‘World Of Warcraft’ Movie Update

World Of Warcraft is a PC game that seems to turn once ordinary decent, hard-working men and women in to addicts, addicts who will do anything for another fix of fighting another boss or going on a quest. So the movie that is currently very early in production is sure to see movie theaters full of geeks enjoying their favorite pastime come to life on the big screen.

Frank Pearce, executive VP of product development at Blizzard, the makers of the game, recently gave an update to MTV about where the movie project is currently at. He also talked about the possibility of making a full CGI World Of Warcraft film and videogame to movie crossovers in general.

“Legendary Pictures is currently trying to assign some names to write the screenplay and find someone to direct it, so it’s still really early in production. They want to make sure they get the right talent for those different parts, especially the screenwriting, because that’s the foundation for the movie.”

“[The idea of a CGI movie] has come up in discussions but it’s not something we’ve really considered because it takes so long to generate just the brief amount of footage that we create for the game. That department’s focus is creating the footage for the games to tell the story; it would be a huge undertaking and it’s not really something that we’re ready to do anytime soon.”

“It would be definitely be really cool. There’s no question about that, it’s just that the quantity of work that it would take is more than we’re willing to take on at this point. We’ve got a lot of work to do as it relates to ‘WoW’… we’ve got all this stuff in the pipe and that would just be one more thing on top of it, and that would be a huge thing on top of it.”

“There’s been some [movies based on games] that have been decent, and there’s been some that have been disappointing. It’s just a question of how much energy, time, blood, sweat and tears are invested in [the movie]. Anything we take on, whether it’s live-action or CG, pocketbook novels or trading card games, whatever it is, it’s really important that the overall experience is a high level of quality in line with what we do with our games.”

I’ve personally never played World Of Warcraft, mainly because of the costs involved, and the fact that I know I’d become addicted. But I can definitely see the appeal of the game, and therefore the movie. And it sounds like Blizzard are taking good care of their property, hopefully making sure this is one game to movie translation that doesn’t suck.