Future movies in the Avatar series may feature elements that have been created by Ubisoft for its upcoming Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora video game.
The game, developed by Ubisoft’s Massive Entertainment studio, is a canon part of the Avatar universe. Taking place in the newly developed Western Frontier, every new plant, creature and Na’vi clan is considered an official part of the lore. Talking to IGN, creative director Magnus Jansén explained that “The Western Frontier is no less a part of the world of Avatar than what’s in the movies.”
One of Ubisoft’s original creations has already made the leap to a different medium. “One of the species that we conceived and that we built together with [Avatar movie studio, Lightstorm Entertainment] is being used in an Avatar exhibition that they did.”
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But what about elements of the game appearing in the movies? It looks like that’s also a possibility. “There is already some talk about maybe using some of the stuff that we did in the upcoming movies,” Jansén revealed.
As part of a media event at Lightstorm Entertainment, the studio behind the Avatar movies, producer Jon Landau elaborated further to IGN on what aspects of the game could make their way across into the movie series.
“I think clans are a perfect thing to someday try to weave into the movies,” said Landau, referring to the three new Na’vi clans that have been developed by Massive for Frontiers of Pandora. “But down the road after that, new environments. Going and really saying, ‘Okay, let’s now take what you did in the video game and explore that in the movie.’”
Additionally, Lightstorm also confirmed that elements of the next Avatar movie can be found within the video game.
“I can say that there are going to be some future sequel elements in Frontiers of Pandora that will pay off when the movie comes out, when Avatar 3 comes out in 2025,” revealed Joshua Izzo, Lightstorm’s vice president of franchise development. “Careful Avatar fans who have played the game will want to go back and maybe revisit certain things because it will be revealed to them in ’25.”
It’s currently unclear what will be shared between Frontiers of Pandora and the upcoming film. However, due to the game’s canon status, nothing is off the table.
Creating a game world and storyline that is completely canon to the Avatar universe has been a huge focus for Massive Entertainment. IGN has spoken extensively about this with the development team and staff at Lightstorm, and this weekend we will premiere a short documentary about how the two companies worked together. How a Canon Avatar Game Was Created will be available to both watch and read on IGN from December 3 at 9am PT / 5pm UK. You can watch a trailer for this latest episode of our Inside Stories documentary series above.
Matt Purslow is IGN’s UK News and Features Editor.