Reliance Big Entertainment (RBE), the flagship media and entertainment arm of India ' s Reliance Anil Dhirubhai Ambani Group today announced a joint-venture with Tom Hanks and Gary Goetzman’s Playtone.
Press Release from Reliance Big Entertainment
Mumbai/Los Angeles – Reliance Big Entertainment (RBE), the flagship media and entertainment arm of India ' s Reliance Anil Dhirubhai Ambani Group today announced a joint-venture with Tom Hanks and Gary Goetzman’s Playtone. RBE together with Playtone will create ‘ ELECTRIC CITY ’ – a multi-platform digital experience covering a multi-episode animated internet series, online social game and mobile application.
Conceived and written by Tom Hanks, ELECTRIC CITY will offer a tantalizing view of the future of civilization, presented through the lens of provocative themes such as energy consumption, freedom of information, crime and punishment.
ELECTRIC CITY is being specifically designed as a multi-platform, multi-screen unified digital experience. A Social Game, a Mobile Game, Webisodes and Mobisodes will be interlinked creating a unique digital experience. The storyline lends itself perfectly to a multi-player browser game application for social networking sites and mobile devices.
Zapak, the gaming arm of RBE, will spearhead and manage the whole project. ELECTRIC CITY will look forward to strategic partnerships with leading global companies in video distribution, social gaming & mobile applications.
Commenting on the project, producer Gary Goetzman said, “Tom and I are thrilled to be taking ELECTRIC CITY into the digital space with Reliance and Zapak as our partners. We’re excited by the challenge of making content for new distribution platforms and interactive formats.”
Mr. Amitabh Jhunjhunwala, Reliance ADA group, said, “We are delighted to work together with such talented individuals as Tom Hanks and Gary Goetzman on ELECTRIC CITY . We are sure Reliance’s strength in the entertainment space combined with Zapak’s expertise in the digital world, and Playtone’s demonstrated creative and production acumen, will create an exciting and magical experience in the digital space.”
Joshua Feldman and Bo Stevenson will co-produce.
About Playtone:Playtone is Tom Hanks and Gary Goetzman’s production company. Some projects include the films Where the Wild Things Are, Mamma Mia!, Charlie Wilson’s War, The Polar Express, the Emmy and Golden Globe nominated HBO series Big Love, the Emmy and Golden Globe winning HBO miniseries events Band of Brothers and John Adams, and the Rock and Roll 25th Anniversary Hall of Fame Concert. Most recently, The Pacific, an epic 10-part World War II miniseries, aired on HBO, and received the Emmy for Best Miniseries. Hanks and Goetzman recently completed production on the romantic comedy Larry Crowne, which Hanks directed and stars in with Julia Roberts.
About Reliance Big Entertainment:Reliance BIG Entertainment Ltd. (RBEL) is the flagship media and entertainment arm of India ' s Reliance Anil Dhirubhai Ambani Group, with a significant presence in film entertainment (film production, distribution, and exhibition), broadcasting and new media ventures.
In Hollywood , Reliance BIG Pictures has partnered with Steven Spielberg and Stacey Snider on the formation of DreamWorks Studios and has development deals with Nicolas Cage's Saturn
Films, Jim Carrey ' s JC 23 Entertainment, George Clooney ' s Smokehouse Productions, Chris Columbus ' 1492 Pictures, Tom Hanks’ Playtone Productions, Brad Pitt ' s Plan B Entertainment, Jay Roach ' s Everyman Pictures, Brett Ratner’s Rat Entertainment, Julia Roberts’ Red Om Films and Brian Gazer and Ron Howards ' Imagine Entertainment.
The Reliance – Anil Dhirubhai Ambani Group is among India’s top five private sector business houses on all financial parameters, with a market capitalisation of over US$ 27 billion, Total assets touching US$ 39 billion and net worth of over US$ 19 billion.
Across different companies, the group has a customer base of over 230 million, the largest in India , and a shareholder base of 11 million, among the largest in the world.
About Zapak Digital Entertainment Ltd:Zapak (www.zapak.com) is India ’s largest gaming company that addresses the complete value chain of Digital Gaming. With currently over 7 million registered gamers, Zapak.com is not only the largest casual gaming sites in the country but amongst the top gaming sites in the world.
Zapak owns the largest chain of dedicated gaming cafes in the country – Zapak GamePlex. These are first of its kind, high speed gaming cafes that offer world class gaming content to the Indian user. Presently there are over 100 cafes in more than 40 cities in India . Zapak Games, the Licensing & merchandising arm of Zapak has created one of India ’s largest retail distribution network with presence in over 5000 retail outlets across 135 cities all across India.
Zapak is also the biggest publisher of Massively Multiplayer Online Games (MMOG) in India . It has launched some of the world’s most popular MMOG titles such as “Crazy Kart” (in partnership with Shanda , China ’s largest Gaming company worth $ 3 Billion) and “Runescape” (world’s second largest MMO with over 8 million subscribers, in partnership with Jagex Games Studio).
Zapak has a division, Jump Games, which is the leading Global publisher and developer of Online and Mobile Entertainment with global distribution across North America, South America , EMEA and APAC on 80 networks across 40 countries. Jump also publishes leading entertainment applications on the ITunes App store, Blackberry App world, Nokia Ovi amongst others and have had top selling applications/games around the world. Our leading games can be accessed through 80 leading networks across 40 countries worldwide like Verizon Wireless, ATT Wireless, Vodafone, Orange.
Zapak works closely with most of the leading global gaming and entertainment players such as EA, Microsoft, Valve, Popcap, Boonty, Payfirst, Disney, Universal Studios, Shanda, Jagex, Cartoon Network, THQ, iPlay, Hands-On etc.
Rick DeMott
Animation World Network
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