 In September 1994, Atari Corp. and Williams Entertainment announced their partnership that included plans to update and release some of Williams' early arcade games for the Jaguar such as "Defender", "Joust" and "", with Atari handling the publishing of these titles.Six months later it was announced that, alongside "Mortal Kombat III" coming to the Jaguar as a result of their partnership, "Defender 2000" and "Dactyl Joust" were in development for the system.It was also revealed that Jeff Minter, who was previously involved with "Tempest 2000", was working on the game and that it would feature three gameplay modes.