Steven Spielberg to Direct Ready Player One Film

According to Deadline, Steven Spielberg has signed on to direct the adaptation of Ernest Cline’s dystopian cult hit Ready Player One. The 2011 novel, as the name might suggest, largely takes place in a futuristic video game world called OASIS. As such, the question of how to film it has been tricky. (The film rights were sold before the book was published.) Deadline:

With this news, a question arises about how they will bring a key element of the book’s virtual world to life for the big screen. After all, it seems imperative for the audience to feel like they were dropped into the middle of a video game.

That kind of technology is just becoming available, and if these guys implement that, this could change the face of cinema. The studio has been on the cutting edge of this kind of thing before, pushing the envelope with technology and visual effects with such films as The Lego Movie, Inception and The Matrix — all with great results. If anyone can pull it off again, it will be these guys.

No release date has been set, and Spielberg is set to direct The BFG first, so don’t expect the film anytime soon.