Games that could make a good movie

The Game Room
1

Now, game movies haven’t turned out too well in the past, but given the right director and writers what do you think could make a good movie. It doesn’t have to be limited to the main plotline, it could be a side-story, prequel, or a “meanwhile, in another part of the planet during the game” thing. Feel free to list directors or actors you’d have on it if so inclined.

I think Mass Effect could make a pretty good movie, although they’d probably have to add some filler in the middle, flesh out a sidequest or something maybe (preferably not the mineral surveying one). The only issue is the fact that there’s paragon and renegade and they’re both canon from what I understand, so you could have an inevitable backlash depending on what side you chose (and which side probably depends on the director you choose).

Half-life 2 - albeit with a bit of tweaking. If you look at it as a movie the Ravenholme part seems kind of schizophrenic compared to the rest of the plot, it works fine in the game, but I don’t think it would work as well in a 2 hour film. Not sure why I feel this way, and it seems kind of arbitrary to say it works in one and not the other, but whatever (and I admit that I would mourn the loss of Father Grigori that would follow from that, he’s just so awesome). Luckily there’s enough character contact that it won’t feel like Cast Away* the thrilling action adaptation! If paced correctly. Half-life 1 is probably still a no-go, however.

Sonic - What? I’m convinced Sonic Team’s pre-rendered cinematic department is the only thing still left functioning in that place (every time I start a new Sonic game I see the opening cinematic and think it’s going to be AWESOME, and then I cry three hours later)… now if we could just work on that story a bit, SATAM sounds like a good starting place. This is nothing to say for the ahem previous attempt at a Sonic movie though.

[sub]*Hmm… replace Wilson with a Companion Cube aaaaand…[/sub]

2

It died for various reasons, but I think the Halo movie could be good. Lots of bacxstory from Marathon.

Brian

3

Bioshock has lots of potential with its setting. Rapture has endless possibilities.

The Darkness also has nice setup.

Deus Ex could be interesting.

Of course, there are a lot of games that have intriguing premise that when made into movies seem to lose a lot. Mainly because many directors and writers don’t understand that a movie is not a videogame. I haven’t seen many video game movies because they almost always suck. It’s a shame. (Max Payne, I’m talking to you. I refuse to see you.)

4

I’m not so sure about Deus Ex. The game was awesome, but the story is way over-complicated (there are like five different conspiracy theories involved which all turn out to be true.)

Half Life 2 doesn’t really have a whole lot of dialogue, when you think about it. Plus, you’d have to do the first game first, since the whole Combine/Citadel/7 Hour War thing really has to be explained properly.

I think Baldur’s Gate would make an awesome movie, although you’d have to massively simplify it.

Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic would be good. Plot’s not too complicated. KOTOR 2 wouldn’t work at all, since the Darth Traya stuff makes less sense than a Pauly Shore flick.

5

You could make a decent movie from Farcry: “die hard” on a tropical island
And I would love to see a movie based on mirrors edge, the aesthetics of the city, the dynamics of the free running, …but I wouldn’t mind them creating a new story for it

6

Deus Ex would work a lot better as a mini-series with a big budget, I would thing.

Actually, The Ghost in the Shell series(Stand Alone Complex and 2nd Gig) are probably the closest we’re ever going to see to a good Deus Ex Adaptation.

7

BloodRayne
Alone in the Dark
Far Cry
Postal
Dungeon Siege

If only someone would make movies of these games…

8

Metal Gear Solid would be awesome if done right.

You would have to keep the stealth of it all intact, so they don’t butcher the point of the franchise like some movies have done (lookin’ at you Hitman).

But the stealth could be cool, also the gunplay, codenames, ninjas, and of course giant robots.

9

Metal Gear doesn’t exactly have much in the way of dialogue, though. I always thought the Metal Gears themselves were by far the coolest things about the games; what’s more awesome than a fuckin’ nuclear mech?

10

In the Name of the King was surprisingly entertaining. It was bad, but it was entertaining while being bad.

I want a Planescape: Torment movie. I think it could be a satisfying story even trimmed down to 2 hours.

