out the door. They worked on an online football game with Sky Sports that also didn't make it.

A GameBoyAdvance version of Kelly Slaters Surfing did not sell as many units as Tony Hawks Skating.

From over 100 people it got down to just a handful, when in 2002 they struck on making TV games for Jakks Pacific. These were a great success.

Especially with the TV games, HotGen got to work with some of the most recognisable franchises in the world, although not every license deal went through.

In 2010 Fergus McGovern resigned to spend more time with his family giving control of the company to the employees. Terry Haynes and Mark Fisher ably led the company for the second half of its lifetime.

The game Tofu Fury was a launch title for the Amazon Fire phone in 2014 but unfortunately people did not buy many of the phones. At least it got us out of the basement and back into Hotgen's spiritual home of the NLA tower.

Drones were popular in 2015 and the partnership with SkyRocket toys led to purchase of the company.