Atari and Universal sign deal to bring 10 classic video games to the big screen

Games like Pong, Breakout, Asteroids, and Centipede date back to the very early days of video games. But a little over 50 years after their release, they will finally get the recognition they deserve and make their way to the big screen.

According to a report by Deadline, Atari and Universal Pictures have signed a partnership agreement with Entertainment 360 to allow the studio to develop films inspired by 10 of Atari’s properties, to create “big-scale action-adventure fare.” Among these IPs are the titles Asteroids, Adventure, Berzerk, Breakout, Centipede, Crystal Castles, Millipede, Missile Command, Pong, and Yars’ Revenge.

“For more than five decades, Atari has created games and worlds that have remained part of popular culture long after their original release,” said Atari chairman and CEO Wade Rosen to Deadline. “We are excited to work with Universal and Entertainment 360 to bring the spirit of our iconic brand and games to a new medium.” So far, Universal Pictures has not confirmed anything about this.

The first film has already been selected

According to the report, Universal has already selected its first project, although it has not been disclosed which of these 10 titles it is. All that is known is that it is based on a screenplay by Matt Reilly and Carl Hampe and will be produced by Guymon Casady of Entertainment 360.

“Matt Reilly and I grew up playing Atari 2600 games and have remained fans ever since,” said Casady. “The best Atari games dropped you into a world and let your imagination do the rest. Carl and Matt saw an opportunity to take that same spirit and build an original, large-scale adventure around it. From the moment we read the screenplay, we believed there was a great movie here.”

Although there aren’t any details yet about any of these movies, I just have one hope... that they don’t end up like Adam Sandler’s ‘Pixels’—then everything will be fine.

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