Gears of War

Now, this shouldn't surprise anyone. The New Line movie studio has announced they've acquired the rights to produce a film based on the absurdly popular Gears of War 360 game that garnered tons of acclaim in 2006. As of now, the movie could potentially hit theaters just in time for the sequel in summer, 2009.

Taking a look at the latest edition of Variety, New Line won the rights at auction, and their prize was a 21-page screenplay prepared by Stuart Beattie, who also penned "Collateral." Of course, as to the rumor of a simultaneous movie/game sequel release, both parties involved wouldn't mind seeing it happen: "New Line and Epic would surely love to see the film and a game sequel come out around the same time," the article said.

There is, of course, the potential for multiple movies, just as there's the obvious potential for multiple game installments. They're even talking about the idea of novels based on the Gears of War universe, so as expected, the best game on the 360 so far continues its widespread popularity. But when are we finally going to get a decent movie based on an awesome game? Even Epic VP Mark Rein is well aware of the possibility of a film failure, but he feels he's got the right team for this one.

"Our first and foremost philosophy is to do no harm, so we debated heavily the idea of doing a movie at all," added Rein. "But we feel we stacked the deck in our favor by working with the best players."

"Do no harm." Yeah. Remember that, Epic. We'll be comin' after ya if the movie turns out to be trash. Sullying the good name of Gears is just plain wrong.