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Video Games: The Movie finds publisher, release date
Following a controversial, yet undeniably successful crowdfunding campaign, Video Games: The Movie has been picked up for theatrical distribution in North America on July 18. According to The Hollywood Reporter, Variance Films will distribute the film to theaters, though its initial debut comes on July 15 via a digital, iTunes-exclusive release. The movie, which features narration from one-time Goonie Sean Astin, hopes to document the rise of the games industry from its pixelated roots to its current status as a modern media juggernaut to rival any other in existence. "Everyone loves a great video game, but in recent years they've evolved into something way beyond what any of us who grew up playing an 8-bit system could imagine," Variance Films president Dylan Marchetti told The Hollywood Reporter. "But regardless of whether you're up gaming until 3 a.m. or haven't played a video game in decades, there's something for you in this film, and we think audiences will be delighted." [Image: Variance Films]
Duncan Jones: Filming on Warcraft is now complete
Though it won't hit theaters until March of 2016, director (and David Bowie progeny) Duncan Jones has announced that filming on the World of Warcraft movie adaptation is now complete. "Final day on Warcraft now officially... wrapped!! Off to bed for 3 hours before a meeting in the AM. Goodnight/good morning twitter!" Jones tweeted, before being showered in congratulations from his various followers and electronic hangers on. Scant plot information is available, suffice to say Warcraft focuses on the eternal struggle between Azeroth's human-led Alliance races and the Horde, a noble yet overtly aggressive group consisting of orcs, trolls, tauren and the like. Paula Patton (Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol) and Travis Fimmel (Vikings) reportedly headline the film's cast. [Image: Blizzard]
Hollywood production company Lionsgate grows gaming arm
Though best known for the films it produces and distributes - including hits like The Hunger Games - Lionsgate has decided to take a swing at the world of interactive entertainment via a newly-announced gaming division. According to Games Industry, Lionsgate has tapped Peter Levin to lead the company's new wing. Levin is best known as co-founder and former CEO of Nerdist Industries, a growing online presence created by former MTV fixture Chris Hardwick that caters to a wide range of geeky proclivities. At Lionsgate, Levin will be in charge of investing in new intellectual property, growing existing properties and leveraging the company's not insignificant supply of popular franchises to create games. "Peter is a perfect fit for our entrepreneurial culture, and he is ideally qualified to lead the continued growth of our content business into the video game space and other interactive digital ventures," said Lionsgate CEO Jon Feltheimer in a statement following the announcement. [Image: Lionsgate]
Sony Pictures registers BioShock movie domains
The on-again, off-again BioShock movie adaptation appears to be on the move again, as Sony Pictures has registered three domains seemingly related to the ethereal film. As Kotaku points out, Sony Pictures now holds the rights to bioshock-movie.com, bioshock-movie.net and bio-shock.net. None of those URLS bring up any sort of content, suggesting a preemptive move to lock up the domains in the event that Sony Pictures has need of them later. While this does not necessarily mean that the BioShock movie has entered production, it should be mentioned that this isn't the first time we've heard about this project in recent months. An IGN report from March 13 claims that Courtnee Draper, the actress who lent her voice to BioShock Infinite heroine Elizabeth, has been badgering BioShock maestro Ken Levine for the same role in the event of a movie adaptation. This is especially intriguing, given that Levine claims to have killed the BioShock production that Universal Studios was attempting to mount with Gore Verbinski in the director's chair. If Levine is still kicking around the idea to the extent that he's discussing the movie with a potential lead actress, maybe he hasn't entirely turned his back on the idea. Our attempts to reach BioShock publisher 2K Games for more information were met with a boilerplate "no comment." [Image: 2K Games]
Report: Lego: The Hobbit to add third movie's storyline via DLC
When Lego: The Hobbit debuts in April, the game will only feature content from The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey and The Desolation of Smaug, though the third film in the Peter Jackson-directed trilogy may appear later as DLC, according to reports from the London Toy Fair. Brick Fanatics, a UK site focusing on all things Lego, states that developer Traveler's Tales plans to launch a sizable downloadable addition for Lego: The Hobbit right around the same time that The Hobbit: There And Back Again rolls into theaters. The film is currently slated to debut on December 17, giving the developer eight months to cobble together its downloadable content. As Brick Fanatics points out, this will be a novel situation for the developer. Traveler's Tales has released DLC for its previous Lego games, though so far it's all been minor additions like characters and new costumes. On the other hand, Traveler's Tales has a long history of working with cinematic trilogies, so it makes a certain kind of sense that the developer would want to touch on the final Hobbit film, even if its game will debut eight months prior to the movie's launch. Lego: The Hobbit will reach the Xbox 360, Xbox One, PlayStation 3, PlayStation 4, Vita handheld, Wii U and 3DS on April 8. [Image: WB]
