If you went to see a blockbuster movie over the holidays, chances are good it was King Kong. The Peter Jackson remake of the classic 1933 film spent two weeks as the nation's top grossing movie and raked in over $50 million in its first week alone. The film has, to date, grossed over $200 million domestically and $500 million worldwide.

On the other half of the same coin, gamers looking for a movie game probably turned to Peter Jackson's King Kong: The Official Game of the Movie. The console versions of the game have been a critical success, garnering over 80% GameRankings.com. Commercially, NPD has reported that the PS2 version of the game has sold 376,000 copies in just two months, with the Xbox pushing 180,000 units. In the U.K., the game has been in the top 5 best sellers for the past seven weeks according to the ELSPA. All told, the PS2, PSP, GCN, DS, PC, Mobile, Xbox and Xbox 360 versions have sold more than 2 million copies worldwide.

"Historically, the sales performance of movie licensed video games has had a direct correlation to box office sales," Ubisoft's VP of Marketing, Tony Kee told GameDaily BIZ. "Peter Jackson's King Kong outperformed previous movie licensed video game titles in regards to sales per box office million."


The fact that Peter Jackson worked intimately with the game's creators was no small part of the game's success. "The video game and the film complement each other from a creative point of view due to the close collaboration of Peter Jackson and Michel Ancel," said Kee. "The Ubisoft Montpellier development team worked directly with Weta Ltd. to receive and incorporate Weta concept art directly into the game engine creating the highly immersive 3D environments."

"The main challenge is to work in parallel with a movie and a universe that is created as you are developing the game. You have to anticipate, to wait for assets to be delivered, and make sure you validate on a regular basis the different choices you make to make sure you are on the right track... while making sure everything still fits in your planning," producer Xavier Poix commented to GameDaily BIZ in December. "Peter J made us feel comfortable because he really did not want the game to be a simple adaptation of the movie but he sees the game as a sister or a brother to the movie and an expansion to his universe. That means he accepted (and was suggesting) differences between the movie and the game in order to meet our constraints and make the best game possible."


This dino will need some dental work in a second...


While the King Kong game itself was fairly short by today's gaming standards (clocking in at about 8 hours) the game did offer replay incentives. Primary among them was a secret, alternate ending first revealed to GameDaily BIZ in an exclusive interview with Xavier Poix, Michel Ancel and Chance Thomas, who collaborated on the game. For players earning a cumulative 250,000 points in the game, they could see and ending where Kong actually lives and is returned to Skull Island.

"I wanted the game to be able to take the audience a bit further than what the film could," said Peter Jackson. "And the final climax of the game gave us an opportunity to do something that the film could not do, which was to have an alternate ending - obviously everybody pretty much knows how King Kong ends."

"I think the alternate ending was a great treat for gamers and something that Peter Jackson was excited to be able to bring to the story, an extension of the movie experience which was exclusive to the game," said Kee.


While the movie's run in theaters is winding down, Peter Jackson is no doubt planning for a special edition DVD release later this year. Ubisoft could benefit from a second push for the game when this happens, with price cuts likely and special editions of the games not out of the question. With a possible sequel to the King Kong game (the alternate ending opens that door) things are far from over for videogaming's other Kong.