We learned recently that the award winning survival-shooter, The Last of Us, is getting a movie adaptation in the future. The vast majority of details regarding the development of the film are unclear, but the game's creator Neil Druckmann has given us an idea of what to expect. Speaking to IGN at last night's BAFTA Game Awards, Druckmann said the film will be an adaptation of the game's story.
This means the movie won't just be creating and telling its own tale with new characters set within the The Last of Us universe, but will be a big-screen version of roughly the same story and events you played through in the game.
"It's an adaptation of the story of The Last of Us. As far as where we go and how we make it fit into a film, how it takes into account the unique properties of film...We're not sure yet. We're only just scratching the surface," Druckmann said.
Clearly, there's still a lot of planning left to do and the movie is just in its initial conceptual phases. But we do know Ellie and Joel will be the focus of the movie if it follows the events of the game. Perhaps we'll see some of the exact scenes from the game recreated, or we'll get re-imaginings of the events.
It remains to be seen whether this is a positive choice or not, but I suppose that boils down to opinion. Given that many people enjoyed the game so thoroughly, some will be thrilled to see the story they loved portrayed by real actors with (hopefully) good real-life production values. Others may have preferred leaving the game as its own entity, and letting the movie take the universe and create something new.
We'll have to wait for further details and a first glimpse of film to see what direction they're taking it, but I have a feeling it might be a while before anything concrete is released.