A "Fallout" TV show based on the popular post-apocalyptic game franchise is being developed by the creators of "Westworld" for Amazon

Amazon won a bidding war to license the rights to the game and asked Jonathan Nolan and Lisa Joy, the husband-and-wife duo behind HBO's hit sci-fi drama, to adapt it The Fallout TV show was the first project for which Nolan and Joy signed a huge nine-figure deal to produce shows and movies for Amazon

Amazon and Bethesda, the game studio that produces "Fallout," confirmed the news on Twitter

"Fallout" is set in a future envisioned by Americans in the late 1940s The country self-destructed in 2077 due to nuclear war; the Fallout video game series was first released in 1997 and has enjoyed record-breaking sales worldwide The mobile game Fallout Shelter has been downloaded more than 170 million times

"Fallout is one of the greatest video game series of all time," Joy and Nolan said in a joint statement

"Each chapter of this tremendously imaginative story has cost us countless hours that we could have spent with our families and friends So we are incredibly excited to team up with Todd Howard and the other brilliant madmen at Bethesda to bring this huge, subversive, darkly funny world to life with Amazon Studios"

Here's everything you need to know about the "Fallout" TV series

No release date has been set for the "Fallout" TV series adaptation

The project is in its early stages, as Amazon has just acquired the rights and is part of Nolan and Joy's Quilter Films production banner

Therefore, the first step is for Nolan and Joy to write the script Amazon has committed to a series commitment penalty, which will be paid even if the script is rejected However, if they move forward with the script, "Fallout" will bypass the traditional pilot stage and become a series

Since the scripts have not yet been written, there is not much to speculate about the plot of a Fallout show

However, Bethesda stated in the announcement, "The series is set in a harsh wasteland, in stark contrast to the utopian ideas of the previous generation that nuclear energy would make for a better world While the tone is serious, it is also littered with moments of ironic humor and B-grade nuclear fantasy," he revealed

"Westworld" also has moments of ironic humor Think of the clumsy engineer that Thandie Newton's Maeve so easily manipulates, and you may find that "Fallout" resembles those aspects of "Westworld

It's hard to imagine who would be cast in a "Fallout" TV show Perhaps Nolan and Joy will return to the well of "Westworld" Evan Rachel Wood might be cast as a tired but competent vault dweller, or James Marsden as an explorer who extensively explores the nuclear wasteland Thandie Newton would certainly make a badass raider

It may be some time before we see a trailer for the "Fallout" show, but stay tuned for updates down the road