Hundreds of attendees here at BlizzCon took time off from playing StarCraft II and the newly announced World of Warcraft expansion, Wrath of the Lich King, to attend a spirited panel on the upcoming WOW movie, plans for which finally seem to be coalescing. Blizzard COO Paul Sams and chief creative officer Chris Metzen joined Legendary Pictures' CEO Thomas Tull and chief creative officer Jon Jashni onstage to dish on the current production status of Blizzard's first movie, which the company has been trying to get off the ground for a good five years now.
The audience of diehard fans seemed pleased with Blizzard's choice to partner with Legendary on the WOW movie, given the cheers that erupted at the mention of the company's recent fan-favorite hits like 300 and Batman Begins. Tull reiterated several times his company's commitment to creating "not a video game movie," but rather a grand fantasy epic--one on the order of Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings adaptation--that just happens to be based on a video game property. He also said Legendary is targeting a roughly $100 million budget for a film it hopes to release in 2009, and confirmed emphatically that the movie will be live-action rather than animated. No firm decisions have yet been made on director, cast, or the use of practical versus computer-generated special effects.
View: Full Story @ Gamespot
The audience of diehard fans seemed pleased with Blizzard's choice to partner with Legendary on the WOW movie, given the cheers that erupted at the mention of the company's recent fan-favorite hits like 300 and Batman Begins. Tull reiterated several times his company's commitment to creating "not a video game movie," but rather a grand fantasy epic--one on the order of Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings adaptation--that just happens to be based on a video game property. He also said Legendary is targeting a roughly $100 million budget for a film it hopes to release in 2009, and confirmed emphatically that the movie will be live-action rather than animated. No firm decisions have yet been made on director, cast, or the use of practical versus computer-generated special effects.
View: Full Story @ Gamespot
and lol biggest flop of the decade in the making...
The story is set about a year before the events in World of Warcraft take place, so I guess you can associate it to WoW in a way.
I saw years ago a Warcraft animated game (prior to WOW) and it was even worst to Zelda CD-I. Glad that Blizzard never released this game.
9 million people who understand whats going on is all well and good, but it takes more than 9m ppl to make a movie a hit, you would have to start from the start of Warcraft and why wouldnt you? The epic first battle between the Orcs and Humans, all the classic Heroes Guldan, Khadgar, Medivh etc. Plus starting from the beginning potentially gives them storylines for 4 movies, starting from a WOW era would have too much backhistory required to understand the movie for it to be more than a retelling of the past lore of Warcraft so you can understand the history.
I just think the Storylines of WC1-3 have a good set of lore, characters and potential for a large fantasy based movie. Whatever they decide I hope the movie makes a profit so they might consider a Diablo movie. Everyone loves a hell versus heaven good versus evil movie and the Cinematics from Diablo II convinced me it has plenty of potential to be an impressive one.
That said, I agree with the idea of a Diablo movie. I loved Lord of Destruction when I got it, especially Baal. Would also like to hear some new music for it as Diablo II had one of the greatest soundtracks, imo. But we can only dream on.. Maybe one day when they create part III. Too bad it takes a decade before anything new comes out of Blizzard. Ah well..
LAME
Glassed Silver:mac
But still, this better be done well. Don't F it up!
Don't F it up Blizzard/Legendary !
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