Digital Jesters was a British

video game publisher A video game publisher is a company that publishes video games that have been developed either internally by the publisher or externally by a video game developer. They often finance the development, sometimes by paying a video game developer ( ...

, based in

Welwyn Garden City Welwyn Garden City ( ) is a town in Hertfordshire, England, north of London. It was the second garden city in England (founded 1920) and one of the first new towns (designated 1948). It is unique in being both a garden city and a new town and ...

Hertfordshire Hertfordshire ( or ; often abbreviated Herts) is one of the home counties in southern England. It borders Bedfordshire and Cambridgeshire to the north, Essex to the east, Greater London to the south, and Buckinghamshire to the west. For govern ...

. The company was founded in 2003 by veterans from CDV UK (after the UK office was shut by CDV), and their first UK-releases were

TrackMania ''TrackMania'' is a series of racing games for Microsoft Windows, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, Nintendo DS and Wii developed by Nadeo and Firebrand Games. Instead of following the usual trend of choosing a set car and track to play ...

and

Virtual Skipper 3 Virtual may refer to: * Virtual (horse), a thoroughbred racehorse * Virtual channel, a channel designation which differs from that of the actual radio channel (or range of frequencies) on which the signal travels * Virtual function, a programming ...

, both by

Nadeo Nadeo (pronounced ''NĂ-dā-yō'') is a French video game developer founded in 2000. The studio is best known for creating the racing game series ''TrackMania''. Other games developed by Nadeo include the ''Virtual Skipper 5: 32nd America's Cup: ...

. In the beginning, they concentrated on the UK market only, but began publishing games in other regions as well. Notable releases included ''

TrackMania Sunrise ''TrackMania Sunrise'' is a racing video game developed by Nadeo, and the second game in the ''TrackMania'' series. It was released in April 2005 in Europe and May 2005 in Russia and the United States. It received positive reviews from critics, who ...

'' (UK & Scandinavia), '' Freedom Force vs. the Third Reich'' (UK & Scandinavia), the '' Pro Rugby Manager'' series (UK) and '' Chaos League'' (UK). Despite a well publicised investment, on 22 December 2005 a winding-up order was made against the company in the Birmingham District Registry of the

UK High Court The High Court of Justice in London, known properly as His Majesty's High Court of Justice in England, together with the Court of Appeal of England and Wales, Court of Appeal and the Crown Court, are the Courts of England and Wales, Senior Cou ...

on the petition of Kaoscontrol Limited. This followed a period where the company was accused of withholding payments to various developers they had worked with, resulting in some developers terminating contracts with the publisher.Bet On Soldier dev ditches DJs News // PC /// Eurogamer
/ref> Their website disappeared soon after. The last game the company released was a racing game based on the

Crazy Frog Crazy Frog (originally known as The Annoying Thing) is a Swedish CGI-animated character and Eurodance musician created in 2003 by actor and playwright Erik Wernquist. Marketed by the ringtone provider Jamba!, the character was originally creat ...

licence in November 2005.

References

External links

Digital Jesters' website
*{{London Gazette, issue=58108, date=26 September 2006, page=13151 — official notice of appointment of liquidator
UK companies registryUnofficial forum for all PRM discussion
Defunct video game companies of the United Kingdom Video game companies established in 2003 Video game companies disestablished in 2005 Video game publishers