Realtime in administration

A video games business founded by the creator of Grand Theft Auto has gone into administration amid lacklustre sales for its latest release.

About 200 staff at the Dundee-based company have been told they are at risk of redundancy after Begbies Traynor was appointed administrator to Realtime Worlds.

The business, which also has operations in the US, was founded in 2002 by Dave Jones, who designed the action adventure game Grand Theft Auto (GTA), a series which has sold more than 50 million copies. Mr Jones also co-founded Rockstar North, formerly known as DMA Design, which developed GTA and the popular puzzle game Lemmings.

Begbies, which hopes to sell the business as a going concern, blamed the slide in fortunes on poor sales of Realtime's latest game APB: All Points Bulletin, which was released six weeks ago.