Alligata Software Ltd. was a computer games developer and publisher based in

Sheffield Sheffield is a city in South Yorkshire, England, whose name derives from the River Sheaf which runs through it. The city serves as the administrative centre of the City of Sheffield. It is historically part of the West Riding of Yorkshire ...

in the UK in the 1980s. The company was founded by brothers Mike and Tim Mahony and their father J.R. Mahony in 1983. They produced games for a number of home computers including the

Commodore 64 The Commodore 64, also known as the C64, is an 8-bit home computer introduced in January 1982 by Commodore International (first shown at the Consumer Electronics Show, January 7–10, 1982, in Las Vegas). It has been listed in the Guinness W ...

, BBC Micro, Acorn Electron,

ZX Spectrum The ZX Spectrum () is an 8-bit home computer that was developed by Sinclair Research. It was released in the United Kingdom on 23 April 1982, and became Britain's best-selling microcomputer. Referred to during development as the ''ZX81 Colou ...

and

Dragon 32 The Dragon 32 and Dragon 64 are home computers that were built in the 1980s. The Dragons are very similar to the TRS-80 Color Computer, and were produced for the European market by Dragon Data, Ltd., initially in Swansea, Wales before ...

. The company published many of

Tony Crowther Antony Crowther is a former designer, programmer, and musician of Commodore 64 games. During the 1980s he worked for Alligata, Gremlin Graphics and later his own company, Wizard Development. Career The first computer game he created was a versi ...

's early

games, including Aztec Tomb, Blagger and Loco. Chris Butler was another programmer whose earlier games were released by Alligata. The company also published budget priced software under the Budgie label. Tim Mahony took over the day-to-day running of the company in 1987 and closed the company nine months later. The name and back catalogue were sold to Superior Software. Two titles were released under the joint Superior/Alligata label for ports of Superior's BBC/Electron games to other systems. Superior also included some old Alligata games on their ''Play It Again Sam'' compilations.

Games

* 1983 ''Aztec Tomb'' ( C64) * 1983 ''Here Comes The Sun'' (

) * 1983 ''Bug Blaster'' (C64, BBC Micro, Acorn Electron) * 1983 ''Lunar Rescue'' (BBC Micro, Acorn Electron) * 1983 '' Blagger'' (C64, BBC Micro, Acorn Electron, MSX, Commodore 16) A version was also released through Amsoft for the Amstrad CPC * 1984 '' Loco'' (C64, ZX Spectrum,

Atari 8-bit The Atari 8-bit family is a series of 8-bit home computers introduced by Atari, Inc. in 1979 as the Atari 400 and Atari 800. The series was successively upgraded to Atari 1200XL , Atari 600XL, Atari 800XL, Atari 65XE, Atari 130XE, Atari 800XE ...

) * 1984 '' Son of Blagger'' (C64, ZX Spectrum, BBC Micro) * 1985 ''Who Dares Wins'' (C64) * 1985 ''Jack Charlton's Match Fishing'' (C64, ZX Spectrum) * 1985 ''Blagger Goes to Hollywood'' (C64) * 1986 ''Who Dares Wins II'' (C64, ZX Spectrum, BBC Micro, MSX, Amstrad CPC) * 1986 ''Night World'' (BBC Micro, Acorn Electron) * 1987 ''Kettle'' (C64, ZX Spectrum, Amstrad CPC) * 1987 ''Livingstone, I Presume?'' (C64, ZX Spectrum, MSX, Amstrad CPC) UK release of Spanish Opera Soft game ''Livingstone, Supongo'' * 1987 ''Addicta Ball'' (C64, MSX,

Amiga Amiga is a family of personal computers introduced by Commodore International, Commodore in 1985. The original model is one of a number of mid-1980s computers with 16- or 32-bit processors, 256 KB or more of RAM, mouse-based GUIs, and sign ...

Atari ST The Atari ST is a line of personal computers from Atari Corporation and the successor to the Atari 8-bit family. The initial model, the Atari 520ST, had limited release in April–June 1985 and was widely available in July. It was the first per ...

) * 1988 '' By Fair Means or Foul'' (C64, ZX Spectrum, Amstrad CPC) A Superior/Alligata release * 1989 ''Repton Mania'' (ZX Spectrum) Ports of the first 2 '' Repton'' games - A Superior/Alligata release

Budgie label

Alligata published budget games under the Budgie label from 1985. When a typical Alligata game would cost around £6.95, Budgie games sold for only £1.99 in order to compete with the likes of budget software pioneer Mastertronic, already selling games at that level. Almost all titles were original rather than re-issues of Alligata games. Probably the most well known game is space shoot 'em up ''Video's Revenge'' (BBC Micro, Acorn Electron) with others including ''Convoy'' (ZX Spectrum), ''Super Sam'' (ZX Spectrum, Amstrad CPC), ''Raskel'' (C64) and ''Shuffle'' (BBC Micro, Acorn Electron).

References

{{Reflist

External links

''Alligata'' at ''World of Spectrum''''Alligata'' at the ''BBC Games Archive''''Budgie'' at ''World of Spectrum''Who Dares Wins game ending by Alligata Software
Defunct video game companies of the United Kingdom Video game companies established in 1983 1983 establishments in England