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Dlala Studios co-founder dives into the developer's origins

Fresh off the release of Disney Illusion Island, AJ Grand-Scrutton talks to Shacknews about the history of Dlala Studios.

Ozzie Mejia

March 14, 2024 3:00 PM

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Last year, Dlala Studios left a lasting impression on Nintendo Switch owners with the release of Disney Illusion Island. It was a beautifully animated platformer that featured much of the signature humor of The Wonderful World of Mickey Mouse. It was one of the Switch's biggest third-party gems of the last year and it was a strong effort from the developer. We've been interested in learning more of Dlala's story, so we recently had a nice chat with Anthony James Grand-Scrutton about its history.

Grand-Scrutton talks about Dlala's history from the very beginning, talking about taking a chance on leaving Bossa Studios to start a new studio from scratch. He talks about starting with nothing and working from their garages, the origins of the Dlala name, growing as a work-for-hire developer, and the developer's first projects, including 2015's Overruled. He also has plenty of stories to share about Dlala's more high-profile projects, like 2020's Battletoads and the aforementioned Disney Illusion Island, as well as the developer's affinity for 2D animation.

Disney Illusion Island is available now exclusively on Nintendo Switch. For more interviews and videos like this, be sure to visit Shacknews and Shacknews Interviews on YouTube.

Ozzie Mejia

Senior Editor

Ozzie has been playing video games since picking up his first NES controller at age 5. He has been into games ever since, only briefly stepping away during his college years. But he was pulled back in after spending years in QA circles for both THQ and Activision, mostly spending time helping to push forward the Guitar Hero series at its peak. Ozzie has become a big fan of platformers, puzzle games, shooters, and RPGs, just to name a few genres, but he’s also a huge sucker for anything with a good, compelling narrative behind it. Because what are video games if you can't enjoy a good story with a fresh Cherry Coke?