Meet the xenomorph in this behind the scenes Alien: Isolation trailer
In lieu of serving up in-game footage or even pre-rendered cutscenes from the upcoming sci fi survival horror game Alien: Isolation, the developers at Creative Assembly instead offer this behind-the-scenes look at how the team is translating Hollywood-style horror for the virtual world. The focus of the clip is on the creation of the game's titular xenomorph, and specifically the artificial intelligence ruling its in-game behaviors. According to the game's designers, the alien utilizes a unique set of "senses" to actively hunt players down, leading to encounters with the creature that can last up to half an hour, depending on how cautious a player is in approaching the confrontation. The development team claims this just isn't possible with scripted cutscenes and traditional enemy behavior patterns, but the extra effort poured into the birth of the xenomorph pays off by presenting players with an enemy that is both deadly and unexpectedly cunning. Alien: Isolation is slated for release toward the end of 2014, when it will debut on the Xbox 360, Xbox One, PC, PlayStation 3 and PlayStation 4 platforms. [Image: Sega]
The Last of Us film moving ahead with Naughty Dog writing
Naughty Dog's stellar PlayStation 3 exclusive, The Last of Us, may soon appear in theaters, thanks to an agreement between the developer, Sony and Resident Evil: Afterlife production company Screen Gems. According to Deadline, the film adaptation will be written by Neil Druckmann who served as creative director on The Last of Us. Druckmann will also join Naughty Dog co-presidents Evan Wells and Christophe Balestra as well as game director Bruce Straley in designing the film's overall creative vision. Ghost House Productions, a company led by Evil Dead auteur Sam Raimi, will assist with general production duties. "Screen Gems' Brian Dukes and Eric Ling brought this game to my attention insisting we go after it, and when I saw the quality of the storytelling, I knew the audience for this project was far greater than just the gaming community and that Neil Druckmann must write the screenplay," stated Screen Gems president Clint Culpepper. Missing from Deadline's report is any info on who might star in or direct the movie. This means you readers get to fill the comments below with speculative casting choices - well, except for Ellie. That one's a no-brainer. [Image: Sony]
See the Need for Speed ad you missed by skipping the Super Bowl
Those of you who didn't spend yesterday hovering around a glowing picture box, while giant sports guys from Seattle trounced giant sports guys from Denver, missed the above teaser for the live-action Need for Speed movie. Aside from pretty cars crashing and Aaron Paul's sole line of dialogue, you didn't miss much. [Image: Dreamworks]
Review: Final Draft 9, the world's most popular screenwriting software plays catch up
Final Draft is without a doubt the industry's leading software for screenwriting. It is used in virtually every writer's room across Hollywood and endorsed by such heavyweights as James Cameron, Tom Hanks and JJ Abrams. However, the reason the software rose to the top spot in the film world is that for years there were no better alternatives. That's changed a lot in the last five or so years, with plenty of cheaper and more feature-rich alternatives popping up on the Mac platform. As a matter of fact, many in the industry had started to complain that Final Draft was showing its age and it needed to do some serious catching up. And "catching up" is indeed what the company has done with the latest major release of Final Draft -- Final Draft 9. How'd they do? Read on. New Mac-Only Features While there are plenty of good scriptwriting software alternatives now available on the Mac, the reason Final Draft has such a strong hold on the industry is because it's a strong cross-platform app, with versions for OS X and Windows. But it seems like the company realized it was going to have to give a little more love to the Mac side of things this time around given all the advances its Mac competitors have made in the four years since the last major version of Final Draft was released. The most noticeable change you'll see in Final Draft 9 is that it now supports the MacBook Pro's Retina display. This is huge to those writers with a Retina MBP because Final Draft 8 frankly looked like a pixelated mess on Apple's latest notebooks. In addition to supported Retina text, all the buttons and menu items have also been Retina-ized. Other Mac love added to Final Draft 9 includes full-screen support, full Mavericks support and support for OS X 10.9's