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Jaws debuts on Blu-ray August 14th remastered and upmixed (video)
Universal Pictures promised it would celebrate its centennial by bringing classics out of the vaults and onto Blu-ray discs and now one of our most anticipated flicks, Jaws, finally has a release date. Steven Spielberg's 1975 hit will come home in "digitally remastered and fully restored" form with an upmixed 7.1 DTS-HD MA soundtrack August 14th. The soundtrack and picture have both been carefully restored in a process undertaken in conjunction with Spielberg and Amblin Entertainment, as they went back to the original 35mm film and repaired it frame by frame. Also packed in will be four hours of bonus features, including an all new documentary The Shark Is Still Working: The Impact & Legacy of Jaws. If you're wondering about the restoration process, there are a couple of samples included after the break, plus a video about it and teaser trailer for the Blu-ray disc -- we're gonna need a bigger boat.
The Complete Indiana Jones Blu-ray Collection finally brings the entire set home in HD this fall
It's taken forever to come about, but the first three Indiana Jones movies will be released on Blu-ray for the first time later this year. Paramount announced it will deliver The Complete Indiana Jones Blu-ray Collection this fall (no exact date yet), without explaining how it could possibly be complete if it lacked The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles. This set does however include the three movies everyone wants to see (Raiders of the Lost Ark, Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade) plus the other one (Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull) which was previously released on Blu-ray. Paramount and Lucasfilm are promising the "highest possible" picture and audio quality plus a collection of the usual behind the scenes featurettes and extras plus some surprises. Judging by the work Lucasfilm and Fox did on the Star Wars Blu-ray discs we should be in for a treat, and fans of other classic Spielberg flicks have a lot to look forward to from Universal's centennial celebration releases which will include Jaws and E.T. While we wait for more details, hardcore Indy fans can already get their preorder on at Amazon where the set is priced at $74.99, or check after the break for the press release and a few throwback trailers.
Rumor: Dreamworks Halo movie mentioned in press release [update 2]
So this is ... weird. Halo.fr received a press release for the French version of the novel Halo: Cryptum, and it mentions a forthcoming Halo movie in development with Steven Spielberg and Dreamworks. Now, we've gotten better than a greedy mortician at ignoring signs of life from the oft-revived and killed-off Halo movie, and would have been more than happy to dismiss this as a misinformed publicist or hopeful copy editor. But it's a little harder in this case. The blurb mirrors a report from Vuture that Dreamworks was considering adapting the books, avoiding some of the legal cruft gathered around the video game-to-movie adaptation. Ready for the weird part? We ran the story on the Vulture piece exactly one year ago today. Spooky, right? We suspect the interference of ghosts, but we've contacted the novel's US publisher and Microsoft in the hopes of finding our for sure. [Update: We heard back from Tor, which publishes Halo books stateside. It doesn't work with French publisher Milady directly, but was unaware of any movie version of Halo in the works. That's not a denial per se, but if it was happening, you can bet Tor would have heard about it. Update 2: And now, a post from 343 Industries' Frank O'Connor on NeoGAF, which reads "This is ow you say? Ah yes. Ze nonsense." Yeah, we're calling it: Time of death: 12:05 p.m. EST]
Robopocalypse coming soon to a theater near you, Spielberg to smother it in PG
The Robopocalypse is coming -- just not in the way you'd dreaded. DreamWorks and Twentieth Century Fox have joined movie-making forces to reanimate Daniel H. Wilson's fictional (for now) literary account of a future, robot-helmed doomsday. The studios have thrown some guy named Steven Spielberg behind the lens of this cinematic cautionary tale, and plan to scare the bejeezus out of us all when it premieres July 3, 2013 -- that's if we make it past the Mayan end of the world. No casting was mentioned in the project's announcement, so we'll continue to cross our toes in the hopes a certain daytime show couch jumper and film star-turned-pilot don't join in on the blockbuster fear-mongering.
Jurassic Park Trilogy comes to Blu-ray October 25th
We've had to wait quite a while, but after Dreamworks and Steven Spielberg signed up with Universal three years ago, the Jurassic Park Trilogy will finally be available on Blu-ray this fall. All three flicks have been restored and remastered and John Williams' orchestral score will come home in a 7.1 DTS-HD MA encoding. Also included are over two hours of new special features with a six part Return to Jurassic Park documentary focusing on the cast and crew of the films. If that's not enough, there's also a plan for a "Limited Special Edition" with a custom T-Rex statue. No word yet on any pricing info but you can check the press release after the break for the long list of extras and all other details, plus a brand new trailer. Update: Now with the HD trailer Universal just posted to YouTube.
Ubisoft details Adventures of Tintin: The Game, has Kinect and Move support
Ubisoft has handed out some details on the upcoming game based on the Steven Spielberg and Peter Jackson-produced Adventures of Tintin movie. A trailer and short segment of gameplay was shown at the company's E3 conference this afternoon, featuring both a singleplayer campaign that will take players to famous locations in Tintin's world, as well as co-op and competitive gameplay modes with sword combat, aerial fighting, and driving sequences. The game is being developed by Ubisoft Montpellier, the same studio currently working on Rayman Origins and Beyond Good and Evil 2, and is set to come out for consoles and PC later on this holiday season.
