Masi Oka, star of TV's Heroes, has pitched a movie concept to studio DreamWorks based on massively multiplayer online role-playing games.
Called The Defenders, it's a family adventure based on Oka's own experiences playing MMORPGs, and follows a group of gamer teens who only know each other via their online identities. An unnamed threat rears its ugly head, and the group must meet up in real life to save the day. Seems familiar...
"You can be whoever you want to be," Oka said. "The question came to me: What if you had to live up to the person you created in the virtual world?"
The project is supposed to along the lines of what Spielberg's "Amblin [Entertainment] used to do, that combined an innocence with the adventure." We assume that means something along the lines of The Goonies or Innerspace or Back to the Future. Oka will be producing the film, and The Book of Eli scribe Gary Whitta will be penning the script. Eagle Eye director D.J. Caruso is "in talks" to helm the picture.
And yes, DreamWorks will develop a game tie-in.
Masi Oka project set at DreamWorks [The Hollywood Reporter via MTV]