Made by French giant Ubisoft, “Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora” is an opportunity to “extend the universe and give fans somewhere to go”, said Jon Landau, the head of director James Cameron’s production company, Lightstorm Entertainment.

The follow-up set for release late next year is the latest gargantuan film project that the company has steered for Cameron since the late 1980s, from “Terminator 2: Judgement Day” and “Titanic” to the first “Avatar” film in 2009.

Landau pitched the game as a complement to the new movie, a chance to explore the mythical planet of Pandora and its blue-skinned inhabitants beyond even the sprawling version on cinema screens.

“It’s an extension of the experience of the movie, and the movie is an extension of the experience of the game. It goes both ways,” he said.

If Lightstorm succeeds, it will mark a shift in fortunes for video game tie-ins.

Through the 1990s and 2000s, no blockbuster movie release was complete without a video game to go with it.

Since games take substantially longer to make than film, they gained a reputation for being rushed and cynical attempts to suck a few extra dollars out of a Hollywood juggernaut, and they have all but disappeared in recent years.

But the “Avatar” producers commissioned their new game in 2017, allowing time for a serious attempt at a hit.

“We make great movies in our world. We wanted someone else to take our world and bring their expertise with the same philosophy, the same passion that we have,” Landau said.

The developers have been given some breathing room by endless delays to Cameron’s monumental film project, which has become something of a running joke in Hollywood.

Two sequels were initially promised after Avatar’s record-breaking 2009 release, with the first initially slated for 2014.

Since then there have been at least seven postponements, and the project has swelled to four new movies, currently set for release between 2022 and 2028.