“Titans of the big screen hope to conquer a smaller screen: video games”
The Electronic Entertainment Expo is this week at the LA Convention Center and the LA Times graces us with yet another story about Hollywood’s obsession and inevitable conjunction with videogames.
Hollywood’s love affair with games dates to the 1970s, when Warner Communications bought Pong-maker Atari Inc. In 1982, George Lucas, intrigued by the technical magic involved in making interactive entertainment, started a studio called LucasArts that creates games based on the “Star Wars” and Indiana Jones movie franchises.
Six years later, Walt Disney Co. began its own computer game division. Steven Spielberg declared his ardor for games in 1995, creating DreamWorks Interactive in Los Angeles. And media tycoon Sumner Redstone began in the late 1990s to amass shares in Midway Games Inc., the Chicago developer of Mortal Kombat.
And yet:
Happy endings were elusive. Warner shed Atari in 1984 after it bled nearly half a billion dollars. Spielberg sold his studio to Electronic Arts Inc. in 1999. And in November, Redstone liquidated his 87% stake in Midway for a mere $100,000 and claimed $800 million in losses. It’s now in bankruptcy.
Only Lucas’ and Disney’s game studios have survived.
In large part, these failures have been based on ignorance and hubris on the part of the studios — they figured because they were in the entertainment business, they understood videogames. More often than not, they were wrong. But Hwood suits and creatives are back again. And easy to see why. Just look at these numbers:
Part of what fuels Hollywood’s interest is the game industry’s relentless growth over the last two decades and its recent reincarnation from geek pastime to mainstream entertainment. Game sales, which long ago surpassed music revenue, are quickly gaining on the movie business. In March, the average American spent 33% of his entertainment budget on games, compared with 40% to buy, rent or watch movies and television shows, according to market research firm NPD Group Inc. Music took up 27% of the average budget.
Videogames are a growth area for screenwriters, too. I have a friend, a working screenwriter since 1993, who for the last 18 months has been hired to write for an online game that is set to launch this year. In fact, my friend has added this descriptor to his professional bio: “Narrative Designer.”
Anybody out there work in the videogame business? Any writers? Care to share your thoughts on similarities / dissimilarities on writing movies and writing for videogames?