Apocalypse Now Video Game In The Works
When is the right time to begin working on a video game based around Francis Ford Coppola’s 1979 movie Apocalypse Now? If you ask the development team asembled by American Zoetrope, that time is January 26, 2017. And Coppola agrees.
“Forty years ago, I set out to make a personal art picture that could hopefully influence generations of viewers for years to come,” Coppola says. “Today, I’m joined by new daredevils, a team who want to make an interactive version of Apocalypse Now, where you are Captain Benjamin Willard amidst the harsh backdrop of the Vietnam War. I’ve been watching videogames grow into a meaningful way to tell stories, and I’m excited to explore the possibilities for Apocalypse Now for a new platform and a new generation.”
The publisher not only has the blessing of Coppola, but a team of experienced game makers working in pre-production: Rob Auten (Gears of War, Battlefield and Far Cry), Lawrence Liberty (Fallout: New Vegas, The Witcher and DC Universe Online, and that is his name), Montgomery Markland (Wasteland 2 and Torment: Tides of Numenera, and Josh Sawyer (Fallout: New Vegas and Pillars of Eternity). They’re gods, man!
How does one add interactivity to the search for Colonel Kurtz? American Zoetrope is thinking something along the lines of survival horror, a genre normally reserved for haunted houses but could actually work well with 1960’s Vietnam. The game is described “as seen through a survival horror lens in which players with limited resources face unspeakable horrors.”
You can be part of the team too — well, you can at least get your name in the credits. A Kickstarter campaign has been launched to partially fund the Apocalypse Now game.