According to The Hollywood Reporter, MTV Films, a division of Viacom, has acquired an option on the worldwide film rights to Midway Games' action horror game The Suffering.

MTV Films is working in conjunction with Stan Winston and Brian Gilbert from Stan Winston Prods. and Jason Lust and Rick Jacobs from Circle of Confusion on the development of the horror film.

MTV Films senior director of development Jason Weiss, who brought the project to the company, along with MTV Films director of development Gregg Goldin and MTV Films executive vp David Gale will be developing on behalf of MTV Films. "We were tracking this project really early on, and it really was about the material itself for us," Gale said. "It felt very cinematic -- more cinematic than most video games and with a real sense of style -- with very strong characters."