One of the producers for the upcoming Splinter Cell movie has provided an update for how it’s coming along and explained why star Tom Hardy is so excited to play Sam Fisher.

Regarding the status of the project, Basil Iwanyk told Collider that a script is finished and it’s being sent to Hardy soon. If Hardy approves (he sent in notes about an earlier draft), then production should begin in earnest later this year, Iwanyk said. He added that the script is a “little long,” but it’s the best one that’s been sent in so far.

Also in the interview, Iwanyk said the Splinter Cell movie has the potential to perform better at the box office than the Michael Fassbender-starring Assassin’s Creed, which has made more than $210 million worldwide. This is because the producers are going to expand on the game’s backstory, it sounds like. Instead of making it a retelling of any game in the series, it will be an action movie that people can enjoy even if they don’t know the games.

“So the challenge of making Splinter Cell interesting was we didn’t have this IP with a very specific backstory,” he said. “That allowed us to make up our own world and really augment and fill out the characters. I don’t think our movie will feel like a movie that came out of a video game, I think it’ll feel like a badass, Tom Hardy action movie, which is what we wanted.”

Iwanyk added that he doesn’t anticipate the film receiving an R rating, but instead a “hard” PG-13. Story details are being kept under wraps, but Iwanyk said it probably won’t be inspired by any real-world event. Also, it won’t have a tone similar to James Bond or Jason Bourne films.

The Splinter Cell movie will instead try to break new ground.

“What’s a world that we haven’t seen yet? What’s an area of the world and a conflict that we haven’t really touched upon in movies in a long time, to make it feel fresh?” he said.

Finally, Iwanyk said Hardy is a gamer himself and has a lot of friends in the special ops word. “He wants to play this character [Sam Fisher] really, really badly,” Iwanyk said.

No release date or supporting cast for the Splinter Cell movie have been announced. Bourne veteran Doug Liman was at one time attached to direct, but he has since dropped out, according to ScreenRant. Though the movie isn’t even out yet, a sequel is reportedly in the works.

The latest entry in the Splinter Cell series, Splinter Cell: Blacklist, was released in August 2013.

Ubisoft is also making a movie based on The Division, starring Jake Gyllenhaal and Jessica Chastain.