JJ Abrams confirms Portal and Half-Life movies are still in development

Movies based on popular video games Portal and Half-Life are still in the works, according to director JJ Abrams, despite there not being too much of a buzz surrounding the projects in recent years. Talking in an interview with IGN about the upcoming sci-fi drama 10 Cloverfield Lane, Abrams opened up about where the projects are at when it comes to production and while they're still both in very early stages, things are starting to look hopeful in regards to them eventually making it to cinema screens.

"Not yet, but they're in development," he answered, when asked for a tip-off on the projects. "And we've got writers, and we're working on both those stories. But nothing that would be an exciting update."

News first emerged that movies based on the pair of games at the annual multi-day gathering of video game executives, DICE, in Las Vegas 2013. At the time, Abrams and co -founder of game developer Valve, Gabe Newell, expressed their desire to partner up to create games and films, the most notable being adaptations of both Portal and Half-Life. Since then, nothing has been heard about either project

Interestingly, filmmaker Dan Trachtenberg who acted as director on the eagerly-anticipated 10 Cloverfield Lane, which is released in the UK on 18 March and was produced by Abrams, was actually first recognised with his short live-action film, Portal: No Escape, based on the aptly-named video game. Currently however, the 34-year-old is not linked to the Abrams' version.

Pardon the pun, but it's inevitably just a waiting game now as to whether the film versions will reach the big screen before Valve releases upcoming instalment Half-Life 3. The developer has kept gamers guessing since the release of Half-Life 2: Episode 2 way back in 2007 but, according to document-sharing website Pastebin, one user claims to have insider knowledge of the upcoming title.

"Half-Life 2 Episode 3 has been cancelled. The project has turned into a fully fledged title confirmed to be Half-Life 3. Half-Life 3 is the official title and has turned very well into a standalone game. Well sort of. It's complicated," wrote the unnamed user in a post titled simply "HL3 Legit S**t" .

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