Game developers making movies and movie f/x houses making games

Yesterday Tameem Antoniades from "Heavenly Sword" developer Ninja Theory bragged to GamesIndustry that his team could have made "Beowulf" for "15-20 percent of the cost."

Lots of people in the videogame business have talked about how their technology could be used to make animated movies and TV shows inexpensively. The problem is that outside of some limited TV shows, it hasn't yet happened.

But while the videogame business is talking about taking over Hollywood, it's worth remembering that some in the film business are move into videogames. Not just publishing them, as Disney and Warner Bros. now do, but getting into the technology side as well.

Hollywood special effects house Digital Domain, for instance, has revealed that it's making a "proof of concept" for Warner Bros. to jointly produce a "Thundercats" movie and videogame using the "common architecture of a videogame engine."

And just yesterday came the news that Animal Logic, the Australian animation and effects company that made "Happy Feet," (left) has opened an L.A. office to drum up videogame business and has recruited Activision vet Giancarlo Mori to head it up.

The race, in a sense, is on to see which industry will more effectively take business from the other.