It was bound to happen. Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment has announced plans to release games based on ABC’s “The Bachelor” and “The Bachelorette”.

The games will be developed by Ludia, which has become something of a specialist in licensed products, producing games based on “The Price is Right,” “American Idol” and more. Look for the titles announced to day to hit shelves at the conclusion of season 14 of “The Bachelor” in 2010.

How they can build a worthwhile gameplay component out of hot tub encounters and awkward meetings with potential in-laws is a bit beyond me, but Ludia is the same company working on a video game version of “The Amazing Race,” so they’re definitely believers in the reality-tv-to-video-game conversion.

Let’s face it: It’s pretty easy to make jokes at the premise of the game, but there have been some successful reality TV games, mostly centered around the “American Idol” franchise. And while the game was terrible, there was actual excitement when Infogrames put out a “Survivor” game in 2001.

Put into hard numbers, as of June, "American Idol"-themed games have collectively sold some 1.6 million copies, according to the NPD Group, which tracks video game sales. "Hell's Kitchen," which is more comparable to "The Bachelor" in terms of potential audience, has sold 63,000 copies life to date. 

Last July, when Microsoft took the wraps off of its Xbox Live Prime Time program, it promised the games would allow people to compete for “real world” prizes. So far, it has failed to deliver on that.

That begins to change this Friday, though, when players of the U.S. and Canadian beta of “1 vs. 100” will be competing for up to 10,000 Microsoft Points and a new Xbox LIVE Arcade title in every round. (Each two hour episode of the live show generally features between eight and 13 rounds.)

Players who are playing as part of the mob (or, the “100” in the game’s title) or “the One” will have a chance to win the points and games. The great unwashed in the crowd still just get to play for ego boosts and sweepstakes entries, which puts them in the running for a Zune or an HDTV home theater system.

That’s a bit nicer, though hopefully Microsoft will offer players in the game more than just points and LIVE Arcade titles when the game comes out of beta and launches its regular season. That (at least, according to Shane Kim -- corporate vice president of strategy and business development for Microsoft’s Interactive Entertainment Business -- was the plan at the beginning.

Time has a way of changing game plans, though.

It’s worth noting that residents of Connecticut, Iowa, Maryland and Vermont (as well as Quebec, Canada) are ineligible to win prizes due to laws in those areas.

Just one month after signing a deal to stream live programming via the Xbox 360 in the UK and Ireland, Microsoft has struck a similar deal for customers in France.

Canal+ has signed with the console maker to offer more than 3,000 live and on-demand films, sports and television programming to users of the system. The two companies plan to incorporate more programming and expand the partnership to other Microsoft devices in the future.

It was just last month that Microsoft and Sky TV unveiled a similar partnership, letting Xbox Live subscribers in the UK and Ireland gain access to Sky's Sky Player service without a set top box. One of the appeals of this sort of programming is being able to watch sporting content with online friends and chat in live time during the game.

For now, U.S. Xbox Live subscribers cannot access live programming, though they are able to stream films on-demand from Netflix. However, today’s agreement (as well as the Sky TV deal) suggests that the company is continuing to work on a way to enable more streaming programming for domestic audiences as well.

It’s all part of the company’s plan to make the Xbox 360 the entertainment hub of the living room. Both Microsoft and Sony have made no bones about their desire to displace other set top boxes as space becomes more limited in people’s homes.

Though it has literally hundreds of little casual games on its websites, Cartoon Network was late making its big splash in online gaming the way Disney has with "ToonTown," "Pirates of the Caribbean Online," "Pixie Hollow," and Nickelodeon has with "Neopets" and "Nicktropolis." But the cable network has finally launched its piece de resistance for its target audience of young boys and Variety critic Leigh Alexander, who knows something about young boys (I couldn't help it; Sorry Leigh!), says in her review they're the first big media company to do a true MMO (not a virtual world) for kids. She calls it "a 'World of Warcraft'-lite game that's the first [online game from a kids' cable network] to approach the quality, playability and potential for mass appeal of its older-skewing brethren."

 Leigh's particularly impressed by the action, the smooth learning curve, and the way the game brings together many disparate Cartoon Network shows with a unique visual style:

She also likes the sizable amount of free content the game offers. Though there are plenty of reasons to pay, this isn't one of those scams designed to make kids miserable who can't get Mom or Dad to cough up the credit card.

