Sega continues plans to make live-action movie based on Ninja games that no one thought of in years

I’m not quite sure what Sega’s plans are for the game, but the developer is working on another live-action adaptation, this time about ninjas.

Today, it’s all about intellectual property. Exploit it, flog it like a dead horse, no matter what, if it’s a pre-existing IP, someone will find some way to make it bigger and fit it into whatever medium it already isn’t. Sega is clearly going all-in right now, with the massive success of its live-action Sonic the Hedgehog movie, a third installment due out this year, and its attempt to launch a Yakuza TV series on Prime Video later this month. But it has bigger ambitions than just the series everyone’s still talking about right now, as Deadline reports that Universal Pictures is developing a live-action movie adaptation of the classic hack-and-slash series Ninja.

I would hope that anyone old enough to have played Ninja wouldn’t have really thought about this for a while, whereas anyone young enough not to have played Ninja would be like “What is Ninja?” Well, initially The three games tell the story of Joe Musashi, who works very hard to become a respected ninja and ultimately saves Japan, you know, it’s an ’80s video game story. According to Deadline, Marvel’s “Hit-Monkey” and “Sunny” screenwriter Ken Kobayashi will write the script, and Marvel’s stunt coordinator and “The Rescue” director Sam Hargrave will direct.

A new Ninja game is also in development, which Sega first announced last year in a Game Awards trailer that revealed a slew of other classics like Golden Ax, Crazy Taxi, and Jet Set Radio” will also return.

Shinobi is definitely one of Sega’s best-known classics, but it’s still an odd choice for an adaptation – though not as odd as Eternal Champions, a fighting game that hasn’t had a new entry in nearly 30 years. The game was also adapted into a movie.