We just got off the phone with Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment senior vice president Jason Hall. Earlier today, Warner issued a press release stating that Hall, who had been with the division since its inception in 2004, would move into "a first-look videogame and feature film development deal through his wholly owned production company, HDFilms Inc." In Hollywood, the producing deal is a time-honored way of easing out a high-ranking executive without incurring a lawsuit. But at the same time, we were struck by the fact that Hall, who has spent most of his career in game development, had been given the kind of deal that many game creators would kill for. So rather than speculate, we decided to go straight to the man himself for this exclusive interview.

Before we could even ask Hall whether he'd been forced out, he made it very clear that this was a natural evolution of the division he'd helped build as well as a return to his creative roots. "You have probably never seen a game person get a producing deal from a major studio," Hall said. "The way I viewed my job when I got here was to get Warner Bros. into the game space in a competent, sustainable way--to set up the studio for success in this area. To do that, you needed an entrepreneurial person to grow a new business inside an established culture. That's why [Warner Bros. Home Entertainment Group president] Kevin Tsujihara brought me in."

Hall went on to explain that that during his tenure, WBIE had evolved from simply licensing its properties to publishers like Electronic Arts and Sega to developing its own games through its acquisition of Hall's former company, Monolith, to publishing and distributing its own games through Warner Bros. Home Entertainment. That last part, Hall said, was best served by someone whose skill sets were more centered around balance sheets and sales than creative and development. "I'll still be playing a role in the videogame aspect of the studio, but now I'll be leveraging my unique qualities that aren't easily replicated. Do you want me in a P&L, sales or distribution meeting, or are we better served by having me meet with Clint Eastwood to help explain why he should make a game like Dirty Harry?"

Most close to Hall know that he has harbored ambitions to produce movies and television shows. In fact, the Xbox 360 launch title Condemned, which was developed by Monolith and published by Sega, is based on an idea that Hall and a partner developed on their own and then licensed to Monolith--before Hall joined WBIE. Since then, Warner Bros. film division has acquired the film rights, and the project will be among the first movies that Hall shepherds into the theaters. "I've always been interested in content," said Hall. "That's why Monolith wasn't a publisher. However, moving into content production for film and TV--and not only videogames--I'm not a proven entity that way. So I needed to accomplish and establish very clear objectives for the studio, to deliver on my promise to get them into game space."

But Hall, who also has plans to enter the burgeoning direct-to-dvd market, insists that his tenure at WBIE was not a smokescreen for his Hollywood ambitions. In fact, when asked why he couldn't have simply leveraged his entrepreneurial success from founding and building Monolith into a studio deal, he says that he didn't even try. "There are two distinct cultures between games and Hollywood," Hall said. "How you go about making a game is very different from how you go about making a film. Hollywood had to learn how to get into game space in a way that was competent and sustainable. That was the first step in ultimately making an argument that there's real value in games creatively. I already had a deep interest in film and storytelling, which comes across in everything that I do. And I realized that as this business grew, as the studio became more familiar with games and how they work, I was learning a great deal about how Hollywood works. Now that I've given my boss what I promised him, there's an opportunity that plays into my passions and desires. However long it would have taken to get us into publishing and distribution, I would have stayed. Now it's time for more suitable people to step in and execute on the foundation that we've laid.

Part of what makes Hall feel comfortable about moving into his new digs on the Warner Bros. lot and away from what he's helped build is that he's very familiar with his successor. Samantha Ryan, WBIE's new senior vice president of development & production, previously replaced Hall as the head of Monolith when he stepped down. "I've worked with Samantha for over a decade, and invested heavily in her growth. For the new people she'll be introduced to down here in L.A., she won't be culturally disruptive. I've not spent three years building this thing, only to step out and have it go sideways because someone has a different take on what we need to be doing. She's absolutely the right person, and with her, we're set up for success."