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“One of the biggest hurdles to selling entertainment is the awareness problem -
making sure
that potential customers understand what it is you’re promising them.”
“For Nightfire it wasn’t so much ‘input’ as it was ‘direction.’ The design of the game including weapons, characters, missions, plot and script were mostly invented at EA and MGM. Gearbox artists and content mak- ers constructed the content for the game.”
Eidos Games have more experience than most of the video game/movie intersection. Makers of the Tomb Raider games, they’ve now seen two successful Lara Croft games spin off into cinemas.
“We have final script approval and also work closely with Paramount throughout the whole process,” says Stave Starvis, head of Eidos Communications. However he doesn’t necessarily think that an Enter The Matrix approach is the future.
“I think what they have done is very clever, however this does- n’t mean that every game based on a film will have to go down the same route. The most impor- tant thing is delivering a quality game that enables people to ‘experience’ the film.
“Video gaming is certainly becoming a bigger part of the whole merchandising machine, you go and see the film, you
buy the t-shirt, action-figures and the game.”
The general feel amongst game developers seems to be that while Enter The Matrix was interesting, it’s not fired the imagi- nation of consumers to such an extent that they (and film studios) feel compelled to follow in its footsteps.
Even Shiny Entertainment/Atari seem to be stepping away from the idea a little. This year’s sec- ond Matrix film, Matrix Revolutions, is due in cinemas in November, but (despite the fact the film was shot back to back with Matrix Reloaded) no second intricate tie-in has been planned. There will be a second Matrix game from the company, but probably not until Christmas 2004.
So if Enter The Matrix is the future, then it’s the long-term future rather than the short-term for film-game tie-ins. What is cer- tain though is that the genre will keep developing.
“One of the biggest hurdles to selling entertainment is the aware- ness problem - making sure that potential customers understand what it is you’re promising them,” says Gearbox’s Randy Pitchford.
“That problem becomes min- imised when a form of entertain-
ment can leverage some kind of idea that already has occupied mindshare.”
“I think a lot of people fanta- sise about being James Bond. I think more people fantasise about being able to hack into the Matrix (if such a thing were to exist).
“I saw some people at movie theatre waiting in line for Matrix Reloaded that looked as if they actually believed the ‘matrix’ was real. Living fantasies is a real- ly important part of being human. Interactive entertain- ment (like video games) helps people do that.
“As long as there’s a lot of people interested in living a fan- tasy created in novels or film or elsewhere, you’re going to see video games that promise to let people live their fantasy.”
Photos: games including Tomb Raider, Enter The Matrix and Bond
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