Argus Press Software

Argus Press Software at a Glance

If you are browsing PlayPile looking for information on Argus Press Software, you will find a publisher with a very specific footprint in the history of British gaming. This company operated for only three years, active from 1984 to 1987, and has nine games listed on our platform. They started as a development division within the larger Argus Press Group before becoming an independent entity under Stephen Hall in 1987. Shortly after that buyout, they rebranded themselves as Grandslam Entertainments. Their catalog is heavily concentrated in the 1980s with all nine releases coming from that single decade. The output volume was small, averaging three games per year during their brief existence. Their platform strategy focused almost entirely on home computers popular in the UK market at the time. They released seven titles for the Commodore C64, 128, and MAX systems alone. They also published six games for the ZX Spectrum and five for the Amstrad CPC. Smaller numbers appeared for the BBC Micro, Mac, DOS, Amiga, Atari ST, Apple II, and MSX. In terms of genre focus, Strategy was their most common category with five releases. They also had a strong showing in Adventure games with three titles and Puzzle games with another three. Their portfolio included two Shooters, one Arcade game, one Real Time Strategy title, one Platformer, one Simulator, and one Racing game. You can find specific examples like Nether Earth, Grange Hill, The Hunt for Red October, The Detective, and Time Trax in their late 1986 to late 1987 lineup. Quality trends for Argus Press Software are mixed based on the available data. While they managed to secure licenses for recognizable properties like The Hunt for Red October and Grange Hill, their overall output remains limited compared to larger contemporaries. The company did not span multiple decades of operation, so there is no long-term evolution to track beyond their rapid transition into Grandslam Entertainments in 1987. Their brief window of activity resulted in a compact but distinct library that catered specifically to the UK home computer scene of the mid-eighties.