Arclight and Micott & Basara fund fighters

Arclight Films and Japan's Micott & Basara will jointly finance and produce a live-action adaptation of bestselling video game King Of Fighters, which is set to be directed by Hong Kong film-maker Gordon Chan.

Chan (The Medallion, Fist Of Legend) will direct from a script by Chris Chow who wrote the Bill Kong-produced features Fearless and Blood: The Last Vampire.

Production on the English-language script is expected to start in Asia at the beginning of 2008.

Japanese video game company SNK Playmore has released more than 30 King Of Fighters games both in arcades and on home video game platforms worldwide in the franchise's 21-year history. The property has also spawned an animated TV series produced by Japan's Production IG, the company behind Mamoru Oshii's Ghost In The Shell.

Axis Entertainment's Joseph Chou and Convergence Entertainment's Tim Kwok will serve as main producers. Micott & Basara's Sumiji Miyake and Yasuhiko Kinoshita and Arclight Films' Gary Hamilton will executive produce.

- Story by Liz Shackleton, ScreenDaily.com