Freebird Games’ RPG Maker title, To The Moon, will be turned into a major animated film. Production on the film and getting all the paperwork done took two full years, but Freebird was ready to announce that To The Moon will become a fully animated flick and is currently in production right now.
China will be funding the production while Japanese animators and artists will work on producing the film. The studious involved with funding and the studious involved with animating will be disclosed at a later date.
What they have announced is that funding is secure for the project and while strict numbers haven’t been revealed, they do note that the budget will be above what was secured for the film Your Name, which came out last year under the CoMix Wave Films production house. A concrete budget for the animated film hasn’t been made readily available so it’s tough to tell exactly how much is being allocated for To The Moon, but I imagine that with some decent storyboard pacing and a visually inventive approach to the film could easily make it a standout success with the anime crowd.
What would be absolutely hilarious is if the film managed to win an award. Could you imagine how insane it would be for a video game movie to win any kind of an award that wasn’t a Razzie?
Anyway, the original creator of To The Moon, Kan Gao, will work on the script for the film, which should be interesting.
The thing is, video game scripts are nothing like movie scripts… and sometimes what pulls at the heartstrings for a game doesn’t always translate so well into a movie. But then again it’s rare that the original creator of the game actually works on the movie script, as surely it would have helped in cases like Max Payne or Alone In The Dark.
As for To The Moon, the game was quite popular when it first released back in 2011. It’s about two doctors attempting to traverse through the memories of a dying man in order to fulfill his final dream before he dies.
You can purchase the game from the Steam store for $9.99, however during the announcement of the movie the game is currently discounted by 50% off.
