In 1998, Hines produced a small independent sci-fi film called "Bug Wars" to see what he could accomplish with a quarter-million dollar budget using desktop computer hardware and commercially available software for post-production and compositing. A few of the founding members of Microsoft happened to attend one of the screenings, and found themselves fans of Hines' work. Among the small audiences at the screenings, Hines found the initial support he needed to take on the feature project he had been waiting to produce, "The War of the Worlds."

"...they loved the film so much, immediately afterwards they asked me, 'What have you got planned next?' I said "The War of the Worlds," and they all happened to be fans of the material. In a very short period of time I found myself in New York assembling 42 million dollars to put the film together entirely without Hollywood's help or backing."

Hines planned to update the story to take place in the present instead of 1900's Britain where the H.G. Wells novel is set. In the initial script, the aliens that invade earth have electromagnetic pulse wave (EMP) weapons, which they use to wipe out all electronic devices on the face of the earth. It's not as futuristic as it may sound; the U.S. military is rumored to already have e-bombs as part of their arsenal. With all technology destroyed, contemporary times would resemble the 1900's and much of Wells' storyline could play out just as it did in the novel.

Above all, Hines sought to create a movie that would be as true to H.G. Wells' vision as possible. That meant finding a look for the invading aliens and their technology that would reflect the fears and anxieties of the Victorians, rather than current trends in special effects. For inspiration, he looked to what was "cutting edge" at the turn of the century.

"This was the booming point of the industrial age and human beings were just fascinated with things that they could overscale. You know, giant wrenches the size of houses. A piston the size of a car. Things that are like, 'wow, look what we can do!' Big giant gargantuan lathes with huge bolts that are as big as your head. And bridges that were bolted together with zillions of rivets."

He wouldn't reveal much, but Hines did provide a brief glimpse at what his aliens and their technology would be like:

"... it's as if the medievalists, they had these giant overscaled catapults that they would use to sling these huge bales of fire the size of a wagon at each other. And so we sort of applied the idea that what if the medievalists had somehow stumbled on computer technology. How frightening would these massive overscaled iron and copper age kind of energies be, applied to computer use. And that's about as much as I can say ..."

"One, it was a great in-joke to me. Because the Boer War was the war in which H.G. Wells wrote 'The War of the Worlds' in reaction to. And so anyone who actually was deeply connected to the book might know..'gee the Boer War, why does that sound so familiar?'"

"Secondly it was a war that was going on in the turn of the century for England. And so for us to be shooting a picture where we're marching around with nineteenth century troops, in England, preparing to go off to war, that was a good cover. People would immediately accept that in reason that 'oh well that makes sense, that was when the Boer war was occurring.'"

"And part of that was that we shot it under 'The Great Boer War' just to not be inundated with onlookers and with fans of War of the Worlds and as it was, and as it is, we get thousands of letters a week of people essentially wanting employment or wanting to be involved or giving us advice on how to make the movie. And it would have been doing it in a fishbowl."