io9
Chair Entertainment Group announced that they'll be developing a series of games based on Orson Scott Card's novel Ender's Game. However, it's not clear if they're developing the games from the novel, or if they'll try to tell the story of the novel in video game fashion.
We know for sure the first game will be based on one of the games that Ender plays during his training, but the company wants to turn this into a series, and eventually they're going to have to tell some sort of a story. Of course, in the book, the game is literally everything.
In the novel, Ender Wiggin is selected at the age of six to attend the Battle School, which the military uses with the hopes that they'll one day train a great military leader who will lead the fight against the "Buggers," an insect-like race that is at war with the humans. They do this by teaching via video games and simulations, and without spoiling things, those become extremely important. Games range from simulations computers, to what amounts to zero-gravity versions of Laser Tag.
Warners is developing the movie with Wolfgang Peterson at the helm, but they abandoned work on the game that usually accompanies every big scifi film these days. Does that mean they couldn't crack the idea and decided to leave it up to someone else? If you've read the book, you'd probably say yes.
Ender's Game In The Works [Sci Fi Wire]
Comments
I say yes. I also say that a mindless videogame shoot-em-up is the exact opposite of the philosophy of the novel. But there's money to be made, so whatevz.
the end battle would be cool.
I thought the game was basically going to be the Battle Room. You work your way up through being a launchie, part of a toon, toon leader, to eventually commanding your own army. Didn't sound like there was a lot to it, certainly not playing through as Ender. That's at least the take I got from yesterday's press release. Maybe the future titles would focus on the space combat simulations found later in the book (trying not to spoil any plot for those who might not have read this excellent book).
There hasn't been any real status on the movie since September, I don't think Peterson is officially attached at this point though, but he has expressed that he wants to do it. Doing a live-action "Ender's Game" movie is incredibly challenging, mostly around the age of the actors and the situations they are going to have to put them in (is an audience ready to see a 5-year old boy brutally kill another to start the movie off?). I thought the Battle Room scenes would be tough too, but over the last few years that tech has come a long way too (Quidditch, etc.) I've said for years that I think an animated version is the only way they could really do it, but the tech wasn't there to make it real enough. Until I saw Beowulf. I think that might just be the way to go for this. Real, but not.
I just finally started reading this last week and as I was read it (haven't finished) I kept saying this is great, would be a great movie, but totally unfilmable because it would be all children in adult situations. So I said, it would probably be doable as a video game... and there you have it.
@AZTriGuy: Yeah MoCap CG was the other thing I was thinking that could get you away from the burdens of an all child cast (and the serious dramatic skills needed for a couple of the stars). Somewhere between Beowulf and Monster House, while totally ignoring the creeeeeepy kids in Polar Express.
Why do They insist on destroying all my beautiful stories?
At this point I'm so jaded about how badly all the adaptations are done that there's a constant cube of shame nesting in my stomach.
@Katana_Mind: Weighted shame cube?
@Garrison Dean: Agreed. When I first read this as a kid (good lord, I just realized I read this for the first time nearly 20 years ago...) I thought animation wasthe only way, but wouldn't do it justice. Then Pixar came around and I thought again, but it still wouldn't have been real enough. Final Fantasy animation? Nope, not lifelike enough. Polar Express was getting there, but yes, creeeeeeepy. The way that technology advanced for Beowulf, I'm convinced they could pull it off that way now. Still going to be controversial with putting such young kids in adult situations, though. Then again, I just watched 300, and that opening montage with the young Leonidas beating the crap out of the other kid, if that made it through then maybe there's a chance...
Must one be naked to play it?
@urukhaifive:
But of course : )
Only, with a tear decorating its sides, instead of the customary heart.
Rated E for Everyone except homosexuals.
We need:
FPS Battleroom
3rd person Fantasy Game
The game that Ender beat the older kid at best 2 out of 3
And maybe a naked in the showers Bonzo hand-to-hand combat, plus the full simulation he plays on eros.
It sure as hell won't be a remake of Advent Rising.
@urukhaifive: Any relation to my dear friend, the Weighted Companion Cube?
@nutbastard: I agree but you should be able to be Bean, too.
@bunnypower:
i didn't say you couldn't...?
Text based adventure game ala Zork.
@nutbastard: I know! : ) Miss you.
@nutbastard: It should be more than a FPS, as there's definitely a strategy element to the battle room. Maybe you give orders and formations to your troops before combat starts, and then let AI take over? Or some combination thereof?
@mumblingmynah:
or do a thing like rainbow 6 vegas whee you can switch seamlessly between 1st and 3rd person. the big problem is the "you can only shoot where you're looking" limitation we currently live under. the maneuvers describes in the book often involved flying on way while spinning and shooting in another direction.
for a single player battle room game, yeah, something like that but with AI it becomes less dynamic, more, well, artificial. MMO would be better.
i dont know how youd handle the flash suit though. honestly if theres one game that CANNOT be done to satisfaction, its the Battle Room. how would you grab a frozen soldier and throw him, or wrap him around you as a shield, grabbing his gun and going akimbo? the battle room is so much more complex than its often made out to be.
Wait 50 years and they'll have a real one.
Oh, boy! A collection of minigames!
* Bully thrashing (think SF II... but with kids)!
* Hacking the desks (think Uplink)!
* The Giant Game (think Fable)!
* The Battle Room (think Capture The Flag)!
* The War "Simulation" (think Homeworld)!
* Writing Political Screeds as Peter/Demosthenes!
Sounds... just great.
@nutbastard: An MMO with players' teams competing for real rankings would be sweet. Maybe a certain percentage of the team is controlled by AI: the "launchies," who would naturally be awkward and clueless. But yeah, I forgot about the mechanics of the flash suit. There's no way to make that work.
Remember, the gate is down...
Unless you're actually, say, invading Iran by playing the game, it's a wash.
they shoulda made this film, and made it GOOD, years ago. yeah, I know, 'well' is grammatically correct, so bite me nutsack, Mildred.
@cde: Third cousins, twice-removed.
[blog.newsweek.com]
The game is going to be the Battle Room - it's being designed to be distributed via online content providers like Xbox Live Marketplace and Playstation Network.
The game always was to disable Peter but he figured it out to late being a 3rd and never made it back to earth in time to dispute the hedgemony. His sister was powerless besides being a political blogger peon to Peters ideals. Ofcourse a videogame would be pointless as that isn't the point of the book anyway. If they took it down the road of the book overall timeline they could make a good game about how judgement and ideals of one species interplanetary or family can doom both in the process.
@Katana_Mind: speaking of weighted companion cubes, i actually found "the enemy's base is down" a good philosophy for quickly orienting one's self when making the transition from one portal to the next.
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