Ender's Game Adaptation in the Works from Chair; Author Orson Scott Card Involved

Chair Entertainment Group, the studio that created and freely released the underwater shooter Undertow as a gift from Microsoft to make up for Xbox Live downtime, has obtained the rights to develop games based on Orson Scott Card's classic sci-fi novel Ender's Game. Card (pictured left) himself is collaborating on the project.

"From the moment I started working with [creative director] Donald Mustard and his team at Chair, I knew that these were the guys I wanted to do the first Ender's Game video game," said Card. "It's not enough to slap the Ender's Game name on just any game--it has to be exciting, memorable, and endlessly replayable. Chair shares my understanding of this and I am looking forward to working with them to ensure the game is as authentically Enderish as possible."

In keeping with the studio's recent work, the first game based on Ender's Game will be a downloadable title. Chair also has experience with space-themed science fiction, and with working alongside Card. Its core was borne out of the GlyphX team that developed Advent Rising (PC, Xbox), which featured a story written by the novelist.

The news was broken by Newsweek's N'Gai Croal, who also published an interview with Donald Mustard and Chair technical director Geremy Mustard.

No release date was given; development is expected to start later this year. Chair also created the near-future politically themed property Empire, on which Card based a novel of the same name that was published in 2006. In addition to Chair's ongoing work on game versions of Empire, it has been optioned for a film adaptation.