[News Team]

When games become Movies
Written By: v0rt3x


We see this a couple times a year. A new blockbuster gets released, and at the same time, a game with the same title is released. Most of the time, said movie game ends up being horrible. There a few notable exceptions but we easily forget them over the slew of rushed or barely finished ‘games’.

Over the years, a few studios decided to make the leap to the other side. Create a film based on a video game. In itself, this is a great idea: continuation of a story, expansion of a game world.

Is it possible, though, to capture the essence of a game through film? Can we recapture on the giant screen what made the game so exciting to so many people? Can we also bring the love of a franchise to the non–gamers out there?

Over the years there have been quite a few attempts at this. Let’s take a look:

Now before you say anything about movies missing from the list, I only included movies that got an international theatrical release. It’s interesting to note that all the movies directed by Uwe Boll in that list got a score below 10% even though the gaming franchises were not unsuccessful (House of the Dead, Alone in the Dark, BloodRayne, Postal and In the Name of the King). Also of note is that the film that has the best Rotten Tomato score is Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within, not a live action flick. That does pose the question: should movie adaptations of video game stick to the CG medium? Now correct me if I’m wrong, but I also think that of all those movies, Final Fantasy was the only one that was directed by a by a video game director, not a movie director.

Most of the movies on that list were quite entertaining and some grossed quite a lot, so the answer to the above question is by no means clear. I think that stories in video games, if properly exploited, could lead to great movies. The problem is that, as gamers, we always make decisions in our gameplay. This ability is taken from us in movies and we tend to argue on the decisions characters take in these stories. On the other hand, a franchise like Resident Evil, has garnered quite a dedicated following for their movies, where people want to see other stories unfold in the universe. These numbers show that at least some of these movies have attracted some people that haven’t played the games.

I for one am looking forward to more video game movies, I think there are a great many exciting stories out there, which would bring new and exciting imagery to a rather bland Hollywood scene.