Next-Gen.biz got a chance to speak to Gearbox Software’s head Randy Pitchford, about the Heat game and why they couldn’t do it. Pitchford explained how they planned out many games that were based on movies like Aliens and Heat. For Heat, Pitchford had even met director Michael Mann and they got on well. But, there were other factors that forced them to stall the Heat game.
Randy Pitchford said, “I didn’t want to just take a license and exploit it. We’ve never been about that. He seemed to know enough about us to intuit what we were about, even if it wasn’t obvious. That means that Michael Mann has to not only bless it, but he deserves something, too. If anything, we’ve been about adding value to the properties. And those are the kind of things we choose to get involved with.”
But things turned bad after that. It was not Michael Mann but other external factors. The publishers didn’t like some development partners that Gearbox had been eyeing for Heat. Pitchford said, I think the folks that made the film believe that the game should happen. I’m able to recognize talent on the game making side in some of the studios that don’t necessarily have that same level of talent in business decisions and positioning of their company. A lot of publishing partners aren’t able to see the talent, the potential that exists there.”
If you go by the way that Randy Pitchford explained the whole story to Next-Gen.biz, it seemed that he had inside out knowledge of the film and he had shades of a fan. So there is no way he could have done injustice to the Heat game. It is too bad that publishers did not trust his creative side. I think an action or a shooter game on Heat would be amazing and if Gearbox made it, it would be awesome. Sadly, it looks like we will never get a game based on Heat.