Following its debut at the Sundance film festival on the weekend, US TV network HBO has bought the rights to Indie Game: The Movie. Initial reports suggested that the documentary, which follows several high-profile indie developers, was going into development as a fictional comedy series, a remarkable turn for a serious-minded film that caused widespread confusion in gaming circles.
But the documentary’s makers, Lisanne Pajot and James Swirsky, today clarified via a post on its Facebook page that, in fact, “HBO has optioned IGTM for the basis of a (fictional) series. It is NOT a comedy. It is NOT a sitcom.”
“We heard the same news you did, and were also a bit surprised,” they said, explaining that someone down the PR chain made the wrong assumption on the point that the series is being handled by HBO’s half-hour department, which goes by the nickname of “comedy” department, as opposed to the full-hour “drama department”.
The film follows Edmund McMillen and Tommy Refenes as they wait for the release of Super Meat Boy, Phil Fish as he reveals Fez and Jonathan Blow after the completion of Braid.
“The people involved, the network involved – all are, BY FAR, the best people possible to make this show,” the film’s makers said on their Facebook post.
The series is being produced by Scott Rudin, who also produced the Coen brothers' True Grit, Fantastic Mr Fox and the David Fincher version of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. “We are ecstatic about the possibilities of working with this team. All you need to do is look at the list of HBO series titles & Scott Rudin’s IMDB and you can see why we think this is a brilliant thing. We want to see this show happen. We want to watch this show.”
But being optioned with such a leading name doesn’t necessarily mean anything will come of the project – HBO develops many shows a year. Nevertheless, it’s a fantastic opportunity for a serious attempt to document the creative culture of indie game making, and it has been nominated for Sundance’s Grand Jury Prize. Indeed, initial reviews seem positive:
“There is a vibrant, beating heart that powers "Indie Game: The Movie” and will hopefully serve to inspire the many of us who confine ourselves to small places and lock humanity out while struggling and striving to create something beautiful,“ said Mark Zhuravsky at The Playlist.
Allistair Pinsof at The Flixist was less gushing: “Where Indie Game fails is the same place where many videogame essays have failed in recent years: It focuses so much on validating the medium instead of trying to properly understand and explore it.”