Nothing To Do With Air Benders: Avatar
Whenever a trailer begins with the phrase, "The following is all in-game footage," there always seems to be a horrible chance that what follows will elicit the response, "I should bloody well hope so, because if that's a render..." I'm not sure how I feel in response to the reveal, at last, of Ubisoft's Avatar - a game that boasts the involvement of James Cameron, to coincide with his first movie in twelve years. Set on Pandora, an alien moon populated by the Na'vi, visited by humans, it features actors from the film reprising roles. However, rather than attempting to botch together the film's plot in a game format, instead the game is set before the events of the movie.
Like the film, the game is set to be played in 3D should you possess the tech - both for consoles and the PC version. (Which never fails to draw a frown for those like me whose brain doesn't interpret information from both eyes equally, and thus see a blurry mess.) However, Ubisoft are promising the flat-screened version will be plenty splendid.
As you'll see in the trailer, Pandora is a... brightly coloured place. I'm trying to avoid the word "garish". Although undoubtedly it's also bursting with imagination, and the screenshots look gorgeous. It's hard to get an impression of the game from the explosion-in-a-Dulux-factory trailer, but it seems it will be a third-person shooter, featuring far more heavy duty tech than the magical-fairy-land images might imply. In fact, there's meant to be some awesome mechs to play in.
Beyond this, both the content of the film, and in turn the game, are deeply mysterious at this point. Knowing Cameron, finally - finally - back to making science fiction action rather than whinging and crying on a boat, the film should offer vast entertainment. The game? Well, it would be a first if it manages to be something special, however the pieces might be in place for that to happen. Right now, who knows? You might want to head this way to get the HD version, as I'm fairly certain the LD is hurting its chances. Oh, and IGN have a video of Cameron discussing it all.