Valve Working With J.J. Abrams on Portal or Half-life Movie

The man behind the new Star Trek and Star Wars movies has his eyes on Valve’s IPs. J.J. Abrams isn’t just interested though, Engadget reports that Abrams has already started early production on some movie based on one of Valve’s IP’s. In fact, Gabe Newell himself stated the following:

We sort of reached the point where we decided that we needed to do more than talk. Storytelling Across Platforms: Who Benefits Most, the Audience or the Player?

Abrams followed up and stated that he is aware of the criticisms of video game movies and that he is passionate about working with other great individuals on games that he enjoys.

We’re also aware of the cautionary tales of movies that became games and vice versa… We’re not looking to make a movie in the gaming world, we’re not looking to impose what we do on that, we’re looking forward to taking some of our strengths and collaborating with some of these incredible minds that make some of my favorite games.

Why is Newell working with J.J. Abrams? Well it seems that Gabe wanted someone with experience in making not just popular movies that cash out, but great movies that do justice for its fans and the franchise. Mr. Newell states that he has had quite a few bad offerings in the past.

…Their stories were just so bad. I mean, brutally, the worst. Not understanding what made the game a good game, or what made the property an interesting thing for people to be a fan of.

Furthermore, J.J. Abram’s film studio, Bad Robot, may also be working with Valve on a few games. However, when Abrams was pressed about the future of these projects he stated that “It’s as real as anything in Hollywood ever gets,” which means that this could still fall through.

Sources: polygon.com, engadget.com