robert-jordan posts

Last November we reported that a Hollywood production company called Red Eagle Entertainment had gotten the rights to make both movies and games based on The Wheel of Time, the fantasy novel series from the late Robert Jordan. Today Electronic Arts announced that it has teamed up with Red Eagle and will distribute the Wheel of Time games via its EA Partners program.

As we reported previously Red Eagle plans to work with Universal Pictures to release a Wheel of Time movie and game tie-ins will be part of that package. Also a Wheel of Time MMO title is in the works as well. So far no developers have been announced for either the movie-based game or the MMO.

In yet another game announcement out of left field, VentureBeat reports that a Hollywood production company called Red Eagle Entertainment is getting into the game business, starting with an MMO based on the Wheel of Time fantasy novel series created by the late Robert Jordan.

Red Eagle has the movie, TV and game rights to all 11 novels in the best selling series along with the rights to the upcoming and final Wheel of Time book (currently being written by another author based on notes by Jordan who died in 2007). Games are planned to be tied into releases of movies based on the Wheel of Time novels with VentureBeat reporting that Universal Studios may pony up as much as $150 million to make the first novel, The Eye of the World. An Wheel of Time MMO is also planned.

This won't be the first time that a game based on the novel series will be released. In 1999 the now defunct Legend Entertainment released a first person action game based on the Wheel of Time series. Published by GT Interactive (now renamed Infogrames/Atari) the game got good reviews but was overshadowed by the release of Quake 3 Arena and Unreal Tournament at the same timeand did not sell as many copies as anticipated.