GTE Interactive Media

• Name — GTE Interactive Media • Former Name — * GTE ImagiTrek • GTE Entertainment • Type — Subsidiary • Industry — * Video games • Interactive television • Fate — Dissolved • Founded — 1990 • Defunct — 1997 03 14 • Hq Location City — Carlsbad, California • Hq Location Country — United States • Num Locations — 1 • Num Locations Year — 1997 • Owner — GTE Corporation • Num Employees — 120 high in 1996, 85 end • Num Employees Year — 1997 • Parent — GTE Vantage • Website — www.im.gte.com

GTE Interactive was founded as GTE ImagiTrek in 1990 by Richard E. Robinson, as a division of GTE Vantage, a wholly owned subsidiary of the now-defunct telecommunications provider GTE. Originally named GTE ImagiTrek, it was renamed GTE Interactive Media in 1994. Richard Scott, vice president of New Ventures at GTE said "At its inception, GTE Interactive Media was viewed as a complementary adjunct to GTE's plans to develop broadband video services networks." In January 1995, the division entered a partnership with Nintendo for the development of arcade games and of online networking. In the same month, the partnership previewed its first title, FX Fighter, at Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. In 1995, the division employed a high of 120 employees. Experiencing difficulties in the video game market and with the Telecommunications Act of 1996 putting a pinch on GTE due to deregulation, the division began to steadily lay off staff. The parent company GTE planned to cease its own content creation in favor of feeding its networks with the rapidly expanding market of third party content. Failing to find a buyer or partner, the division announced in January 1997 that it would lay off 85 employees and cease operations on March 14, 1997. The remaining "skeleton staff" would provide technical support and further shutdown services through June 30. Citing hardships in the entire CD-ROM market, Dick Nordman, finance director for GTE's New Ventures group in Irving, Texas, explained, "In the beginning, the idea was that we wanted to get into the content business. Now, with everything else going on in the telecommunications industry, we felt our energies would be better spent in the telco arena."

This is a list of video games designed in whole or in part by GTE Interactive Media. • Title — Platform — Developer — Release date • Time Traveler Hologram — Arcade — GTE Interactive Media (for Sega) — 1991 • M.C. Hammer's Soulfire — Genesis — Unknown — Unreleased • StreetSports Jammit — MS-DOS 3DO, SNES Genesis — GTE Interactive Media — 1994 • Vitsie Visits Dinosaurs — PC Classic Mac OS — GTE Interactive Media (under the Interactive Toys brand) • Vitsie Visits Space • Vitsie Visits the Ocean • FX Fighter — MS-DOS — Argonaut Games — 1995 • Rolling Stones Voodoo Lounge — Second Vision • Forrest Gump: Artists, Music, and Times — GTE Interactive Media • NCAA Championship Basketball • Street Hockey '95 — SNES • Night Light — MS-DOS Mac — GTE Interactive Media (under the Interactive Toys brand) • Tank Girl — MS-DOS — Argonaut Games — Unreleased • Dust: A Tale of the Wired West — Cyberflix — 1995 • Sea Legends — Ocean Software — May 31, 1996 • Skull Cracker — Cyberflix — September 30, 1996 • Timelapse — MS-DOS Mac — GTE Interactive Media — October 16, 1996 • Titanic: Adventure Out of Time — MS-DOS — Cyberflix — November 12, 1996 • FX Fighter Turbo — Argonaut Games — 1996