See gameplay 'target' footage of Spielberg's canceled Project LMNO
It's common practice for developers to create "target" footage of their games early in the development process in order to give their artists and designers something to shoot for. Following its look back at the now-canceled collaboration between EA and director Steven Spielberg, Project LMNO, 1UP has posted what it says is target gameplay footage from the cooperative "escape" game. It's a (very) brief clip, but it clearly shows the A.I.-driven future girl "Eve" from a first-person perspective, and actions that imply that it's the player's character looking at her. The player sniffs a rose that's sitting in a vase on the table of the diner they appear to be in, and passes it to her. Eve smells it next, showing a range of reactions on her face, then abruptly bolts from the table when a sinister black Humvee pulls up outside. This is presumably the beginning of an escape sequence, and sees Eve performing inhuman acrobatic moves to traverse the restaurant. The footage is clearly pre-rendered, and it's not much to go on, but it's unquestionably neat to see what Project LMNO could have looked like. You can see for yourself just after the break.
Microsoft to spend one billion dollars advertising Kinect and Windows Phone 7
Microsoft's serious about making Kinect a success. A $500 million kind of serious. That's the latest report, courtesy of the New York Post, on the change Steve Ballmer and company intend to drop to make sure that every living and breathing creature in the US knows about the controller-free controller this holiday season. That mirrors earlier analyst estimates placing the Windows Phone 7 marketing budget at a similar figure, which in total would amount to a cool billion dollars in advertising expenditure. We already know Microsoft's scooped the Old Spice Guy for WP7, but Kinect is getting the extra special carpet bombing treatment with Burger King, Pepsi, YouTube, Nickelodeon, Disney, Glee, Dancing with the Stars, People and InStyle magazines, and even Times Square all having a role to play in spreading the word. Yup, it's gonna be pretty hard to miss it.
Report: Rez 2 prototype was in the works, Project LMNO canned
According to industry vet Jake Kazdal, immediately following the completion of Rez, a small group of developers at United Game Artists worked on a prototype for Rez 2. Kazdal -- a man who's worked everywhere from Nintendo to Irem to Sega, and is currently developing Skulls of the Shogun -- also explained on the latest 8-4 Play podcast that another game he worked on, Steven Spielberg's now mythic "Project LMNO," has been cancelled. EA confirmed as much, telling Joystiq this afternoon, "While EA maintains its relationship with Steven Spielberg, we ceased development of LMNO." We pushed EA for clarification about the status of any projects in development with Spielberg and were told again, "EA maintains its relationship with Steven Spielberg. EA has ceased development of LMNO. EA continually monitors development resources and adjusts resources as appropriate. No new title announcements."
Back to the Future's 25th Anniversary celebrated by a Blu-ray box set October 26
The Back to the Future trilogy is coming to Blu-ray for its 25th Anniversary, with a boxed set hitting stores October 26. There's apparently two hours of new extra content, with plenty of BD-Live and U-control features baked in. Back to the Future.net reports these should be great looking and sounding, with an all new transfer that preserves the original film grain and lets viewers hear the "full dynamic range" of the audio. Of course, we would have preferred a hoverboard and Mr. Fusion pack-in, but we may have to wait for the 50th anniversary to get those -- details are in the press release after the break.
Naughty Bear's cannibalistic, Jaws-inspired trailer
The parodies keep coming for Naughty Bear, as this latest trailer takes a bite out of Steven Spielberg's horror hit, Jaws. While we definitely enjoy the spirited homage, we do have one issue: it's straight-up cannibalism. We don't care if these bears are full of fluffy cotton -- seeing one bear consume another is terrifying. You can get in on our own personal nightmare by clicking the play button after the break. Just don't say we didn't warn you.
Funny or Die unlocks 'Spielberg' level in Call of Duty
If there's one thing we don't get to talk about enough here on our vidya game blog, it's film legend Tom Hanks. The man just has a presence about him, one that adds an indefinable trait to anything he breathes on. Luckily, the restraining order he filed against us doesn't extend to the realm of typed-out words on the internet, so when we saw this Funny or Die (NSFW) video that combines a bit of Call of Duty with that gruesome Normandy Invasion scene from Saving Private Ryan, we just knew we had to post it up. You can check it out past the break, but be warned: Aside from seeing all that gore, you'll hear the cackles of foul-mouthed Brits. Small price to pay for one of the funniest things you'll see, if you ask us.[Via Go Nintendo]
EA job listing mentions next-gen project for Boom Blox team
We've heard sly references and seen mysterious job listings indicating that Xbox 360 and PS3 owners would soon know the joy of tower toppling -- however, we've not seen anything as concrete as a recent help wanted ad from EA's Boom Blox team. According to the listing, "our last two titles were Wii-based, but our next titles will be for the next generation." We assume they actually mean the current generation's high definition consoles. Otherwise, whoa, we just confirmed the PS4. This job listing, which was initially discovered by internet detective extraordinaire supererogatory, is supported by two other EA job listings he (or she) previously uncovered -- both of which reference Project Natal or the unnamed PlayStation Motion Controller. Unless the studio is changing directions to work on a motion-controlled Mirror's Edge (which would be unimaginably dangerous on Natal), the odds of an upcoming high-def Boom Blox announcement seem pretty good.
