Universal gearing up for Asteroids

The Hollywood Reporter has announced that Universal is setting its sights on a remake of the classic arcade game Asteroids. This acquisition apparently came after a bidding war between four studios.

Transformers producer Lorenzo di Bonaventura is on board to oversee this project, and Disney newbie Matthew Lopez will write a first draft of the script.

Asteroids was released in 1979 and put gamers in the seat of a triangular spaceship. The aim of the game was to then traverse space while zapping countless asteroids and the odd UFO. It proved to be a big success and spawned three sequels in Asteroids Deluxe, Space Duel and Blasteroids. The game didn’t follow any real narrative path, so with a blank canvas to work from Universal can take this possible franchise in any direction.

Asteroids is in the very early stages of production and at this time there are no details regarding dates of release and casting.