Rockstar's former executive Dan Houser explained in an interview why a film adaptation of “Grand Theft Auto” never came to fruition.
The American media company The Ankler had the opportunity to interview Dan Houser. The now 50-year-old once co-founded Rockstar Games, but left the well-known video game publisher in 2020.
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No control, big risk
One day, Houser received a call asking if he could imagine a “GTA” film. The British developer asked why Rockstar should get involved. After all, they have no control over this external production and are therefore taking a “big risk”.
We had what we thought was a billion-dollar intellectual property, and the economics didn't make sense. The risk didn't make sense. The perception at the time was that games made bad movies.
Dan Houser on his view of a “GTA” film adaptation at the time
It's exactly the same opinion that Take-Two boss Strauss Zelnick previously expressed. In 2016, he commented on the risks associated with a film adaptation. A bad film could “cause great damage” to the brand, he said at the time.
However, the Briton then notes: We live in a different time now. In fact, more and more successful adaptations are coming to the screen these days. Examples of this are the films “The Super Mario Bros. Movie” and “Sonic the Hedgehog”. The former is getting a sequel due to its huge success, the latter already has one and is even getting a second one.
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There are also successful productions in the series. These include “The Last of Us” and “Fallout”. While the HBO series about Ellie is expected to have three seasons, the Amazon show will have at least a second one.
Dan Houser opened his own media company a year ago, called Absurd Ventures. He is not concentrating on a specific medium. The first two projects were presented in November. And his team also seems to be working on a video game, as one job ad revealed.
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