Start-Up Brash Entertainment Gets Its Game On

It's axiomatic in the entertainment industry that video games and Hollywood movies have a hard time traversing platforms. Video games almost always make terrible movies (Super Mario Brothers, Street Fighter, Tomb Raider, Resident Evil...the list goes on and on and on...), and movies adapted to video games have a checkered past with a few exceptions.

Part of the problem may be trying to make an interactive narrative linear, or vice versa. And to piggy back on a movie's marketing campaign, games often get rushed through production, compromising quality. But a new company is looking to bridge that gap. Brash Entertainment LLC announced today that it has raised $400 million from investors including Abrey Partners LLC, New York Life Capital Partners and PPM America, to focus specifically on producing games based on movies, TV shows and other entertainment properties. The company, run by both entertainment and vidgame vets, says it has deals with five major film companies, licensed 40 film properties, including Lions Gate's Saw franchise and have 12 games in development, including one based on Warner Bros. 300. Warner Bros. will distribute their games worldwide.

Brash says it will get involved with filmmakers to develop game concepts even before movies are officially greenlighted by studios. That's certainly the best time to start and I wish them the best of luck. But even the studios' in-house game divisions have struggled in this arena. And it's becoming increasingly expensive to get A-list movie talent to voice their vidgame avatars. But if they don't, the game instantly loses authenticity and is perceived as a let down. This is what happened to Disney's recent Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End vidgame. No Johnny Depp, no Orlando Bloom, no Kiera Knightly, just voice impersonators. A word to the wise; wrap up that talent as quickly as possible. If you do, there's a lot of upside; in the U.S. alone, vidgames are a $6 billion plus a year industry.

A Start-Up's Risky Niche: Movie-Based Videogames [WSJ, sub. required]
Brash game for Hollywood: Videogame unit takes aim at movies, TV [Variety]