Resident Evil producer Jeremy Bolt is looking to develop a film based on The Long Dark, the much anticipated video game set to be released today which has already sold 1.3 million pre-ordered copies. He has partnered with Hinterland, the studio behind the game, for a live action adaptation.
The game itself follows a crash-landed pilot who must survive the frigid Canadian wilderness after a global disaster. An alpha version was released through Steam in 2014 and garnered incredible reviews, leading to the long-awaited Playstation 4 release today.
The game has hints of The Walking Dead and The Road, so it’s little surprise that Bolt has seen cinematic potential in the game. Raphael van Lierop, founder and creative director at Hinterland, said this in a statement:
“My goal with Hinterland — starting with The Long Dark — has always been to create original entertainment properties that could span multiple mediums, exploiting the storytelling potential of each form. Partnering with Jeremy on this project is the first step in achieving that vision of true cross-platform storytelling in the world of The Long Dark“.
“I first reached out to Raphael, as a fan of The Long Dark“, Bolt added. “I was immediately taken by the game’s stunningly immersive landscapes, eerily solitary and realistic nature; it is an existential tale of moral, emotional and physical endurance with strong characters to build on; it is also a mystery. It is an honour to try to do justice to it on film”.
If the full release of the game is critically acclaimed and the strong fanbase remains, a film adaptation of The Long Dark has every chance of being successful.
Though video game adaptations have infamously had a lot more misses than hits, The Long Dark‘s story-heavy gameplay and the fact that it has similarities to already popular post-disaster content should stand it in good stead, and hopefully in a few years time we’ll be looking at arguably the first universally acclaimed video game to film adaptation.
#Peace.Love.TheLongDark