Though the controls and navigation leave a bit to be desired, Leigh's only real complain comes in the second "M" in "MMO." Cartoon Network apparently played it so safe protecting kids from predators, or saying bad words to each other, that there's no strong opportunity or reason to play together, or even talk and make friends.

Full review: FusionFall

Given the show's premise, a "Heroes" videogame is kind of a no brainer.

But given the weak critical and, as far as I can tell, commercial performance of the "Lost" videogame, not to mention the falling ratings and critical problems of the show the past two seasons, giving up on the game right now also makes a lot of sense.

Which is why it's perhaps not shocking that, as MTV Multiplayer reported, Ubisoft has cancelled its "Heroes" game, a story we broke here in Variety last year, and returned the rights to NBC Universal.

It goes to show the problem with trying to turn a hot TV show into a videogame. By the time a game is even close to coming out, the series might no longer be popular.

Between those two titles and last year's crappy "Battlestar Galactica" and "Office" casual games, TV-based videogames aren't doing too well. Except of course for "The Simpsons Game." I guess if the show has been on more than 10 years, it might be safe bet for a game. Which also gives me hope for the "South Park" game coming to Xbox Live.

Given the their frequent cross-over into sci-fi fandom, I'm sure many gamers will be interested in the news in today's Daily Variety that Warner Bros. is developing a new version of the '80s TV mini-series V for ABC (lizard invade in a Nazi/holcaust allegory -- it's cheesy now but was creepy then).

Perhaps even more interesting to gamers, however, is that Jason Hall is attached as an executive producer. Formerly the head of Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment (and before that, Monolith, developer of "F.E.A.R." and "the Matrix Online"), Hall is now a producer and also an online personality as host of "The Jace Hall Show" on Crackle.com.

The article by my colleague Michael Schneider doesn't say much about Hall's involvement besides that he might extend "V" into other platforms, including gaming. We can only speculate exactly what Jason will do, since he wasn't available to talk, but his company HD Films has been focused on cross-media content ("The Jace Hall Show," machinima series "Chadam" for Warner, the "Brothers in Arms" movie in development), so his involvement indicates ABC and Warner are thinking bigger than just a few nights of TV for "V."

Hard to say exactly what that means -- an ARG? a virtual world? extensions of the story via gaming or online? All of the above? The only thing clear right now is that involving someone with Hall's background means the new "V" team is probably aiming to do interactive stuff that's developed from early on a cohesive part of the property's re-launch, instead of just licensing out a crappy mobile game at the last minute.

It's also a sign that Hall, who exited his post atop Warner Bros' videogame division with the kind of "production deal" that's often's nothing more than a face-saving way for executives to be shown the door, is making a real go of it as a producer. As far as I know, he's the first former videogame executive to do that.

The train wreck appeal of Fox's "Hell's Kitchen" is seeing a bunch of total incompetents fail and fail and fail some more and get cursed out by a belligerent British celebrity chef.

That wouldn't quite work in a videogame, since nobody wants to live a train wreck. But Ubisoft and developer Ludia seems to have found a decent way to make it work in the "Hell's Kitchen" videogame, which our reviewer Leigh Alexander calls "an unoriginal but competent restaurant management simulator that's crazier and more fun than it has any right to be."

Leigh finds that the restaurant simulation stuff -- keep your ingredients cooking, your guests happy, etc. -- all work fine, with the added bonus of having to keep Chef Ramsay from exploding in anger. Since it's a videogame and you want to win, though, Leigh notes that this is "a moderately gentler Ramsay who's much more willing to dish out the praise." Though when you screw up, he starts uttering plenty of words that have to be bleeped in a T-rated game.

In the world of generally crappy TV-to-videogame adaptations (remember Ubisoft's "Lost: Via Domus?" If not, I envy you), this one sounds like it's simple, but fairly authentic and perfectly playable for even a casual gamer.

You can read Leigh's entire review right here.

In late 2006, I reported on a virtual worlds development company Multiverse's plans to turn the short lived sci-fi series "Firefly" into an MMO. Apparently that hasn't gone too well, but Multiverse is trying again with a new, much better known Fox TV property, "Buffy, the Vampire Slayer," according to this report on Massively.

Though it's arguable whether an MMO based on any defunct property makes sense ("The Matrix Online," anyone?), "Buffy" is certainly much bigger and more marketable than "Firefly," given that it lasted for seven seasons and the tie-in comics at Dark Horse are currently best sellers. It has a better chance of not only drawing players to Multiverse  but industry attention to its virtual worlds platform, which is where the company is really hoping to make its money.

