Microsoft will launch a slate of nongame content...
Microsoft will launch a slate of nongame content under the Xbox Originals banner for its Xbox game consoles and other devices, starting in June, it said Monday. The content will include dramas, comedies, documentaries, animation, unscripted shows and live events,…
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it said on the Xbox Wire website. Each Xbox Originals show will have interactive capabilities, “customized on a per-show basis,” it said. Projects confirmed so far include a live-action TV series executive produced by Steven Spielberg based on the game series Halo, and Extraordinary Believers (working title), a stop-motion show being developed by Xbox Entertainment Studios and Stoopid Buddy Stoodios, creators of the animated TV show Robot Chicken, said Microsoft. Microsoft is hoping that Xbox Originals will provide a further “incentive” for consumers to make their Xbox consoles their “all-in-one entertainment” device, it said. The new Xbox One can already be used to control all TV viewing by connecting the console to a cable or satellite set-top box. Microsoft has been in the content business for a long time with games and creating original TV content is a “logical next step in our evolution,” said Jordan Levin, executive vice president-Xbox Entertainment Studios. “Many” of the new projects are already in production and have set release dates, but some are still in the early development stages, said Microsoft. Other programs will include Signal to Noise (working title), a six-film documentary series on technology that will include, as its first installment, Atari: Game Over about the excavation of a New Mexico landfill that Atari allegedly used to bury millions of unsold E.T. videogame cartridges, said Microsoft. Scott Free Productions and Microsoft’s 343 Industries game studio are also creating a digital feature film based on the Halo game series that will be released later this year, said Microsoft. That project will be executive produced by filmmaker Ridley Scott and Scott Free TV President David Zucker, said Microsoft.