dictation. Unfortunately, Final Draft 9 doesn't support iCloud's Documents in the Cloud, nor does it support OS X's versioning. New Cross-platform Features Moving beyond the Mac-only features, Final Draft 9 adds plenty of enhancements for both Mac and Windows. The new Character Navigator now lets you add character arc beats in each scene and it also adds non-speaking characters to the Navigator, which helps you keep track of all characters in a script. The ScriptNotes Navigator has an all-new look and now allows users to sort their notes by color, name or type. Another nice feature is Character Highlighting, which highlights each character's dialogue with a different color in the script. This makes it easier for actors and others to keep track of dialogue during table reads. A huge boon is also the ability to watermark scripts in printing and saving to PDF. For every script you print or share as a PDF, you can add a unique watermark to it identifying the person who the script is being given to. This means it's easy to track down who leaked the script if it appears online. Final Draft 9 also includes a host of other, smaller new features including improved spell checkers, thesaurus enhancements, the ability to custom-order Character Lists, Revision page color support and more. Cost and Verdict At a US$249.99 price tag, one may think that the relatively limited major new features for a piece of flagship screenwriting software aren't worth the price, but as usual with any piece of professional software, it's all the little changes taken as a whole that give major updates their worth. With that in mind, I think Final Draft 9 is a no-brainer for any Mac user in the business of writing screenplays. If you own a Retina MacBook Pro, Final Draft 9 is worth buying just for the Retina display support alone. But even if you don't need the Retina support, Final Draft 9 is a decent upgrade that helps the aging software catch up to the younger upstarts -- and for that, it is worth it. Until the end of January, customers can buy the full version of Final Draft 9 for $199.99 on the Mac App Store or via Final Draft's online store. That's 20 percent off of the normal $249.99 price tag. Users of Final Draft 8 can buy the Final Draft 9 upgrade for $79.99 on Final Draft's online store (the upgrade price goes back up to $99.99 on February 1st). A note on buying Final Draft 9: If you don't qualify for upgrade pricing, seriously consider buying the full version of Final Draft 9 through the Mac App Store. Final Draft is notorious for having an annoying and archaic registration process if you buy a version requiring that you enter the serial number each time you install it. You'll save yourself a lot of time and some big headaches if you bypass the serial number all together and get it through the Mac App Store.
Uwe Boll will return to the director's chair for The Rampage 2
Notorious filmmaker Uwe Boll has announced plans for a sequel to his controversial 2009 film, The Rampage. Like its predecessor, The Rampage 2 will star Brendan Fletcher as an unhinged man driven to violent acts. Instead of centering on a bloody killing spree as in The Rampage, the sequel will see Fletcher's character taking hostages at a TV station, then using his captives as "a political platform to awaken humanity." According to the Hollywood Reporter, The Rampage 2 will be filmed over the course of a six-day shoot in British Columbia. Word that Boll is working on The Rampage 2 comes only a few short months after the director attempted to fund a sequel to his film adaptation of Postal on Kickstarter. Unfortunately for Boll, that effort only raised $29,977 of the $500,000 he was seeking. There is currently no word on when we can expect to see The Rampage 2 in theaters, though if the movie follows the same path as Boll's other recent films expect it to skip movie houses entirely and go straight to DVD.
New URLs stoke rumors of Last of Us film adaptation
Few planned film adaptations of video games ever make it off the ground, but new domains registered by Sony indicate that the company is at least working toward a big-screen version of Naughty Dog's apocalyptic hit The Last of Us. GameSpot recently discovered the two domains, TheLastOfUsMovie.net and TheLastOfUs-Movie.com, despite Sony taking pains to obfuscate these sites. Instead of registering the domains through Sony or one of its many subsidiaries, the two URLs were registered by a corporation called MarkMonitor which grabs websites like these for clients who would prefer that their name stay out of the same media spotlight we're now shining at them. That said, it's possible that Sony is acquiring these URLs as a way to protect any future plans it may or may not have to make a Last of Us film. Corporations plan these things long in advance, and there's any number of reasons why a company might want to lock down valuable intellectual property. On the other hand, The Last of Us was one of the best games of 2013, has sold more than three million units in half a year, and generated more critical hyperbole than most publishers could ever hope for. With all that built-in momentum, Sony just needs to find a talented, young lead to play Ellie. Maybe that girl from Juno is available.
