Bioshock is a pretty great game—smart and scary and gorgeous and original—and according to Variety, now it’s getting the movie treatment.

Unlike most videogame movies, though, it sounds like this one might not be terrible, and unlike Peter Jackson’s Halo clusterfuck, it sounds like this one might actually get made. Bioshock’s set to be directed by Gore Verbinski (who’s most famous for the Pirates of the Caribbean flicks, but whose The Weather Man showed he could do smaller, less blockbustery stuff pretty well) and written by John Logan, who wrote Gladiator, Sweeney Todd, and that one lousy Star Trek movie about Picard’s eeeevil clone.

Bioshock takes place in an underwater city based on the free market principles of Ayn Rand, but things have gone disastrously wrong. Players control a pilot who crash-lands at a secret entrance to the city, called Rapture, and is drawn into a power struggle during which he discovers that his will is not as free as he’d thought.

“I think the whole utopia-gone-wrong story that’s cleverly unveiled to players is just brimming with cinematic potential,” said Verbinski. “Of all the games I’ve played, this is one that I felt has a really strong narrative.”

Ditto on that: Bioshock’s concept and story is incredibly strong and innovative, and while I know it’s foolhardy to get excited about any videogame-to-film translation, I’m still finding myself cautiously optimistic about the potential radness of a Bioshock flick. The full story is here, and you can go here and here for more.