Genji developer Game Republic is working on a video game based on Clash of the Titans for PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360, but it won’t launch with the movie. This is one game I will be diving into for sure!

Namco Bandai has Clash of the Titans scheduled for release sometime this summer. No exact dates yet. When it comes out you can play as Perseus, equip 80+ weapons and battle over one hundred types of enemies. That number includes centaurs, chimera, harpies, Medusa, and of course the Kraken. Game Republic also created boss monsters just for the game and a two player co-op mode. No word on who the second player controls, though.

The blockbuster revision of the 1981 heroic epic “Clash of the Titans” hits theaters today.

Tack on the March 16 release of “God of War III,” the concluding title of a sprawling Greek action video game series, and the glut of all things mythological is starting to make 2010 look more like the year of the minotaur than the year of the tiger.

To local fans of ancient legends, that’s not a bad thing.

“This (mythology) is what people believed in ancient times, which gives it more realism than, say, ‘Harry Potter,’ ” said Jake Redish, 21, who recently finished playing “God of War III.”

“It’s kind of like having all these superheroes who are already there and who people already know,” he added.

In “God of War,” players guide the Spartan warrior, Kratos, as he seeks vengeance against the gods of Mount Olympus. The re-release of the 1981 Greek epic “Clash of the Titans” follows the hero Perseus as he becomes embroiled in a battle between his father, Zeus, and uncle, Hades.

Audiences continue to respond well to films and games based on millennia-old tales because the original myths set the framework for modern storytelling, said Ralph Covino, an assistant professor of history of the ancient Mediterranean at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga.

“We’re always going go back there because it’s the basic template … big names, big heroes, big victories and big defeats,” he said. “If we’re going to play the Western civilization game, we’re always going to be going back to those stories.

“It does disappear for a while, but it always comes right on back because those are the foundation documents that make us what we are.”

Pop cultural references to ancient myths still can captivate modern audiences, but they also can encourage academic interest as well, Dr. Covino said, citing an increase in Latin and Greek language studies at UTC since 2006.

Reed Brock, 30, recently finished playing “God of War III” and said he is interested in learning more about Greek myths as a result.

“Certain games I’ve played totally lead me towards reading up on it and find out how much they took from actual myth and how much they added to it,” he said. “I haven’t checked out a book or anything, although I do plan on looking up some more of it on the Internet.”

DID YOU KNOW

* Harry Hamlin, who starred as Perseus in the original “Clash of the Titans,” also provided the voice of the Greek hero in the “God of War II” video game.

* The memorable stop-motion animation of the original “Clash of the Titans” was the last work by special effects master Ray Harryhausen, who also animated “Jason and the Argonauts.”

* Although the kraken is portrayed as a titanic humanoid in “Clash of the Titans,” the monster is actually a legendary giant squid originating from Scandinavian mythology.

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