Absolute Entertainment, Inc. was a New Jersey-based video game company founded in 1986 by David Crane, previously the co-founder of Activision and developer of such games as Pitfall!. The co-founders of Absolute included several other ex-employees of Activision.
At first, Absolute reserved its own name for games it published on its own, though these were largely unsuccessful. Games created for other publishers, including almost all of Activision's later games for the Atari 2600 and Atari 7800 and numerous Licensed Games, were developed under the name of its subsidiary Imagineering (not to be confused with Japanese video game publisher Imagineer) until it was folded back into Absolute in 1992.
Absolute went bankrupt in 1995. Crane and several other employees would move on to found Skyworks Technologies.
Not to be confused with Walt Disney Imagineering.
Games developed and/or published by Absolute/Imagineering include:
- A Boy and His Blob: Trouble in Blobolonia and sequel The Rescue of Princess Blobette
- The Adventures of Rocky and Bullwinkle
- Attack of the Killer Tomatoes
- Battletank (NES and Game Boy versions)
- Super Battletank (Super NES and Sega Genesis/Megadrive versions)
- Super Battletank 2 (Super NES exclusive sequel)
- Casper
- Commando (Capcom) (Atari 2600 port)
- Double Dragon I (Atari 2600 and 7800 ports)
- Family Feud (SNES version)
- Ghostbusters II
- Ghoul School
- Home Alone (SNES and Game Boy versions)
- Home Alone 2: Lost in New York (Game Boy, NES and SNES versions)
- Home Improvement: Power Tool Pursuit!
- Ikari Warriors (7800 port)
- Jeopardy! (Genesis and SNES versions)
- Kung Fu Master (2600 and 7800 ports)
- Penn and Teller's Smoke and Mirrors
- The Ren & Stimpy Show: Buckeroo$!
- The Ren & Stimpy Show: Space Cadet Adventures
- River Raid II
- The Simpsons: Bartman Meets Radioactive Man
- The Simpsons: Bart vs. the Space Mutants
- The Simpsons: Bart vs. the World
- Bart Simpson's Escape From Camp Deadly
- The Simpsons: Bart vs. the Juggernauts
- Space Ace (SNES version)
Tropes associated with this company:
- In Case You Forgot Who Wrote It: Absolute often named game designers in titles they published, e.g. David Crane's A Boy and His Blob, Garry Kitchen's Battletank, Alex DeMeo's Race America. The game the company didn't survive to publish, Penn & Teller's Smoke & Mirrors, fits a slightly different category.
- The SNES version of Home Alone has a credits roll on the attract screen, a rarity for video games.