Film and game crossovers are becoming increasingly common and even though we prefer most franchises to be left alone, some studio’s just can’t help themselves. The next big budget blockbuster game to movie adaptation is Prince of Persia and series creator Jordan Mechner has spoken to Gamasutra about the motivation was to pick up the twenty year old franchise:

“The reason they wanted to make this movie, not because it was a video game, but because they liked the idea of doing a swashbuckling adventure movie.”

“Movie genres follow cycles, just like game genres. The Arbian Nights genre hadn’t been done at the A level in 40 years. It was a film genre that was ripe for renewal.” Explained Mr Mechner, who seems to be very media savvy. “Somebody else would have made an Arabian-themed film that’d be coming out right about now.”

“The game Prince of Persia story was just an excuse for getting the player to get from point A to point B and kill everybody he meets.” Not exactly great film fodder but at least Hollywood are trying with this one, enlisting Jake Gyllenhaal and Jerry Bruckheimer who both have money making potential.

Who knows if the motion picture of Prince of Persia will be any good, but at least the creative talent behind the project understand that games and films are different mediums. Sounds crazy enough to work!

We’ll find out how the multi-million dollar project has turned out in 2010 when it’s finally released, we reckon sometime during the summer.