14 DAY TRIAL // As we said on previous occasions, Hollywood must really be in a slump, because it is looking more and more towards videogames for inspiration and story ideas. We are seeing a big number of gaming companies signing off the rights for movies based on their games, and every one of the presumed films is promoted as the title that will change the history of game-based movies. However, only the best selling games usually make it to Hollywood because both the company responsible for the title and the movie studio want to capitalize on the big fan base that would surely go to the cinema to watch them.
But now it would seem that Hollywood can choose a not so successful title for a big screen adaptation, as Electronic Arts has just announced it has signed a contract with Universal Studios in order to make a movie based on its Army of Two shooter game. And don't go thinking it will be an ordinary medium budget flick, as EA has also announced that the team that will work on it has an impressive career. Scott Burns, the one behind the story for The Bourne Ultimatum, will be writing the script, and Scott Stuber, who worked on a variety of titles, including the scrapped Halo movie, will be the producer.
He recently sat down with Variety and talked about this new project. “The ambiguity of these private military corporations lends weight to an intelligent thriller with relevance to what's going on in the world right now. You have contractors with their own agendas, and two guys whose friendship supersedes all the politics. I told EA right off the bat I wasn't a gamer, and that appealed to them because they didn't want to simply replicate the game.”
For those of you who don't know, Army of Two is a third person shooter game launched by EA in March this year for the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3. It focused on co-operative gameplay, thus the title, and engaged players in different combat scenarios that they could win only by working together. It received mixed reviews and it was considered a pretty mediocre title. Yet, who knows how this movie will fare, so all we can do is wait and see.