Many "Buffy" fans (in fact, all but two of the "Buffy" fans I know) are women, so Massively will have a challenge to get them playing a game as immersive as an MMO, traditionally mostly male territory. It looks like Multiverse is trying make the game more casual, with the somewhat bizarre assertion that the "Buffy" MMO will "exemplifies a new era of game design, allowing consumers to play it either as a fully immersive 3D environment or as a Flash-based 2D game." A Flash-based 2D MMO? That's certainly different. Even "Club Penguin" is 3-D.

Multiverse is also planning a "virtual interactive learning experience" tied to "Titanic" that uses some of James Cameron's own footage and computer models. Which of course makes perfect sense since Cameron is on the company's advisory board. In fact, as I reported at the time of the "Firefly" deal, he's the one who connected the company with Fox in the first place.

From the perspective of videogames meeting traditional entertainment, I think the most intriguing news from Microsoft today was its partnership with Endemol to make an interactive version of "1 vs. 100."

No, not the idea of turning a game show into a videogame. That's been done.

But what's really interesting is that Microsoft is "programming" primetime "1 vs. 100" events. It's essentially a massively multi-player casual game and it only happens at certain times. It's part of a new tab in the Xbox Live interface called "Xbox Primetime."

So at 8 PM on a Thursday, for instance, thousands of people sign on to play as the one, the 100 (though I imagine it's more than 100 online), or watch in the audience. Everyone is playing together. There's even a  host who will run the game and respond live to what's going on. I'd call it a massively multi-player casual game.

I spoke to Xbox Live head John Schappert about it and he threw out scenarios like an 8 PM game focused on sports trivia and then one at 9 focused on entertainment.

Microsoft hasn't yet announced a business model for "1 vs. 100," which launches this fall along with the update to Xbox Live. But Schappert definitely didn't dissuade the suggestion that it will be advertiser supported. Given that this is a programmed event, it seems like the best opportunity I've seen for free, advertiser-supported gaming.

I don't know what Endemol's deal is with Microsoft, but this is an obvious strategy for any media company with a property that has options for huge numbers of people to interact. A live interactive version of "1 vs. 100" is much, much more compelling than playing a disc-based game on your own with canned responses from the host.

I think what's most innovative about "1 vs. 100" is that it's PROGRAMMED. Consider the fact that as more and more people get DVRs and watch video online, TV is becoming increasingly less programmed. And here videogames are becoming MORE programmed. If you have a DVR, there's really no reason to watch TV at 8 PM, unless it's a live sporting event. But now, for the first time, there's a really good reason to play a videogame at 8PM.

"1 vs. 100" is part of an entire new section of Xbox Live called Xbox Primetime, so we can expect to see more games with live events like this. And having a captive audience at a certain time is a fantastic way for Microsoft to sell advertising on Xbox Live and rapidly grow that revenue stream.

In tomorrow's Daily Variety: THQ has nabbed a long-term deal to make games based on Marvel's upcoming animated series aimed at little kids: "Super Hero Squad."

Makes pretty obvious sense for THQ, which has had a lot of success with kids games based on the Nickelodeon and Pixar licenses.

What's notable here is that THQ is banking on a license before it's a success. Well, sort of. Certainly the Marvel heroes are well known. But in their incarnations as brightly colored little guys with big heads, they're new. The "Super Hero Squad" series won't hit TV until 2009 and Marvel doesn't even have a network signed up to air the show yet (though it surely won't have much trouble finding one).

I spoke to THQ CEO Brian Farrell and Marvel's head of videogames Simon Phillips for the story and they both commented that they hope this is the start of a longer-term relationship between the two.

It's especially important since THQ's lucrative deal with Pixar is likely coming to an end. There's "Wall*E" this year, "Up" next year, then in 2010 Disney Interactive is adapting "Toy Story 3," then THQ has "Newt" in 2011 and the deal is up. A lot of people in the industry will be shocked if Disney Interactive doesn't start making all the Pixar-based game after that.

Here are a few other interesting comments from Farrell:

You just made a deal for DreamWorks Animation's 2010 film "Master Mind" and now this. Are you on a new licensing spree?

