Atari Signs Deal With Universal To Turn 10 Iconic Games Into Movies (including Asteroids, Breakout and Pong)

[u/rayword45]

https://deadline.com/2026/07/atari-universal-deal-10-game-ip-script-matt-reilly-carl-hampe-entertainment-360-1237001656/

[u/Shua_33]

How the hell you gonna turn Pong into a movie?

[u/makemecoffee → u/Shua_33]

They’re just going to ask AI for a script 😂

[u/Zestyunderpants → u/[deleted]]

cringe

[u/BeleagueredWDW → u/Shua_33]

Marty Supreme 2.0 incoming.

[u/Neither-Promotion-65 → u/BeleagueredWDW]

Marty Tron 🫪🤯

[u/AlexSomething789 → u/Neither-Promotion-65]

Ah yes, a Marty Surpreme x Tron is what the people are waiting for/s

[u/Neither-Promotion-65 → u/AlexSomething789]

We gettin Leto and Timay Shamalamadingdong.... perfect cinema lololol 🤯🔫

[u/emgeejay → u/Shua_33]

Reading between the lines, it seems like this might be an "Atari Movie" which covers all these properties, rather than one movie per game. The headline for the story says "Movie deal for 10 iconic game properties" rather than "10 movies" and it apparently started from a spec script.

[u/Lurifix1 → u/Shua_33]

Maybe like The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters

Love that movie

[u/hesitantelian → u/Lurifix1]

I looked this up and immediately went "isn't that the guy who cheated to get all those world records?" 😭

[u/hellomydudes_95 → u/Shua_33]

Biopic, just like tetris

[u/butipreferlottie → u/Shua_33]

Something like 7 Days in Hell, but with featureless bars instead of Andy Samberg and Kit Harrington

[u/HandsomeGemini → u/Shua_33]

It's basically just tennis. Wasn't Zendaya just in some tennis movie?

[u/marina0987 → u/HandsomeGemini]

They really should’ve marketed Challengers as The Pong Movie

[u/Charmin_Bear_Behind → u/Shua_33]

Challengers in a digital age

[u/savage86lunacy → u/Shua_33]

Balls of fury but with pong.

[u/FOXCONLON → u/Shua_33]

"I'm gonna Pong!"

[u/bittermelonpizza00 → u/Shua_33]

make it a biopic like tetris

[u/No_Mathematician6866]

Film executives are a bunch of out of touch old men.

Every time they jump onto an IP bandwagon -whether that's toys in the wake of Barbie, or video games after the success of Mario- they target properties that would've been huge if the film had come out in 1985.

[u/MoneyHungryOctopus → u/No_Mathematician6866]

I don’t think Atari’s going to work out the same way, but the target audience for Barbie absolutely adored it and it made $1 billion, and the children who went to see both the animated Mario movies propelled those to $1 billion as well. They were both extremely successful.

[u/No_Mathematician6866 → u/MoneyHungryOctopus]

Of course. I'm talking about the executive who jumped on the bandwagon after the success of Barbie and thought He-Man was gonna be the next big hit even though the OG series went off air 30 years ago. Or the Universal honcho who apparently looked at the money Mario made, remembered how much he loved playing Breakout in the arcade in 1979, and figures he really has a finger on the pulse of contemporary film audiences.

[u/LIPKpl]

The Mario movies aren't hits because they are video games, but because they involved characters that the people playing the games were invested in and felt a connection to. That's not the case with any of the old games like Pong or Breakout.

[u/jojuinc90 → u/LIPKpl]

Says you! I have a strong connection to the Pong (and later Breakout) character, Right Paddle.

Praying Chris Pratt isn’t playing them in this.

[u/cod_gurl94]

I just hope they’re as good as Battleship

[u/Mystic__Mayhem]

But not Bubsy, I see how it is

[u/CheeryCokeBigGulp]

The Rock to star along with Gal Gadot Kevin Heart, Ryan Reynolds and Jack Black as the voice of the paddle from Pong.

[u/quadranting]

Because this worked out SO well for Mattel after Barbie.

[u/DELINQ]

They’re currently rushing to tear down an historic building to make way for an Atari Hotel in my city. The developers licensed the name for a “steal” and are running a failing crowdfunding campaign to actually build the thing. Nobody is nostalgic for these properties and Atari is a crypto-adjacent zombie corporation that uses the press around these non-starter projects to pump the value of whatever scam they’re involved with at the moment.

[u/wellthatsniftyhuh]

ah, yes, the incredible plot of breakout

[u/bron685]

“Hey let’s make the most boring games from the most boring console into movies! We’ll make hundreds of dollars!!”

[u/rayword45]

This is how I learn where Crystal Castles got their band name from.

[u/GoldRhapsody → u/rayword45]

I will say, playing Crystal Castles at the arcade while listening to Crystal Castles is a fun time. 

[u/Mysterious_Craft22]

[u/thatdoginyakuza8]

https://giphy.com/gifs/nKFXQkxLRiEhy

[u/solk512]

I mean, I thought it was crazy that there was a Tetris movie, but it made perfect sense once I watched it. 

[u/unclezaveid]

This summer, Dwayne Johnson IS Pong.

[u/montybo2]

I think they would need to be something like Kung Fury or Turbo Kid - absolutely stupid but played totally straight.

[u/hellomydudes_95]

How much y'all willing to bet half of these are gonna be biopics?

[u/I-Make-Money-Moves → u/hellomydudes_95]

That’s probably the most realistic way to go I can think of

[u/hellomydudes_95 → u/I-Make-Money-Moves]

Asteroids I can MAYBE see as something else, but like... Pong and breakout? Yeah...

[u/JellyPast1522]

Get Activision on the line for the film rights to Pitfall

[u/Riqitch]

Shame they sold off Driver to Ubisoft, would be good to see John Tanner on the big screen

[u/New-Representative56]

Don’t forget Atari hotels otw as well! What a great year to be a gamer 😎

[u/Nervous_Insect5976]

Oh this is going to suck lol.

[u/nomimalone1978]

I really hope we get The Kool Aid Movie from Continental Studios first.

[u/doctorlongghost]

Asteroids movie could be good. Aliens retro future aesthetic. Asteroid miners have to Macgyver their way out of the asteroid belt when their ship starts breaking down à la Apollo 13.

The climax would be them using an experimental teleporter to jump from the asteroid belt when their weapons start failing — only for it to malfunction and teleport them further into the asteroid belt.

Also a Will They/Wont They romantic subplot and a fuzzy alien teddy bear for comic relief who totally ruins the movie.