Following the success of one brick-heavy franchise, Warner Bros. is moving to another. A Minecraft movie is in the works after rights were secured by the studio.
Deadline reports that Warner Bros. has acquired the film rights to the Minecraft franchise from the game’s developer, Mojang AB. Interestingly, the film is being billed as a live action project. The Minecraft video game has built its brand around the 8-bit design.
The Lego Movie producer Roy Lee is back to produce this project for WB.
The Minecraft game has seen tremendous success over the past couple of years and has spawned merchandise, endless pop culture references, and now a feature length film. The game – in which users operate an open world and can create whatever they can virtually imagine – has over 100 million users, which obviously means there would be a lot of interest in a film adaptation.
Markus Persson, the creator of the video game, tweeted about the news earlier today and appeared to be a little disappointed that he wasn’t the one to announce the news:
Someone is trying leak the fact that we're working with Warner Brothers on a potential Minecraft Movie. I wanted to be the leak!
— Markus Persson (@notch) February 27, 2014
It’s worth noting that a Kickstarter-funded movie based on the Minecraft world was in development thanks to Freddiew YouTube channel co-founder Brandon Laatsch (who was working on it independently), but the project was recently halted by Mojang. Perhaps this WB movie is why.
Can you imagine a live action ‘Minecraft’ movie having potential for box office success?
Minecraft follows in a recent line of game-to-film adaptations, including next month’s Need For Speed and the upcoming Warcraft movie.
The Lego Movie has been a big hit for WB, so it’s no surprise that they’re looking at other brick/video game-esque worlds to bring to life. The yellow bricks have scored the studio $279 million worldwide since its early February opening.
Thanks, Deadline.