Microsoft says Halo movie still stalled
We hope we didn't get your hopes too high with yesterday's rumor that Mama Spielberg's favorite son was interested in making a Halo movie of his own. Microsoft told Kotaku early this morning, "The Halo feature film remains on hold as we focus on projects like Halo 3: ODST and Halo: Reach."Here's some friendly advice from us to you. Adopt the attitude that the Halo movie is never, ever, ever going to happen. Then, if you see it on the local marquee, it'll be a great surprise. If not, well, you knew it all along, didn't you?
Ambitious Halo fan film looking for donations
It figures. The moment we hear the rumor that Spielberg is interested in making a Halo movie, we learn about an intriguing fan film that we have to imagine would be in deep trouble if a studio project got off the ground. The Britain-based "Chastity Project" is looking to raise around £30,000 (roughly $49,000) to film a movie of the same name in the spring of next year.They'd be a lot easier to write off as nut jobs if they hadn't already crafted some really cool props, like the Warthog-in-progress you can see above. Here's hoping the lawyers don't inevitably crush their dreams.[Thanks, Dylan]
Rumor: Spielberg looking to produce Halo movie
The Halo movie may be dead to Neill Blomkamp and Peter Jackson, but it's apparently not dead dead, as IESB reports Spielberg is in negotiations to produce the feature film. Spielberg only had to read Stuart Beattie's script before wanting to tackle the project, IESB claims, which focuses on The Fall of Reach, the prequel to the original Halo game written by Eric Nylund. This likely comes as either bad news or good news, depending on your feelings toward Spielberg these days. Some enjoyed his recent Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, while others still remember those stupid walkie-talkies. [Via Eurogamer]
Spielberg's LMNO project may have been renamed 'Eve'
You know, for a game that was supposed to be dead, Steven Spielberg's codenamed project "LMNO" sure has been generating a lot of heat lately. First, the aforementioned near cancellation and subsequent resurrection, and now we get word from superannuation that the game may have been renamed "Eve."The title (apparently derived from the game's AI-controlled female lead) was spotted on the resume of Melissa Garza, who assisted with mo-cap on the game [Update: Ms. Garza has asked that we clarify she only worked on preliminary motion capture, not the game itself.] Sure, it's probably just a working title, but we really want LMNO to be released, so we're doing what we can to keep the story alive.
Jason Rohrer: Spielberg's 'LMNO' project probably cancelled
Before it was known as Boom Blox, Steven Spielberg's puzzle game project was known as PQRS, and it was revealed alongside an Xbox 360/PS3 action game, codenamed LMNO, about a former secret agent on the run with a dynamic AI character.Boom Blox, of course, was released to great critical acclaim, but LMNO hasn't been so lucky. In fact, the last thing we heard about it were rumors that the team had been laid off (which Spielberg denied) and the project put on hold.In an interview with Edge, Passage creator Jason Rohrer revealed that he had been involved with the project. "On top of (odd programming jobs), I did some consulting work, most recently for EA on the Spielberg LMNO project," he told Edge. "My understanding is that project's pretty much been canceled now, what with the changing economy, but I'm not sure."[Update: EA responds, telling Kotaku: "The rumor is incorrect. EA remains deeply committed to its collaboration with Steven Spielberg and projects we are developing together. LMNO was a code name for a project in development at EALA. While the project continues to develop at EALA with Steven, we no longer refer to it as LMNO. We have no further details to reveal at this time."]
Ubisoft making games based on Spielberg/Jackson Tintin films
Ubisoft's Yves Guillermot just announced that the company is working with both Steven Spielberg and (King Kong director and game collaborator) Peter Jackson on games based on the upcoming Spielberg-directed, Jackson-produced movie adaptation of the Tintin comic. The movie is currently slated for late 2011, so we'd expect to see the game around the same time.Spielberg's pretty busy being peripherally involved with the video game business today!
Spielberg presents: Spielberg in: Boom Blox Bash Party trailer
In the latest trailer for Boom Blox: Bash Party, the man with a plan, Steven Spielberg, gets intimate and offers details on EA's sequel to its beloved Wii puzzler. Marketing jargon is thrown around quite freely, with Spielberg admitting that Bash Party "takes Boom Blox to a new level" and that "all of the good ideas" were saved for the sequel. Yeah, right.Thankfully, the video doesn't stray into that territory for long, as we eventually get a close look at what we all want to see: multiplayer! If that doesn't look like fun, then we must be dead.%Gallery-43440%
