The legendary Atari E.T. dump is being excavated in two weeks
Hopefully it's better than Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.
Last year Ontario-based film production company Fuel announced that it would be digging up the long-rumoured E.T. cartridges buried in a New Mexico landfill. It's now been announced that the excavation will take place on 26th April at the Alamogordo Landfill.
The announcement was revealed on the Xbox News Wire as Microsoft has since joined forces with Fuel to bring about this Raiders of the Lost Ark-like event.
As legend has foretold, in September of 1983 about nine semi-trucks dumped countless copies of ET and other unsold Atari products. Reports on exactly how much of what was buried are conflicting, while some believe the whole thing was a hoax. Guess we'll find out soon either way.
The actual event will be filmed for the documentary, and writer of X-Men 2 and The Avengers, Zak Penn, will be covering the excavation.
For more info, I interviewed Fuel's director of communications Nick Iannitti about the project last year. He spoke of how E.T. symbolises the industry's greatest hubris and serves as a tale of what not to do with licensed games. "I think a lot of licensed games today have a great amount of success, but there's definitely a sense to focus on the quality of the games first and the licensing second," he explained. "That's exactly what E.T. represents."
If you happen to be in the area, stop by the Alamogordo Landfill that day. It'll be going on from 9.30am to 7.30pm PST. You might even end up getting interviewed for the movie.
