Electronic Arts has hired Steven Spielberg to develop three game titles for the game company.
To my knowledge it's the first time a major studio producer/director has been tagged to create games first, movies second. There have been games made from movies and visa versa but this will be the first time games will be produced before the movie with the intent of creating content worthy of the silver screen.
Last year, Spielberg offered a hint of where he thinks cinema will go in the 21st century, urging an audience of film students to play more videogames because gaming may one day change the way movies are made, especially since people prefer to stay home than pay a visit to their local cineplex.
To underscore that point, the gaming industry now dwarfs Hollywood studios in terms of revenue. Last year's domestic movie receipts totaled $9.4 billion, less than the $9.9 billion raked in from the sale of videogame hardware and software.
The tail now wags the dog.
It would be interesting to get Chris Roberts' take on this news. While working at Origin Systems in the early 1990's, Roberts converged cinematic themes and first-person gaming into the largely successful Wing Commander series, which paved the way for games to become a growing source of entertainment.
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Well, that's pretty cool. Too bad we're talking about the most overrated director of them all.
Spielberg deserves all the kudos you can lay on him IMHO :) It'll be interesting to see how this plays out. Telling stories is one thing; gameplay is something else. But Spielberg is supposedly a major gamer, so I think we may be surprised.
Spielberg = a brand today, not much more. Kudos for accomplishing that anyway. Sidebar: When actors who appear in games want residuals will you call them 'greedy bastards' too? For someone who makes their living with a practice related to the creative arts I'm always disappointed when you take the simplistic consumer-centric "I wanna save $.02" view. Damn hard for the creative class to make decent money, as one who works with them I'd think you'd be supportive. Most are not Spielbergs y'know.
I may be in a creative practice but I don't demand residuals for every time my work is loaded into a browser or linked to from another site.
Eh... I don't see video games having a big impact on the film industry (see every single movie based on a video game that has failed miserably). And I'd hardly say that $9.9 billion "dwarfs" $9.4 billion.
G--that's because your payment structure is different than film and acting. What if you sold your design services for a specific usage and the buyer went on to use what you designed in ways outside what your agreement specificied, and went on to make lots of money from it. Wouldn't you want some of that? Wouldn't you feel like your work was being used outside of the usage you agreed to? For someone who makes a fuss when a web design gets poached you seem consistently inconsistent on this issue to me, is all. I don't think supporting creative people getting compensated for their work should stop just because it might impact your wallet. I know this is off-topic, so I'll end here.
I'm sure many people have pointed this out, but The Dig was sort of Spielberg's first foray into gaming, even if it was based on an idea for an unmade TV show. I don't believe he had much to do with the actual production of the game, and it's unclear exactly howmuch he'll have to do with these EA games.
Still, step in the right direction and all that.
Game first, movie second. Should prove to be interesting especially if they pull in hard core users of the game for story line input.
Anyone seen Doom yet? I'm an old Doom fan from way back but have to admit... I'm a bit skeptical.
I have no hope for Doom the movie especially with those in-game mode shots. Movies should never attempt to emulate the functionality of game because they lack the interaction and the effect is lost and one-dimensional.
I wonder what it costs to hire a Stephen Spielberg? I'm trying to figure out what color to paint my home office and could use his creative input.
Benjamin Moore - Sultans Palace (red)
I agree the cross over between games and movies lies mostly in their marketing. i.e. built in audience. There is also machinima as it continues to progress.
I was thinking that the Doom movie might look cool on the big screen, but I’ll probably wait until it hits HBO anyway.