Ready Player One is one of those books that seem impossible to adapt. Ernest Cline‘s 2011 Sci-Fi dystopia has been called unfilmable, no doubt a daunting task to any filmmaker thanks to a dual set realities — one in a dystopian future America and one inside the fantastical virtual reality game people use to escape it — and a whole heap of nostalgic 1980s pop culture references that must have been a licensing nightmare alone, before you even get to figuring out how to translate them to the screen. (Example: at one point, the lead character has to recreate War Games as Matthew Broderick’s character.)

But Ready Player One isn’t being directed by just any filmmaker, it’s got Steven Spielberg at the helm; a director who’s both uniquely qualified to capture that ’80s Amblin spirit and equally at peril of indulgent self-reference (Spielberg has said he cut most of the nods of his own work). A director who has never shied from technology and who we all know beyond the shadow of a doubt can create an immersive cinematic world. But the big mystery has been — how will he do it? Now, we’ve got a couple hints

X-Men Apocalypse star Tye Sheridan is taking on the lead role of Wade Watts and his in-game avatar Parzival for Ready Player One, and the actor offered some insight into the filming and story process when I caught up with him for his upcoming thriller Detour.

For one thing, Sheridan says the film will be set about 60% in the digital world known as The OASIS, and confirmed that Spielberg is sticking to the bones of Cline’s story.