A friend and I were discussing this last night - with LA Noire and the like, what TV shows would be adaptable into a great video game?
My answer was Magnum P.I..
Cheesy 80’s clothes, the music, the Ferrari, the Lads, Higgins, controlling TC in the Island Hoppers chopper, trips to the King Kameamea Club, trips to the Navy base. Missions that followed famous episodes, like the guy that blinks before he strikes, crazy Sharon Stone, and of course “Did you see the Sunrise?”
All the actors are still alive and probably wouldn’t mind the voice-over work. Except for Tom Selleck, who would probably do it b/c he though he was cool.
I always thought a Stargate SG1 based game could be really good. Something like an action-adventure-RPG in the vein of Mass Effect.
Yes, there have been a couple of Stargate games before, but one is a crappy SNES action platformer based on the movie not the show (it predates the show), and the other an MMO (blech) that’s apparently been canned.
This Old House. No, I am not kidding. Done right it would be a very popular creative strategy game. You start off with a certain amount of money and get to fix up a house with good bones but needing serious updates. There may be some nasty surprises through unexpected work that needs to be done or contractors that run behind schedule. You have to manage it all yourself or do the work yourself to save money but at a serious time cost. If you do a really good job, you can sell it to buy another fixer-upper and start again with more money. The object is to parlay a rather small starting sum of money into the nicest house you can end up with. Active user communities would allow you to share your house photos or even trade projects with others. See also: The Sims, house flipping reality TV shows. This isn’t a good game to play in real life these days due to the bad real estate market but there is still a lot of interest in the concept.
There are already two Deadliest Catch games. So, why not a Gold Rush Alaska game? You just hang around all day talking to NPCs about why the equipment doesn’t work, and watch your money tick down to zero. And there’s a “Punch Dorsey” minigame halfway in.
There’s also a Gameboy game based on the movie. It’s a Tetris-style 3D puzzle game where you could make matches by either stacking Stargate symbols on top of each other or by arranging them in a circle.
It had absolutely nothing to do with the movie beyond the symbols and the fact that the playing field was circular, but it was actually fairly entertaining.
I agree, though. The setting has incredible potential for an action-adventure game. It’s really too bad that the Stargate franchise seems to be winding down in popularity.
ETA: I’ll be damned. There was a pretty recent action game based on SG-1. It was developed, released, and canned all without me knowing about it. Damn shame.
First thing I thought of. The premise of the show has everything you would need for a really cool game: action, adventure, puzzles, comedy, romance, colorful characters, and geeky references.
Huh, wow, two more, but still strangely next to nothing for such a long lived franchise. I mean, hell, Grey’s Anatomy’s had almost as many games. Grey’s frickin Anatomy!
Battlestar Galactica. The new one. Those super maneuverable looked incredibly fun to play around with. A “X-wing vs TIE fighter” type based on Cylons vs Colonials would be awesome.
24: You have 24 hours to save the world!
(Unfortunately in the video game they’d have to give you equipment screens, pauses and saves. :D)
On the PS3 they’d give the Incredibly Stupid Achievement Award if you play it all the way though without saving.