Thanks to Scrow for posting about this in the forum.
It was always apparent to see Peter Jackson's enthusiasm for the gaming medium, from hearing about his disappointment from the lack of input he had with EA's Lord of the Rings games, to his collaboration in the King Kong game license of the blockbuster movie, as well as his involvement with the Halo movie. It looks like Peter Jackson is going a step further and creating a game development studio named Wingnut Interactive for a closer involvement with making games. Details are scarce, but it is presumed that the new studio would be based in New Zealand...
** Update, the new studio will be in New Zealand.
Wingnut Interactive will be based in New Zealand, Henson said. But he would not elaborate on the business terms of the deal.
Wingnut Interactive
In addition, in collaboration with Microsoft Game Studios, Jackson and Walsh are creating Wingnut Interactive. The two will create a world-class interactive entertainment studio that fuses the strength of Microsoft?s technology and interactive entertainment experience with the creative and imaginative excellence of the Wingnut Interactive team.
?Microsoft has built an amazing living canvas with Xbox 360 and Xbox Live, which allows the storytellers of our time to express themselves in a new medium. They have fundamentally changed how people think about games,? Jackson said. ?My vision, together with Microsoft Game Studios, is to push the boundaries of game development and the future of interactive entertainment. From a movie-maker?s point of view, it is clear to me that the Xbox 360 platform is the stage where storytellers can work their craft in the same way they do today with movies and books but taking it further with interactivity.?
I think Peter Jackson has the potential to make a decent games studio. And any new and decent ones for NZ is a good thing.
I just made an update to the news item, the new studio will indeed be in New Zealand...
What will this mean to SidHe?
@ Sonjay: Competition? :P
Probably not competition, both will be working on different games.
Does anyone know how to contact Wingnut Interactive?
I'd like to apply there, but I can't find any info about the company behond the announcements.
They will probably do a big advertising drive when they have the basics of the company setup.
Well if he works people as hard as his animation studio Weta Digital then good luck to you. We were doing 6 months of work in 1 month. After that you we were broken. It's a nightmare. The conditions are appalling. I hope he doesn't bring that culture to games. That's just what we should avoid.
The product was very good though, at least the recent movies that have been made.
True