Cinefex 'classic collection' coming to iPad in 2014
One of my favorite things in the world, Cinefex magazine, has funded the digitization of its older magazines to its iPad app thanks to a Kickstarter campaign that has become the fourth most-funded publishing project on the site to date. Cinefex, for those who don't know, is a magazine that takes a behind-the-scenes look at special effects work for Hollywood movies. Back in my film school days, I would get an issue when I could afford it, and pore over the photos and text, which took me backstage to some of the world's most talented artists, designers, animators and more. Much of what Cinefex documented shows the evolution of effects work as well, not to mention rare glimpses into what made some of our favorite movies work. The photo of the Stay-Puft Marshmallow man on the Kickstarter page should be enough to clue you in as to how awesome this magazine is for film buffs, never mind anyone actually working in the industry. And to supplement the current Cinefex iPad app, now those older issues of Cinefex will be available via its iPad app by January 2014, according to the Kickstarter page.
The Daily Grind: What MMO should be made into a movie?
As MMO gamers, we're far more accustomed to seeing our favorite movie franchises become games than the other way around, but the upcoming World of Warcraft movie might just reverse the trend. Of course, if the Massively commenters are any judge, the WoW movie will be a trainwreck of epic proportions, either because of the source material or because showrunners often prove more likely to misunderstand, insult, bore, or mock geeks rather than dive into geek favorites earnestly. (MMO TV commercials don't inspire us with much confidence, either.) But surely there's some MMO franchise out there that could be done and done right as a movie. MMOs have come to TV in a big way in the form of Defiance, which might not be the best sci-fi of all time but has at least made it to a second season. Shouldn't we embrace our hobby's arrival on the big screen? And if not WoW, what MMO setting would be better for the Hollywood treatment? Every morning, the Massively bloggers probe the minds of their readers with deep, thought-provoking questions about that most serious of topics: massively online gaming. We crave your opinions, so grab your caffeinated beverage of choice and chime in on today's Daily Grind!
Five apps for the summer blockbuster movie season
Summer is reaching its peak which means the blockbuster movie season is in full swing. Below is a list of five movie apps, hand-picked by the folks at TUAW, to test your movie trivia and make your movie watching experience more enjoyable. Check out the list below and add your own recommendations in the comments. Anything After -The Movie Credits Stinger App [iOS Universal; US$0.99] Don't miss that funny cut scene because you skipped the credits to hurry out to your car. Anything After will let you know when a movie has a bonus scene or extra content after the credits. Run Pee [iOS Universal; $0.99] Run pee will tell you the best time to take a bathroom break during a movie. You can relax while you relieve yourself knowing you won't miss an important scene. 4 Movie Scenes [iPhone; Free] Challenge your friends by asking them to identify the movies shown in a montage of scenes grabbed from popular flicks. Jumbl: movies [iOS Universal; $0.99] Test your movie knowledge by unscrambling the world jumble to spell the titles of popular movies. MediaStinger [iPhone; Free] Another stinger app that'll let you know whether a movie has extra content after or during a trailer. It also includes news, movie reviews, and trailers for your viewing pleasure.
Ubifilms for Ghost Recon, Watch Dogs, Far Cry and Rabbids coming
Ubisoft has been bitten by the acting bug it seems, as the company is preparing film adaptations of Watch Dogs, Ghost Recon, Far Cry and its zany mascots, the Rabbids – of course, this won't be the first movie to bear the Far Cry name. For all these films, Ubisoft will have full creative control, Variety reports. Ubisoft will select screenwriters, directors, actors and other positions necessary to make these movies, and isn't looking to simply repeat the games' existing stories. Last week, Ubisoft announced it was working with Michael Bay to bring Ghost Recon to the big screen at Warner Bros – an announcement we missed during the madness of E3. "These are not adaptations," Ubisoft Motion Picture CEO Jean-Julien Baronnet told Variety. "We will create a brand new story. Always." The Rabbids film – not to be confused with the TV show announced last week – will be a live-action film where the Rabbids star as CG characters, like The Smurfs, Alvin and the Chipmunks or Bill Murray's only regret, Garfield. There is currently no timetable for these films, as Ubisoft still needs to secure scriptwriters. Ubisoft has two other films in the works right now: an Assassin's Creed movie starring Michael Fassbender – which has been pushed a month to June 2015 – and a Splinter Cell flick with Tom Hardy as Sam Fisher.
