If you thought the videogame field wasn't crowded enough already, then prepare yourselves for its newest entry: Brash Entertainment. Specializing in the high risk sector of movie-based gaming, Brash has full intentions of carving out a niche for themselves -- and the financial backing to make it all a reality.
Born out of Los Angeles, the start-up company has already inked deals with five major Hollywood studios, obtained licensing for 40 film properties (including the Saw series), and is already hard at work on developing 12 games as a result of this.
If that doesn't impress, take into account that investors have pumped over 400 million dollars into the company already. So why does Brash think it has a chance at filling the Hollywood void that others feel doesn't even exist in the first place?
As the president of Time Warner Inc. says, the biggest problem with translating movies to videogames is timing:
"By the time we greenlight a film and license that to publishers, the amount of time we're often giving them and access to resources -- it's so challenging."
Brash hopes to combat this by leveraging its own Hollywood connections, and working with movie makers themselves. By getting involved in the process of conceptualizing games before the actual films are even given approval by studios, they have already gained a powerful advantage. This alone will give them the inside edge that competitors like EA can't hope to match.
As Brash executives point out, when you have both the financial means and the attention of directors and other Hollywood talent in the gaming industry at your disposal, anything can happen.
If the dream team at Brash Entertainment can somehow manage to make quality games based on movies such as Saw and Hostel, I'm all for it. Let's just hope that they are more of the Spiderman 2 or Lord of the Rings variety, and not of the E.T.-type in terms of quality and overall sales.
[Via WSJ]
Contest:
10:31 AM on 06.04.2007
| 
I like the idea, but until I know more about the development talent attached to actually make the games I'm going to remain wary. The major problem with nearly every movie based title is being tied to the film's release date. If this company can get earlier and better access from the filmmakers to the game studios, that can go a long way to fixing that particular issue.
Oh man! Danny Glover has to be in it!
Getting access to the creative talent and material of films at an earlier stage is an interesting idea though, but I wonder if they realize that films get canned at that stage all the time. Maybe we'll see games based on movies that were to be but never happened. That would be interesting.
Chronicles of Riddick? Hello?
Chronicles of Riddick you say? Now that was a good game, one of my favorite Xbox games and console-style fps games.
You know why it was a good game? Because Vin Diesel is an avid gamer, and he was so fucking pissed when the xXX game sucked nuts that he founded his own game studio (Tigon) and worked personally made sure that the Riddick game rocked ass. It did.
The only way any good movie-game happens is by some miracle.
That game was awesomce because you could shank bitches.