We're all about building big entertainment brands in the videogame space and we think this Marvel deal is more of what we have done very well. If you look at the Dreamworks deal, I think the reason we won that is execution. They’ve seen that we outperformed "Shrek 3," which is a great videogame property, with "Ratatouille," which isn't obviously one. It's about our ability to understand that younger demo space and execute well on the game, marketing and at retail.

But you recently said on an earnings call that both "Ratatouille" and your Nickelodeon games last year didn't sell as well as you had hoped. What's the reason for that?

If you look at game quality in the kids space, we lead that. Last year, "Ratatouille" was a great film, but didn’t translate well into any consumer products. We've done over 4 million units of "Ratatouille," which a lot of people blown away by for a property that doesn’t translate.

We have a great relationship with NIckelodeon. We’d love to see a new hit property from them.

Your deal for "Master Mind" is just a single movie. But given that DreamWorks Animation's long-term deal with Activision is ending, are you hoping to be their new partner for a while to come?

The "Master Mind" license does include sequel rights, or if becomes series. We don’t like one-off deals. We like long term deals... and to the extent that there's a sequel or a series, it can be long term. For us it’s about building a relationship.

It was over four years ago, when I was a young reporter just starting at Variety, that I broke one of my first big videogame stories: Perpetual Entertainment had secured a license from Viacom to create a "Star Trek"-based MMO. I confidently asserted -- based on what Perpetual told me, of course -- that the game would be coming in "early 2007."

Not so much, as we now know. Not only did 2007 come and go, but Perpetual appears to have gone out of business following rumors that it would be acquired by a media company.

It wasn't clear what would happen to "Star Trek Online" -- whether so much work had been done on the game that somebody would inevitably buy it and make it happen, or whether the main reason Perpetual went under is that the project was going tragically wrong and was better left to die.

Now, via Wired's Game/Life, it appears that "Star Trek Online" ain't going away. The game's homepage has a new graphic: a simple federation logo with the words "coming soon" underneath. Game/Life speculated that "City of Heroes" maker Cryptic may have taken on "STO," which would be a very good sign for the project's future. But right now, we don't know.

On the one hand, it might be good timing to make "Star Trek Online" happen. At the time I wrote my story, the folks at Perpetual had to argue that the game would be relevant even with the franchise running out of steam. But in May of '09, Paramount will be trying to revive it with the new movie directed by JJ Abrams. That would obviously be a great time to launch "Star Trek Online."

On the other hand, as "World of Warcraft" continues to kick ass and take names, it's a very tough time to launch a new MMO. Especially a licensed one. Just as Warner Bros. about "The Matrix Online" or Microsoft about "Marvel Universe Online."

(PS Sorry for the awful headline, but I'm a major "Star Trek" nerd. I can't help myself. And as a major "Star Trek" nerd, I have to say that if this game ever sees the light of day, it will probably be the first MMO I ever play.)

Today brings some slightly bizarre videogame announcements that don't involve publishers or developers -- you know, those minor details you have to bring into a game at last minute.

First comes Showtime's deal with Marck Ecko Entertainment -- the clothing company that was also involved in making Atari's game "Getting Up -- to do a "Dexter" videogame. I'm told the plan is for a small team at Ecko to oversee production of the game and hire a developer. It's not yet clear if Ecko will fund the game itself and then take it to a publisher to distribute, or bring on a publisher early to fund the game from the get-go. Either way, it's an unusual arrangement. Though, granted, it's a very unusual property to turn into a game. I would imagine publishers weren't knocking down Showtime's door to adapt a  drama about a serial killer who murders serial killers.

It's obviously becoming a slightly more common arrangement, though, as Kotaku tells us that famed s/f writer Larry Niven is working with "transmedia" (today's new buzzword) production company Alchemic Productions to create a new game property called "Free Fall." Its sounds like Alchemic is further along in development, since unlike "Dexter," they have gameplay details. But still, it sounds like they're going to need some outside development help to make it happen and they're definitely going to need a publisher to help put it out.

Developing a property with an independent producer is something we're used to seeing in movies and TV, of course. Now we'll find out if it works in videogames.

My review of "Lost: Via Domus" is up now, and I'd say I'm in agreement with the other reviews out there: it's not very good. Fundamentally, there's just not much good gameplay. Here's the introduction to my take:

Watching the tense faces of actors carefully carrying dynamite made for several minutes of very exciting television in season one of ``Lost.'' Watching the back of an animated character carrying dynamite as you make him walk through the jungle in slow motion? Not so much. That's the fundamental problem of ``Lost: Via Domus,'' Ubisoft's new adaptation of the ABC series that hews so closely to its source material it never gives players anything remotely interesting to do. The only people bored enough to play through this tedious and poorly conceived videogame would have to be stranded on a remote island.