Ubisoft hires English playwright to pen Assassin's Creed screenplay
The Assassin's Creed movie is getting some backstage class by tapping English playwright Michael Lesslie to adapt the screenplay. Lesslie's previous writing work includes Prince of Denmark, which was performed at the National Theatre in 2012, short films such as Skirt, and an acclaimed adaptation of the memoir War Reporting for Cowards.Michael Fassbender, recently known as Magneto in X-Men: First Class and the robot David in Prometheus, is set to star in and co-produce the Assassin's Creed film. In October, Ubisoft Motion Pictures tagged New Regency as a partner on the movie. We're pretty shocked at all the public information about this film; for some reason, we assumed the whole thing would be more stealthy.
Kotick on why firing West, Zampella was easy, turning down a CoD film
Activision CEO Bobby Kotick settled a lawsuit with former employees Jason West and Vince Zampella, both now of Respawn Entertainment, in May. Kotick fired West and Zampella in 2010, after learning they were going to bail on their contracts to sign under EA, Kotick said, and from there, his job was easy:"You find out two executives are planning to break their contracts, keep the money you gave them and steal 40 employees. What do you do? You fire them," Kotick told The New York Times in an extensive profile. West and Zampella sued Activision for royalties they said they never received from Modern Warfare 2, and though the terms of the settlement were never disclosed, the case's conclusion had West smiling.Kotick's NYT profile extended from his high school years, when he would pick up friends in a chauffeured limo to visit Studio 54, to his time in college and to the present, when he fended off offers from Hollywood to turn Call of Duty into a high-budget film. Kotick said movies based on games rarely do well with fans and could blemish the Call of Duty brand.He might be on to something there.
Angry Birds movie tags Despicable Me, Iron Man producers, out in 2016
The Angry Birds movie is happening. Despicable Me producer John Cohen has signed on to produce, and Iron Man executive producer David Maisel is taking the same role in Rovio's feature film. The Angry Birds movie is set to hit theaters in summer 2016, and it's fully funded and produced by Rovio outside of the standard studio system."John's an exceptionally talented producer, and we're delighted to have him join the flock," says Mikael Hed, Rovio CEO. "With John's hands-on producer background and David's expertise in establishing and running his own successful studio, these two are the dream team for making a movie outside the studio system. Both professionals have the ideal skills and vision to achieve incredible things."Rovio held meetings with Hollywood advisers in 2010 and was rumored to have sought funding to the tune of $1.2 billion in 2011 to expand its entertainment offerings. As this film takes off, keep one thing in mind: Cohen is the guy who thought 2007's Alvin and the Chipmunks was a good idea.
A Week Between Blockbusters
You're reading Reaction Time, a weekly column that claims to examine recent events, games and trends in the industry, but is really just looking for an excuse to use the word "zeitgeist." It debuts on Fridays in Engadget's digital magazine, Distro. Thanks to a shared caution between movie studios, you were saved from seconds of paralyzing indecision last weekend. Had Total Recall and The Bourne Legacy stuck to a shared release date in theaters, as originally scheduled, you'd have become a seated participant in an extravagant and mutually destructive showdown. Between Colin Farrell and Jeremy Renner, which pouting action star would have gotten your twelve bucks and two hours?If you're a movie buff, you might not even hesitate spending time and money on both consecutively. But what happens when you bump the price up to $60, and extend the temporal investment to something between 8 and 80 hours? Now you see the dilemma squeezed in-between this holiday's most anticipated shooters, Halo 4 and Call of Duty: Black Ops 2, and all of a sudden one week doesn't seem like much of a buffer at all.
Twitter rumored to be pitching in-feed video shows to studios
Twitter has been making a giant push for expanded tweets from content providers. It's only a short logical leap from that to Twitter providing the content itself, and that's exactly what AdWeek claims may well happen. Its unconfirmed tipsters have the microblog taking a page from YouTube by pitching Hollywood movie and TV studios on "several" original shows that would live in followers' feeds, including the seemingly inescapable reality show. While Twitter wouldn't have someone in the director's chair, it might still play a role by letting viewers affect the show as it's happening -- and of course, running ads. Silence is the only official response to the rumor from Twitter so far; don't plan your viewing schedule just yet, but do brace yourself in case Twitter breaks out a Horse ebooks cameo to boost ratings in mid-season.
