Latest Gaming News

Devil May Cry Movie Deal

17th June 2003, 12:28pm
Capcom Co., Ltd. and Gaga Communications, Inc. reached a basic agreement under which Capcom grant Gaga an exclusive option to acquire the rights to create a Hollywood film version of Capcom's global Megahit game software Devil May Cry (total worldwide shipments for the series to-date: approximately 4,270,000).

Based on the agreement, Gaga undertake the future product planning and development necessary to complete a film version of Devil May Cry as a major Hollywood motion picture, which be scheduled for worldwide release. With plans already announced by Capcom and Gaga to also produce a film version of Capcom's popular game software Onimusha, the new project becomes the second film to be produced by GAGA based on an original Capcom game.

Devil May Cry is an action game that unfolds as Dante, a devil hunter whose father is Satan and whose mother is human, joins forces with the mysterious and beautiful woman Trish in a heroic battle against devils that swarm into the world of the living. Beginning with its popularity in North America, Devil May Cry boasts strong appeal around the world. Gaga intends to take advantage of the game's attractiveness, such as hyper-action featuring the cool, dark hero Dante and a stylish, artistic setting, to create a work that represents the best in thrilling Hollywood entertainment.

For this live action film, one among several films made in recent years based on game software, Gaga is planning a total production budget up to US40 million dollars (approximately five billion yen). The company makes decisions on the production aspects, including production staff, cast and U.S. distribution company during the course of planning and development. Gaga plans to begin shooting the film in 2005.

Capcom owns the copyrights to the worldwide Megahit action games Biohazard, Onimusha and Devil May Cry. Biohazard has already been made into a Hollywood film that is enjoying tremendous success following worldwide release after its U.S. premiere (Biohazard's total worldwide box office receipts to-date: 16.8 billion yen).

Following the success of Biohazard, Capcom's other game software has also attracted major attention from Hollywood. Capcom seek to create film versions of its other game contents to achieve synergistic development with its game business, and aggressively promote media mix businesses in the future.

As a new growth strategy for the coming age of graphic contents, Gaga is developing a business to acquire film rights to contents such as Japanese games, animated films and comics from the original creators, and produce "global contents" created in Japan for distribution not only in Japan but also in the world market. Gaga plans to position the Devil May Cry project as its successor project to follow up the live-action film version of Tekken (a three-company joint effort with Namco Ltd. and the U.S. firm Crystal Sky), which it announced for production in February 2002, and the film version of Onimusha announced for production in December 2002 (a three-company joint effort with Capcom and the French independent film distribution company Metropolitan Filmexport), and intends to aggressively undertake other projects in the future.
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by Damien