orson-scott-card posts

A classic sci-fi novel that would seem on the surface to be perfect for adapting for a game isn't going to be made anytime soon. Our sister site Joystiq reports that developer Chair Entertainment has confirmed that its previously announced plans to release game based on author Orson Scott Card's book Ender's Game are now on indefinite hold.

Chair Entertainment got a lot of hype back in January 2008 when it announced its plans for the game. It was going to base the Ender's Game title on the novel's "Battle Room" setting where humans participated in simulated skirmishes against the book's alien threat. So what happened? Basically, Epic Games happened. The developer bought Chair Entertainment just a few months after the Ender's Game announcement. Now Chair's co-founder Donald Mustard tess Joystiq that Epic wants Chair " ... to create original and unique franchises. I don't know that Ender's Game fits into that strategic objective anymore."

Chair just released the Unreal Engine 3 based iPhone/iPad/iPod Touch game Infinity Blade to great reviews and apparently huge sales.

If you don't care for all of that old fashioned print stuff when it comes to comic books, IDW Publishing may be your company. The publisher is one of the leading comic book companies distributing their content online via iTunes which can be read on a PC or via an iPhone/iPod Touch. This week the company released the first full issue of their comic based on the Dragon Age Origins RPG from BioWare.

As we have reported before the comic is co-written by well known author Orson Scott Card. If you still like to buy comics at your local comic book shop the first Dragon Age issue will be available on March 31. However there will be a long wait for the second issue; it's currently set for release in June.

A few months ago comic book publisher IDW Publishing announced a line of comic books based on Electronic Arts' games. That included plans for a comic based on BioWare's RPG Dragon Age: Origins. While the first issue was scheduled for a March release to comic book stores, Big Download has learned, via IDW's editor-in-chief Chris Rydall, that the launch of the comic has been delayed to April. Also, the second issue of the ongoing series will be released this June.

The comic is still expected to be co-written by Orson Scott Card who is working with co-author Aaron Johnston. The comic will have interior art by Mark Robinson and covers by Humberto Ramos.

Earlier this year we reported that comic book publisher IDW Publishing was teaming up with Electronic Arts to launch a new line of EA Comics. Today IDW has revealed that the first issue of the monthly Dragon Age comic book series will ship to stores in March.

As previously reported the series, based on developer BioWare's fantasy universe they launched in their recent RPG Dragon Age: Origins, will be written by acclaimed novelist Orson Scott Card. He will work with a co-writer on the project, Aaron Johnston, with interior art by Mark Robinson and covers by Humberto Ramos (which you can see to the right).

Bestselling author Orson Scott Card has won an endless array of awards for his Ender's Game novels. His most recent endeavor, Empire, was a smash hit based on a video game concept from Epic Games-owned Chair Entertainment. The second novel in that trilogy, Hidden Empire, hits bookstores next month. The recent Xbox Live Arcade game Shadow Complex is a prequel to these new sci-fi novels that focus on a modern day Civil War between the red and the blue states.

In this exclusive interview, Card took some time away from working on the screenplay for Paramount Pictures big screen adaption of Ender's Game to talk about his love of video games and his own personal dream game project. After all, Card ended up working on his newest trilogy because of a relationship that grew from his first video game work on Advent Rising (developed by the founders of Chair Entertainment when they worked at GlyphX Games).

The latest game-to-comics adaptation is due out in January from IDW Publishing as they have announced a new partnership with Electronic Arts to begin a new line of EA Comics. The line begins in January with the debut of a series based on BioWare's upcoming fantasy RPG Dragon Age: Origins.

EA will be doing the actual funding and editing of the comic book line while IDW will handle printing and distribution of the comics for both print and digital release (via iPhone and other outlets). Previously EA has worked with other publishers such as DC's WildStorm line (for Mirror's Edge) and Dark Horse (for their upcoming Mass Effect comic).

The Dragon Age comic will be a regular monthly series (not a mini-series) and will be scripted by none other than acclaimed sci-fi/fantasy author Orson Scott Card. Humberto Ramos will be the cover artist on the series. However story details and an interior artist have yet to be revealed.

Best selling sci-fi author Orson Scott Card may be best known for his Ender series of novels but he has also kept a finger or two in the gaming industry. He wrote dialog for two of LucasArts' adventure games in the 1990s (The Dig and The Secret of Monkey Island) and wrote the story for the Majesco published sci-fi action game Advent Rising.

In a new interview with Card on the Scifi.com web site, he states that the previously announced game based on his near future novel Empire is still moving forward via Chair Entertainment (now owned by Epic Games).Card stated that a game based on his most well-know novel Ender's Game will move forward after Empire is completed. Card states, "My hope and plan is that the Ender's Game computer and console games will not be mere tellings of the story, but rather true games with a high degree of replayability. In other words, you don't play the game once, so you can act out the story (as with, say, the Harry Potter movie-based games), and then discard it."

Epic Games is expanding their reach once again. The Unreal, Unreal Tournament and Gears of War developer (and creators of the much used Unreal Engine) have just announced they have purchased Utah-based Chair Entertainment. Specific financial details were not disclosed.

Chair Entertainment was formed in 2005 by Donald and Geremy Mustard. They previously worked at GlyphX, who developed the sci-fi action game Advent Rising (which used Epic's Unreal Engine 2). So far the only game Chair has released was the Xbox Live Arcade game Undertow (which used Unreal Engine 3) but they have already announced plans to develop a game based onthe "Battle Room" scenarios in Ender's Game, the classic sci-fi novel from writer Orson Scott Card. Chair also helped to develop Empire, a near future concept of a second American Civil War that Card wrote up as a novel of the same name in 2006 (a video game and movie are also in development)

The press release announcing the deal revealed that Chair Entertainment would continue to work under that name and will continue to develop new and original properties while using, naturally, Epic's Unreal Engine tech. This is the second time Epic has purchased a game developer. In 2007 it purchased Painkiller developer People Can Fly who helped Epic with the PC port of Gears of War and is currently working on a new and unannounced game.