Sahara is a movie you'll be hearing a lot about in the coming months. The big-budget motion picture features Matthew McConaughey as a sort of James Bond meets Indiana Jones action star named Dirk Pitt (any relation to Brad?). His adventures take place at various points of interest in the versatile continent of Africa. TKO is working on the game adaptation, and showed it from their secret stronghold deep in the bowels of E3's Kentia Hall. Don't let the meager setting fool you; this title has some cool things going for it.

The game's major hook so far is what the developers call "improvisational combat." This allows you to take nearly any object in the environment and use it for violent purposes. When we say nearly any we mean it. If it's not glued down, you can throw it; if it is glued down, you can toss someone into or through. One a table is blasted to sticks, for example, you can hurl those sticks like projectiles. The control is extremely easy, so you don't have to aim your toss at all; just hit the corresponding button and let Dirk do the rest.

Dirk can do a few other cool things in hand-to-hand battles. When an enemy is down, it's possible to get on top of them and pound their faces in further. Also, Dirk can get in the zone, which allows you to pull off some impressive one-hit kills. New moves and combos get unlocked. All these things are in place to keep the combat from being too button-mashy -- which every action game should strive for.

There are also plenty of gun fights in Sahara, and the developers seem to be striving to usurp the gunplay in the last EA Bond title. I'm not sure how successful they'll be, but now seems like a good time to point out that the game is very early right now, and won't release until next spring. One cool things we saw in the demo are plenty of scripted events where you interact with the environment. For example, Dirk shot up a water tower, which then fell down in a massive heap.

TKO is breaking new ground in terms of graphics. Matthew McConaughey and other actors -- like his movie sidekick, Steve Zahn -- were cyber-scanned for authenticity, and their voices are used in the game as well. Shadows are a major focus, and we're told the PS2 version of Sahara will mark the first time a title on the platform has ever used "stencil buffer" shadows before. We'll take their word for it, but our own eyes told us the lighting is pretty impressive.

Gamers have learned to be wary of movie-based games, especially those done by smaller companies. However, Sahara is already appearing quite promising, and the movie will likely draw a lot of attention later this year, as well. Let's just hope the video game/movie combo will fare better than McConaughey's last action effort, Reign of Fire.

Dirk Pitt shooting down the water tower with a M-16. (I bet your thinking ... water tower ?? ... Did Pitt have a M-16 ??)

Way Cool !! Video Game based on Sahara movie sounds most promising and if the movie can pack the people in then CC's books will get more attention. And this site will get more members ;)

I'm interested in seeing how well this game performs. Most games that focus on the first person view tend to be quite difficult to learn and play, but with advanced technology everything is becoming much easier.

Also, has anyone ever imagined how sad it would have been if a video game was modeled after Cussler's "Raising the Titanic" film. In seeing how well the movie was put together, it is safe to assume that the game would comprise itself of hand drawn stick figures..

wow I like playing games! hope this will be a good one. I am glad to hear such good news for a gamer and Cussler Fan ;) Two in One ;)

If it can live up to it's own hype, the game could really be quite good, and set some groundbreaking new standards for first and third-person shoot-em-ups.

If it can live up to it's own hype.

This sounds nice. Hopefully it comes out on Gamecube (that's the only new system I have -Zelda Freak right here-!!!) This rules!!! I hope it comes out soon. :P :P :rolleyes:

Same here. I have every Zelda game ever made, and am eagerly waiting for Four Swords to show up locally! B)

Wow can't wait to see the movie and play the game.

Wish they would show us some more pics of what the games gonna look like, think the game Dirk will have a strong likeness to M. McConoughey? probably, my guess is that there will be more details and nuances from NUMA in the game than the movie considering the length of each, maybe they'll have Al ride in on fort foureau in the game...?

Great. I have to wait a while to see it, since the comp I'm on is having monitor problems.

I can't wait to get it!!

I wonder if it will be released for PC... :unsure:

I'm almost positive it will be, for all you non-game console owners out there!! :P

I'm pretty sure they have scrapped the idea of a major video game because the company that was producing it went out of business or something. :blink:

Yes, oswalder is right. Even if it was still going to be released, it would've come out by now. Games usually come out a few days before a movie is released.