Pirates Dir. Verbinski Pursuing Game Development

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Pirates of the Caribbean trilogy director Gore Verbinski (pictured left) has revealed his hopes to create a video game, marking the latest Hollywood director to make the leap to game development.

Other renowned directors who have recently transitioned into video game production include Steven Spielberg, who is working with EA Los Angeles to create Boom Blox (Wii) and other titles, and Michael Bay.

Speaking on his particular project, Verbinski offered few details. "It's a little bit out there," he told the Los Angeles Times. "Although I really enjoy Halo and BioShock, I'm not interested in jumping in to compete with those guys. I want to come in from a completely different direction."

Though a long-time fan of video games, a series of back-to-back projects, including The Ring and The Weather Man, kept Verbinksi out of the loop for over seven years. "[Video games are] a completely different form of narrative than being told a story in the traditional sense," he noted. "I can't quite put my finger on it, but I feel that we are on the brink of something phenomenal.

"I've had a tremendous experience in the film industry, taking knocks and figuring out how to navigate that world," continued Verbinski. "Before I assume I know how to navigate [video games], I want to observe."

And as for those Pirates of the Caribbean game Disney published alongside the movies?

"I was not happy with the game," he admitted. "I don't blame the people internally at Disney. I just think things have to change because it's diminishing the brand of gaming overall when you're producing stuff just to make a shelf date."

Chris Faylor was previously a games journalist creating content at Shacknews.

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From The Chatty
  • reply
    March 10, 2008 2:22 PM

    I wish him lots of luck, seriously. His comments seem quite reasonable and he seems in touch with gaming in a way most other 'crossovers' are not. And how about that on-target insight regarding the Pirates games?

    WTF Hollywood people aren't supposed to have a clue!

    • reply
      March 10, 2008 2:46 PM

      yeah, agree totally.

    • reply
      March 10, 2008 4:32 PM

      While he seems to be more on top of it than some others, I agree with the Gore Verbinski-related sentiments in this blog post I read a while ago - http://www.spectrecollie.com/archives/2008/02/auteurism/ (even if I don't know where I stand on the actual core post about auterism)

      • reply
        March 10, 2008 6:05 PM

        read about half of that, and it sounded to me that the author there is an ultra-serious douche who's pretending to have never heard a creative person use hyperbole before.

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