Ender's Game comes to Live Arcade-O.S.C. is on board

Samphis

http://www.xblarcade.com/node/1659

Press Release wrote:

CHAIR ENTERTAINMENT GROUP SECURES INTERACTIVE RIGHTS TO ORSON SCOTT CARD'S BESTSELLING "ENDER'S GAME" SERIES



-- First-Ever "Battle Room" Video Games to Bring Classic Literary Series to Life—



Salt Lake City, Utah – January 29, 2008 – Chair Entertainment Group, an independent video game production company and creators of the award-winning Undertow, and bestselling author, Orson Scott Card, today announced their partnership to create the first-ever video games inspired by the legendary "Battle Room," featured in the beloved literary classic, Ender's Game. Ender's Game is an award-winning, international bestseller and one of the most popular science fiction novels ever written.

Under the terms of the agreement, Chair has obtained the exclusive rights to develop Ender's Game "Battle Room" video games across all next-generation consoles, handheld platforms, and PC. In collaboration with Orson Scott Card, Chair will begin development later this year with the first offering expected for release via downloadable platforms.

"I have been a huge fan of Ender's Game since I was ten years old, so it is a true honor for our team to be entrusted with creating the first video game inspired by this classic story," said Donald Mustard, creative director at Chair Entertainment Group. "Our goal is to create an authentic Ender's Game experience that delivers awesome gameplay and can be enjoyed by both longtime fans and gamers new to the series."

"From the moment I started working with Donald Mustard and his team at Chair, I knew that these were the guys I wanted to do the first Ender's Game video game," said Orson Scott Card. "It's not enough to slap the Ender's Game name on just any game - it has to be exciting, memorable, and endlessly replayable. Chair shares my understanding of this and I am looking forward to working with them to ensure the game is as authentically Enderish as possible."

In the fictional Ender's Game universe, humanity is at war with an alien species known as the Formics, and Battle School is the training ground for the future leaders of Earth's International Fleet. Taken at a very young age, Earth's most brilliant children undergo a rigorous training designed to teach advanced military theory where strategic and tactical glory is won in the null gravity battles known to the elite students simply as the game! Through simulated war games and training conducted in the Battle Room, the children rise through the ranks of Battle School to become Earth's only hope for victory.

The two parties previously collaborated on the Chair Entertainment Group property Empire, which the Company introduced in 2006 with the launch of an Orson Scott Card-written bestselling novel of the same name. A feature film based on Empire is in development by Warner Brothers and Chair has future plans for video games and comic books based on the property.

Gamers and long-time Ender's Game fans are invited to share their thoughts on Orson Scott Card's popular website, www.hatrack.com, and the official Chair forums at: http://www.chairentertainment.com/community/forums/

About Orson Scott Card

Orson Scott Card is the award-winning author of the national bestsellers, Shadow of the Giant and Shadow of the Hegemon, and of the beloved classic, Ender's Game, published by Tor Books. He is a professor of literature and writing at Southern Virginia University and lives with his family in Greensboro, North Carolina. For more information on Orson Scott Card, please visit his official website: www.hatrack.com

About Chair Entertainment Group

Founded in 2005, Chair Entertainment Group is an independent video game production company committed to creating blockbuster entertainment franchises through development of its original intellectual properties. In 2006, Chair launched its first original property, Empire, as a best-selling novel written by Orson Scott Card. A feature film based on Empire is in development by Warner Bros. and Chair has future plans for video games and comic books based on the property. In November 2007, Chair launched Undertow, an award-winning underwater action shooter for Xbox LIVE Arcade. Additional information, artwork, and gamer forums can be found at: www.chairentertainment.com.

ChewyWaffles

Could be promising, although I think the experience of the book will be somewhat lessened with shouts of "WTF NOOB1!!" coming through my speakers.

Arch Guru XX

I'm curious to know what kind of game this is going to be. An fps is the first thing that comes to mind, but it would have to be pretty non-traditional. I think you would need to spend a lot of time on getting the physics right, so you can jump in any direction after grabbing onto a wall - maybe one button causes you to grab a wall/star while another causes you to rebound off the surface. Since you're using laser guns aiming should not be much of an issue but I hope they keep the idea from the book that the farther away you are the more diffuse your beam is, and the more time it take for a hit to register on an opponent. Oh, and it would be cool if they kept the location-based damage concept, so that you could have a leg or arm frozen but still contribute, but the change would also affect how you move in the room, and disabled bodies can be used as floating cover.

There is a lot of complexity to this project, I hope they get it right. At least they don't have to worry too much about level design, since they should all be the same room with various distribution of in-air obstacles.

Cautious optimism is my stance on this.

Kagera

Dude, the other thread is still on the first page