Over a Decade of Inspiration and Innovation

All

4T2 was founded at the dawn of internet time (OK 1998 then). Here's a nostalgic review of a few milestones.

In 1998 our founding fathers (Mike Hawkyard and Rob Fell) focused their considerable creative talents on running round the office having elastic band fights and playing Duke Nuke 'Em. Their first business cards, a masterpiece of origami design, could be folded tightly to make effective projectiles. In between planning office battle strategies, they spent odd moments developing a web content management system. 
  
In 1999 things got serious. A gradual increase in staff headcount and an upgraded IT network meant the company's R&D programme could be extended to playing Unreal Tournament. Concerns about Inland Revenue investigations into use of company resources for personal entertainment, resulted in the creation of 4T2's first Flash game.

By 2002 4T2 was developing online games for several major brands. These included one to support James Bond in his latest adventure. Our websites were also getting national recognition. Poole Borough Council's site was praised by many organisations for its user friendly design and depth of content. We also made the world's first realtime multiplayer game embedded in an email.

2003 saw our games repeatedly top the Lycos Viral Charts for clients such as Comet and Exchange & Mart. The technique of having codes on product receipts or packaging to unlock game content, proved very effective at driving sales. We also released a free J2ME mobile phone advergame for Aiwa.  To the best of our knowledge, no one else had done this before.
  
In 2006 all you had to do to see 4T2's work was to turn on the television.  We worked with GMTV Kids to integrate their Toonattik TV show with their online presence, had advergames featured in TV advertising and worked with BBC Worldwide to promote their TV content via mini-games.

By 2007, if you tried to escape our work by going to the cinema, then LEGO BIONICLE adverts featuring screenshots and cheat codes for our related game were waiting for you.  To really test our metal we also committed to building a web-based real time strategy game designed to be playable by nine year olds.
  
In 2008 this game went on to be the 'stand-out winner' of the New Media Age Effectiveness Awards. Magazines were the next child-related media to get the 4T2 treatment as we designed two websites for publishing house Egmont for its Toxic and Go Girl titles.
  
In 2009 the 4T2 team, now sixteen strong, developed a campaign for BBC Radio One that was played live on air for a week, across its entire daytime schedule.  Other new clients included Disney, for whom we made their first webcam-enabled dance game and CBBC. Finally, we built The Robot Chronicles for The LEGO Company. This expansive narrative-driven Flash adventure game combined models and themes from three LEGO brands. Play levels were so high it topped the Viral Game Chart for three months, including the all important Christmas period.

We could not have done any of this without the support of our amazing clients. So can you help 4T2 make 2011 just as momentous?

For more information on the latest happenings at 4T2, please see our news section.