Of course, I recommend reading the full review for all the details, good and bad. But here are a few items that I couldn't fit in there:

-The gun has a re-loading mechanism and you can buy extra clips from Sawyer. That's actually pretty funny, since it holds 15 bullets and I only fired it five times to finish the entire game. And two of those shots were at the same guy.

-If you haven't taken any standardized tests recently, brush up, because there are a bunch of "IQ" tests from the Hanso foundation you have to take on computers. Most are standard logic ("god is to dog as 394 is to..."), though the final one is a trick question that almost drove me insane before I realized how obvious the answer is.

-Beyond the necessary questions you have to ask Locke or Sayid or Kate or whomever to get information, there are a lot of general questions you can ask them. Sometime it's interesting, but a lot of times they have nothing to say. Which makes you wonder why the developers even bothered writing and recording dialogue. It hardly seems worth it for gems like this... Elliott (the player): "I was attacked." Hurley: "You've got problems."

-Sawyer doesn't seem like a very good businessman when there are water bottles you can  trade him worth $5 sitting on the ground about two feet away from him.

-Most of the characters from the show are voiced by sound-alikes, some of whom (Jack, Kate, Sayid the Others) sound good, but some of whom are way off. Locke sounds like one of the Country Bears and Charlie sounds like one of the kids from "Mary Poppins."

-Those who like the gameplay more than I did -- or can at least stand it -- will find a decent story worthy of at least an average "Lost" episode. And there's a really fascinating twist at the end that will make you think twice about what happened in "Via Domus" and even some of what you've seen on the show.

Also of note: There's a story in the most recent weekly Variety about the poor record of serialized dramas turned into videogames (see: "The Sopranos," "24") and how Ubisoft is aiming to change that with "Lost" (and, next year, "Heroes") both creatively and business-wise.

And if you're looking for a blast from the past, here's the story I wrote when Ubisoft first did its licensing deal with ABC almost two years ago.

I literally just finished writing my review of Ubisoft's "Lost: Via Domus" and will be linking to it, plus providing lots more thoughts and details, when it goes online later today or tomorrow morning.

But one thing I have to get off my chest right away: Remember that hacking mini-game from "Bioshock?" (see left) Some people found it fun, some thought it was tedious, but it was a substantial and somewhat controversial part of the game.

"Lost: Via Domus" rips it off almost entirely. The only difference is that there's no timer and different pieces alter the voltage of the electricity flow in different ways, which is important to the solution. But the basic experience is remarkably similar, right down to some identical sound effects. Coming so soon after "Bioshock," it's downright bizarre.

Of course, the big difference is that in "Bioshock," the hacking mini-game is a break from the awesome, exciting action. In "Lost: Via Domus," it's pretty much the most exciting thing players do in the entire game. But the review's not posted and I'm getting ahead of myself...

Ubisoft not coincidentally picked the day after the day after the "Lost" season premiere to debut... the new, likely final trailer for its upcoming video game "Lost: Via Domus." And I'm not gonna lie folks. It looks really good. From the setting to the characters to the eerie music to the mystery, it really feels like you're watching "Lost."

Variety game reviewer and PC World blogger Matt Peckham says he's worried because the game is not an official extension of TV show canon. But I say thank goodness. Making a game that can only be enjoyed by those who have religiously followed the TV show doesn't seem like a great idea. And I highly doubt the TV show writers want to be tied down by whatever decisions the folks at Ubisoft Montreal make in service of the best possible game.

All that being said, there's still plenty of reason to worry. The game looks good. But that doesn't mean it's going to play well. And as someone who has tracked TV-based games religiously for the past few years, I can say that "Lost" is entering a landscape littered with disasters. Anyone play "The Sopranos: Road to Respect"? Or "CSI: Hard Evidence?" Or "24: The Game?" Or the recent "Battlestar Galactica" and "The Office" casual games? They were all mediocre to terrible. The only good video game based on a TV show in recent memory is "The Simpsons Game," which had the advantage of not having to actually be about anything in the show at all. It just had to be funny.

If "Lost: Via Domus" is even relatively good, Ubisoft will have pulled off a minor miracle: the first quality video game based on an ongoing dramatic TV show. Or am I forgetting one?