Big Screen Gets A Halo

The first Halo game was the number one reason to buy Microsoft's Xbox gaming system. The follow-up took more money in a single day than any film blockbuster ever ($125 million on its day of release), making it almost inevitable that the game would head to Hollywood soon. Now, a deal has been struck that will ensure that the big screen gets a Halo. Universal and Fox have teamed up to buy the script for the film, bringing Halo one step closer to the big screen. Microsoft commissioned the script from novelist and screenwriter Alex Garland (The Beach; 28 Days Later) and shopped it around the Hollywood studios with an asking price of $10 million and 15% of the film's gross box office. Reportedly, however, the studio knocked the price down to $5 million upfront instead. The story concerns a genetically-engineered super-soldier, called the Master Chief. At the beginning of the first game, he's on an Earth spaceship, locked in battle with their enemies, an alliance of alien races called the Covenant. The Covenant ship crashes on a Ring-shaped world (see Larry Niven or Iain M. Banks' sci-fi for an explanation of what Ringworlds are and how they work), and our hero follows them down to wipe the bastards out and prevent them from getting a weapon that could win the war that is hidden somewhere on the planet. Halo is expected to hit screens some time in 2007, but we'll keep you up to date between now and then.