11

I’d go back to the golden age of adventure games.
Gabriel Knight: Sins of the fathers. It would make an excellent film noir inspired supernatural thriller.
The secret of Monkey island. Pirates of the Caribbean was a smash hit. A funny and well made Monkey island could be a hit too.
Grim Fandango. Would make a perfect Pixar film.
Indiana Jones and the fate of Atlantis. Supposedly the game’s story was to be the fourth movie. It would have been miles better than the movie we actually got.
The day of the tentacle. Another one perfect for Pixar.

12

Donkey Kong. I think a movie about trying to rescue a beautiful girl from a giant ape would totally work.

13

You jest, but there is a history here.

When Donkey Kong came out, Nintendo was indeed sued by the people who made King Kong. The suit was in part on the fact that Donkey Kong “stole” the entire King Kong idea.

Nintendo was more or less in dire straits over the entire thing, and one of the lawyers for Nintendo was basically guessing / bluffing when he claimed something to the effect of, I bet you guys don’t even have the rights to King Kong yourself.

It turns out, Nintendo was right.

Universal City Studios, Inc. v. Nintendo Co., Ltd. - Wikipedia.

And, I had my next post ready to go earlier today, when the board went down. So hold on two seconds.

14

TETRIS.

No, not because of the Gameplay. But because of how we play the game.

:confused::dubious:

Let me explain.

Tetris has had quite a few legal battles. If you have ever played the game you know how addicting the game is. [Look to the other post “Tetris is 25” for more information here.] Long story short, Everyone got a piece of the pie where they could.

One day, within hours of each other, 3 companies ended up in Russia to acquire the rights to Tetris on a home console. Nintendo was among the three, and they ended up with the rights. [They had already been using Tetris, and they paid for the prior use. Being the only company that already ponied up the money, they came out well ahead.]

Another company got the rights to the “Conmputer” game tetris. -Legaly defined in the contract as a game for use with a monitor and a keyboard. The company with this contract [Help me out here guys, Tengen?] thought they were getting “Video” tetris, not “Computer” tetris. At the time this happened, the Computer Market for Tetris was over saturated with bootleg copies. The Contract for ““Computer”” tetris was worthless.

A Third Company got nothing.

Then, Nintendo went on to protect it’s version of Tetris, and began to make the game so that it could NOT be reverse enginered.

There are a few more wrinkles to the Tetris story, but I don’t have 2 hours here.

Suffice to say, Corporate Espionage, Betrayal, Period Piece (Early 80s), 80s technology, Old School Nintendo, Atari, et. al. Mother Russia, etc COULD add up to a great, great SERIOUS “Adult” video game film.

*Adult in the sense that it doesn’t need to have a cartoon character from a game.

I am not a Director, but, once you read the history of Tetris, you begin to see why this is a great story. It can be done, and it can be done Right.

15

The link to the Wikipedia article on King Kong V Donkey Kong isn’t working.

It is in the list given on the URL here – Universal V Nintendo

16

I think the Gears of War games could be made into good action movies. Big, hulking heroes, aliens, lots of gunplay and explosions, relatively straightforward plot.

Splinter Cell could probably be done.

17

Any of the Fallout games could make a passable movie. I know (Mad Max) that there have been post-apocalyptic movies before, but that’s priobably a plus.

I think you would probably have most story potential for a movie with Fallout 2, and for a mini-series with Fallout 3.

Worst case: a “Made for SyFy” television movie event based on Fallout 3
with
Tina Fey as Moira Brown
Bill Murray as The Overseer
Will Ferrell as Victor “VeeDee” Demarcos (the Vault Dweller)
* Wayans as Sheriff Lucas Sims
and
Adam Sandler as all the Garys

Working title: Whoops, Apocalypse

18

Actually, the first game would work really well for a movie too. I think audiences would really get into it, especially if they filled in the part before you leave the Vault for the first time.

19

Sometimes (as in the game), it’s best left to leave some elements unexplained.

Ex: “You fought in the clone wars?”
Ex: “I’ve seen things you people wouldn’t believe. Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. I watched C-beams glitter in the dark”

Sometimes better left to the imagination than with 5 minutes of exposition.

20

Knights of the old republic would make a better star wars movie than all 3 prequels. Hell the trailer alone for Star wars: the old republic was better than the prequels.