One of SEGA's more overlooked mascots (with Sonic and Alex the Kidd getting all the attention), Joe Musashi, it seems, will get his shot at the big time. The Shinobi series, which began way back in 1987, is officially getting a film adaptation to be directed by Sam Hargrave for Universal, according to Deadline.
Following the successful mining of the Sonic franchise, it's not surprising to see SEGA go back to the well. Hargrave gained renown in collaboration with the Russo brothers, serving as stunt director on major Marvel films and directing the Extraction series of Netflix films starring Chris Hemsworth.
The Shinobi series, which spans 14 video games, was released across an eclectic mix of what are now considered retro platforms and is confusing to follow. Capitalising on the popularity of ninjas in America in the late 80s, it followed the exploits of Joe Musashi, who fought against the shadowy ninja clan called Zeed, which schemed to return Japan to a Sengoku-style period of civil strife in which shinobi thrived.
Would you be up for a Shinobi film adaptation? Were you a fan of the Sonic movies? Pitch your dream SEGA production in the comments section below.
[source deadline.com]
Comments 14
Very excited that something is happening with this underrated franchise. Especially the genesis and PS2 outings (including the female counterpart kunoichi) are fantastic games.
Just hope the movie won't end up like some Michael Dudikoff-esque schlock.
Ohh man... Hollywood is on its knees again... After age of remakes, age of prequels and age of marvel comes age of games...
I used to play The Revenge of Shinobi on the Sega Mega Drive so often when I was a kid so naturally I would watch a movie adaptation in a heartbeat.
As a longtime Shinobi fans, i feel quite excited but also worried that they could mess up the movie.
But while we're waiting for a new Shinobi game and movie, it would be awesome if Sega make an HD collection for all 14 Shinobi games. Heck, i would take Shinobi + Nightshade (Kunoichi) remaster.
I played a Megadrive Shinobi game the other day for the 1st time. Couldnt get off the first level 😂
Revenge of Shinobi on the Megadrive was s-tier
Well that is all a bit low key with PS5 Pro preorders for general stores release today in the UK.
For those that wish Argos UK have preorders up.
Can’t see anything for Game UK or Smyths Toys.
Though Smyths Toys last week told me they not sure they even getting any yet, waiting to here from Sony.
@djlard and the age of “pro enhanced” lol
Correction Smyths Toys UK have PS5 Pro preorders up, just hard to find.
Can't help but feel Sega is getting over their heads with all these non-Sonic gaming movie announcements lately.
That said I’m cautiously more positive towards this news piece, as Shinobi is atleast relatively better known (within the gaming space), compared to Eternal Champions (which is a nobody) and the movie adaptation news for it a few months back.
How about a brand new 3d shinobi.the ps2 shinobi game is really good.and with all those samurai games its the best time to make a comeback.word up son
@colonelkilgore The "S" stands for Shinobi
Yeah as loose as the Shinobi lore is, it's pretty much an open canvas for any kind of movie plot, but I think what would definitely get me to go on day one would be if they roped in Yuzo Koshiro to do the soundtrack.
Great to see Shinobi get more stuff.
It could go either way of course but I"m interested to see how it goes. I mean any IP with it's type of themes/setting/characters and so on could be done so they really need to try here I think. The games are fair for their hard difficulty and the rest it offers and sure traditional asian history games are doing well these days so it makes sense to go with Shinobi if can I guess for the trend to keep going or time it with but otherwise not sure anything could happen with this movie.
I'd take a new The Club if Sega has the IPs as Bizzare Creations don't exist anymore and many went to Playground or Lucid (Destruction Allstars, Geometry Wars 3 or others) or other studios or quit game devs or maybe are part of Indie vet teams maybe I don't know. But an arcade but modern game then just the shooters we get or the rail shooters we get instead. I think a middle ground would be nice.
If people can have a Mario 3D World that's a blend of 2D/3D Mario why not a blend of rail and modern in modes or character movesets or something. Shooting gallery but modern of The Club was great just like PGR did for modernising arcade racing games in fun ways.
Forget Sonic give me more Sega Rally/GT, I want more racing games with cool ideas but nope we only get Crazy Taxi instead. Which I mean more Crazy Taxi is good but it could also be bad and we go oh well that's Crazy Taxi but modern then Crazy Taxi but embracing the crazy and having more fun open world objectives or modernising it to be just well too much the originals either. Not making a generic open world game especially vehicle based ones is a challenge. There is reason I am very gameplay picky on ones that use mechanics or 'fun' side missions then boring ones any character can do that I don't want to play as but those that those characters can do or feel more like them and the gameplay is actually fun.
Same with Burnout Paradise if it wasn't for the city being so forgettable or events fast paced that I can't get over the map design then sure. The variety of missions is fair. Later open world car games are probably fine but I just can't be bothered, the events weren't fun and the presentation wasn't compelling in the slightest.
Or Outrun that's the 16bit version not a high quality one like Outrun 2 and without the licenses because why do a racing games without licenses anymore Sega? If Wreckfest can do it or Indies with fun arcade ideas why?
Why are you don't making any the racing genre is so bad, safe and stale I'm waiting for interesting mechanics to happen in them and only a handful are if they are any good even besides their difficulty or content not being bland in the process of progression, modes and too expensive of licenses to offer 'modes' to play at all besides racing being so literal or car classes as the focus I just want to yawn and not pick any up.
Loved the mega drive games especially Return of the Ninja Master but the PS2 titles really changed it with the 3d stuff but boy was it hard when you unlocked the sword and it's life eating ability. You Couldn't mess around you had to be fast to keep up with the kills so it didn't take your own life
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