J.J. Abrams is making another jump toward the gaming industry.
The Star Wars: The Force Awakens director’s Bad Robot production company announced today that it has partnered with Chair, the development studio responsible for iOS hit Infinity Blade and Xbox Live Arcade classic Shadow Complex. The two companies have built a new action game called Spyjinx that will launch for PC and mobile devices in early 2016. This is the latest attempt of Hollywood attempting to cross-pollinate with the world of video games. These two industries are responsible for an enormous amount of revenue, and they often attract a similar audience. But previous efforts to mix Hollywood and games, like Steven Spielberg’s partnership with publisher Electronic Arts, never panned out.
As for Spyjinx, we don’t know much else — although Abrams did do a promotional interview alongside Chair founder Donald Mustard to talk about the origins of the project. And Chair is accepting signups for people interested in beta testing an early version of Spyjinx.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-q2sZ8XxD14&feature=youtu.be
This comes when Abrams is one of the hottest names in Hollywood. He is coming off a successful reboot of the Star Trek franchise. Bad Robot is responsible for the last several, and lucrative, Mission: Impossible films. And he is about to release the biggest movie of his career in Star Wars: The Force Awakens next month. So if anyone has the momentum behind them to make the leap from film to games, it’s him.
It’s important to point out that Abrams has already tried to fit into the world of games. In 2013, he even gave the keynote address at the DICE gaming summit with Gabe Newell, who is the chief executive officer of PC gaming behemoth Valve. And the two men hinted that they are thinking about working together on a new game.
So far, the Abrams-Valve collaboration hasn’t manifested in any form.