Hans Zimmer

According to The Hollywood Reporter, Academy Award winning film composer Hans Zimmer (The Dark Knight, Pirates of the Caribbean trilogy, Gladiator, The Lion King) has agreed to score the next installment of the ‘Call of Duty’ videogame series titled Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2. This will be the first time Zimmer has worked exclusively on a videogame project.

Such news brings up a nagging question for Hollywood: what is the future relationship between its films and the medium of videogames? When television was first made popular in the 1950s Hollywood greeted the new technology with animosity, which continues to a fair degree to this day. Videogames have emerged as the newest competitor over Hollywood’s biggest target audience, which are roughly those between the ages of 18 and 35.

The maturity of the videogame medium, particularly since the turn of the century, continues to improve by leaps and bounds in terms of both technological advancement and quality of product. Many videogames have impressively compelling characters and storylines, which users are allowed to become exceptionally familiar with. It is even becoming increasingly customary to provide users with multiple (if not infinite) options as to how their games will progress and conclude. Obviously the film medium is not as malleable.

Videogames provide serious opposition for Hollywood as an entertainment-based medium, but being that the prices of each are nowhere near comparable (average movie ticket: $10, average modern videogame: $50) movies can still advertize that they are arguably the best source of entertainment for the price.

The real issue that presents itself from Hans Zimmer’s decision to work exclusively on a videogame is the interesting fact that videogame studios are borrowing more and more from the Hollywood talent well. Actors have been offering their voices for games for years, sure, but their workloads and paychecks aren’t close to what they make from putting their faces on the silver screen. Zimmer however, as a composer faces many of the same challenges working on a videogame that working on a movie has (working around a script, director, tight deadlines, etc.). And perhaps the most precious thing that Zimmer is selling to work on a videogame is his time. Composers don’t work on multiple exclusive projects simultaneously. This means that a top-rate Hollywood talent is unavailable to work on a film project that would have otherwise greatly desired to recruit him.

Does any of this matter? What does it mean that videogame studios are hiring more and more A-list Hollywood talent and what could it mean for Hollywood?

Perhaps we will have to wait and see.

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 is scheduled to hit store shelves November 10th.