It’s been over a year since our last update on the BioShock movie, and the latest word seems to indicate that the project could be in limbo — but for good reason.
Industry Gamers spoke to Irrational Games’ creative director, Ken Levine, to get a status update on the adaptation, and learned that fans probably shouldn’t hold their breath to see Big Daddy smash his way onto the big screen.
“We got very close to having it get made – we had a deal in place and a director,” he said. “But for us there’s no burning [desire] to have a movie made just to get it made. For us and for Take-Two, it’s really got to be something that will a) give the fans something that they want, and b) for those who don’t know BioShock, really introduce them to something that is consistent with the game, and is it going to be a good representation of the game.”
Originally tagged as a directorial project for Pirates of the Caribbean filmmaker Gore Verbinski, Verbinski subsequently left the director’s chair and moved to producer. Juan Carlo Fresnadillo was then attached to direct, but after progress stalled out during budget talks, updates have been few and far between.
Given the series’ reliance on an undersea setting, complicated set pieces, and characters like the monstrous Big Daddy, the cost of bringing BioShock to the big screen has been a major concern throughout development.
“There are differences between games and movies, no doubt, but the movie has to draw from the same DNA in terms of the world and the story beats,” said Levine. “But you know, we don’t have a need to get it made.”
