ROGUE TRADER: COMING TO A MARKET NEAR YOU

THE ASTRO KNIGHTS will embark on their bid for stock market domination this week, writes Clare Francis. Synthetic Dimension, the Stourbridge- based animation company which created the computer game Astro Knights, is to float on the unregulated Ofex market for an estimated pounds 1.5m.

The group hopes investors will realise that the fear instilled by Rogue (pictured above) is only a facade and that he is really kind, gentle and harmless.

Synthetic Dimension, founded in 1985 as a computer graphics design company, has since expanded into computer games and interactive media, video production and computer modelling, internet development, corporate ID and marketing.

As well as Astro Knights, the company is well known for its PC and Playstation game, Ed Hunter, which it was commissioned to develop by the heavy metal band Iron Maiden.

The company is also the inventor of Syndimation, a 3D technology used by Walt Disney in the films A Bug's Life and Toy Story II.