Xbox Announces Originals
Xbox Entertainment announced six committed projects, and programs based on the Deadlands RPG, Chuck Dixon and Jorge Zaffino’s Winterworld, and Warren Ellis’ Gun Machine in development as original programming that will be exclusively available on Microsoft devices, including Xbox 360 and Xbox One.
Committed Xbox Entertainment projects include a Halo live action TV series with Steven Spielberg executive producing; a Halo digital feature exec produced by Ridley Scott and David Zucker; Humans, an adaptation of Swedish science fiction series Real Humans and several reality-based series. Halo has the best initial merch prospects, with Dark Horse comics and USAopoly tabletop games among others.
Several of the projects in development are also interesting. A script based on the Pinnacle Entertainment tabletop roleplaying game Deadlands has been ordered. There has been some other merch based on the RPG over the past few years, including a board game (Twilight Creations) and comics (Image).
A limited event live-action series based on the Winterworld graphic novel by Chuck Dixon and Jorge Zaffino is being co-developed by IDW Entertainment and Xbox Entertainment. A new comic series from IDW with Dixon writing and Butch Guice art will launch in June.
A pilot script is being written for Gun Machine, based on the hardboiled detective novel by Warren Ellis, with Ellis exec producing with Brett Conrad (Sons of Anarchy), who will also write the script.
Extraordinary Believers, a stop-motion animation series by the creators of Robot Chicken is also in development.
The new Xbox Originals strategy is similar to the exclusive content initiatives of Netflix and Amazon, but is exclusive to particular devices, while Netflix and Amazon are largely device-agnostic. Xbox Originals will all include interactive features.
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