So What's the Deal with Video Game Movies? Why Can't They Get It Right?

[kguillou]

I apologize if there's an existing thread on this but I feel like this is a hot topic currently, especially on the eve of Assassin's Creed. This is something that has been irking me for a while now. What is it about Video Game based movies that filmmakers are finding so hard to adapt? I don't understand it.

It's one thing to adapt something like Super Mario or Sonic The Hedgehog or Zelda, these are things that really don't lend itself to anything else but the video game format. But there are so many modern video game franchises that lend itself to film so well that the games themselves are more or less interactive movies. Things like Resident Evil, Max Payne, Tomb Raider, Street Fighter (Legend of Chun-li? SERIOUSLY??!!), Mortal Kombat, Need For Speed, Warcraft...these things are all, I feel, very easily adaptable to live action.

And in a lot of these cases I feel the biggest offense is that the movie is nothing like the game and has none of the iconic elements that made the game famous. How do you F up something as easy to adapt to film as Max Payne, for example, which is literally a hard boiled noir action film? How do you not have the awesome bullet time shootouts that made that game iconic? How do you do a Resident Evil series and not have the characters the fans love from the games be the stars?

What are your guys' thoughts on this? Is it not as straightforward as I'm making it out to be? Is there something about video games that just is not easily translatable to film?

 

[MadVillainy]

We've gotten 4 this year. 3 of them werent received well, 1 of them looks like it'll be a financial and critical disappointment

IDK what it is. I do think the problem is in the talent. I think of all the video game movies weve only had 3 "good" directors. Mike Newell with PoP, Duncan Jones with Warcraft, and I hear the guy who is directing Assassin's Creed made Macbeth which seems to be received pretty well.

I think it can be done. I just dont know when. All these poor VGMs arent bad because they're VGMs they just don't work on a pure film level. Bad acting, poor CGI, poor action. Those arent necessarily VGM problems.

Someone will do it. I don't know who. I would say Uncharted had a good chance but they cant seem to get that right. Maybe Tomb Raider. I still really want a Gears of War movie but that'll never happen

 

[Kahran Ramsus]

I find that practically all video game films are brought down by one or more of the following three things:

1. A lack of talent involved. Frequently these are just low budget crap that never had a chance.

2. Picking games based on popularity as opposed to whether it would actually work well as a film.

3. Straying too far from the source material. Obviously changes need to be made, but sometimes they change so much that even the basic concept and characters are done away with. It strips away the appeal.

Even as the budgets go up and the talent gets better and they pick the right games to adapt, #3 remains a big problem. When you have things like the director of Assassin's Creed saying he wants the sequel to take place during the Cold War, they clearly don't get it.

There is really only the one recent live action video game movie that I liked, Ace Attorney, and that's largely because it managed to stay faithful to the spirit of the game and the characters.

 

[Arachnerd]

Videogame films need someone like Kevin Feige to steer the whole genre in the right direction.

 

[LoganGambit87]

problem is alot of video games are great to play but are not the greatest stories

 

[Frankeh]

I think part of it is nature of videogames. Resident Evil (the original) for example is based around a mansion with inaccesible areas leaving you to search for keys while battling the monsters that inhabit the mansion... how can you do that cinematically. It's like the dungeons in Zelda. Awesome playing them but how do you portray that in film. That's where the writing comes in. Writing most of the times isn't good in these films. Leaps in logic, plotholes, etc. abound.

 

[Fallen Angel]

Take out Mortal Kombat from your list damn you. That\s cheesy fun and it's faithful to the games.

 

[Drizzle]

problem is alot of video games are great to play but are not the greatest stories

And the ones that do have great stories are good enough as is and don't need film adaptations because they wouldn't improve anything, like The Last of Us.

 

[Boom]

Honestly surprised Halo still hasn't been made.

 

[jmc]

I think the problem is quite simple. The two mediums just aren't compatible. You've got one medium where you're watching the action and another medium where you're engaging in the action.

 

[Kahran Ramsus]

I think the problem is quite simple. The two mediums just aren't compatible. You've got one medium where you're watching the action and another medium where you're engaging in the action.

I don't buy that argument. There are many good anime adaptations of videogames, so it proves it can be done in that medium.

 

[jmc]

I don't buy that argument. There are many good anime adaptations of videogames, so it proves it can be done in that medium.

And yet 30+ years into live action movies the best we have is Mortal Kombat.

 

[MadVillainy]

Yeah I dont buy that argument either.

All the VGM problems arent exclusive to VGMs. They aren't poorly acted because they're based of video games. They dont have shoddy CGI because theyre based of video games

And in the those 30 years we've had 3 maybe 4 good directors. I dont buy it.

 

[Kahran Ramsus]

And yet 30+ years into live action movies the best we have is Mortal Kombat.

Correct. However, if the Japanese can do it, it means the problem isn't with the video game medium. The problem is with American filmmakers.

 

[MadVillainy]

Correct. However, if the Japanese can do it, it means the problem isn't with the video game medium. The problem is with American filmmakers.

Duncan Jones and Mike Newell are Brits

But I agree with your point. I think it's just a silly answer to say the medium can't translate.

 

[Kahran Ramsus]

Duncan Jones and Mike Newell are Brits

But I agree with your point. I think it's just a silly answer to say the medium can't translate.

Yes, I'm sorry. I realized the moment I posted it that I should have said western instead of American.

 

[LoganGambit87]

And the ones that do have great stories are good enough as is and don't need film adaptations because they wouldn't improve anything, like The Last of Us.

comes out in march

 

[jmc]

Correct. However, if the Japanese can do it, it means the problem isn't with the video game medium. The problem is with American filmmakers.

If we're talking anime then you're talking about a different medium to live action. What translates to animation doesn't always work for live action. I'm just saying we've got enough proof to suggest that regardless of the level of the film makers abilities live action video game adaptations have always struggled. Law of averages would dictate at some point in the last 30 years we would have had at least a handful of respectable movies to show as examples, and yet we have zero. So, the question comes back to the mediums themselves. Whether they are actually compatible is a valid question, and at present the evidence points to them not being so.

 

[kguillou]

Take out Mortal Kombat from your list damn you. That\s cheesy fun and it's faithful to the games.

My apologies, I love the original Mortal Kombat, too

But that's the best we've gotten. And I agree with a lot of your points. I, too, don't think that just because a video game is a video game that its characters and story can't be translated over to film. I think even though the studios greenlight these projects they don't really have a ton of faith in them and a lot of good directors/ actors don't want to be involved so its tough to get quality talent involved in these things. But some of these projects are just primed to be kick ass films. Resident Evil could be an awesome survival/zombie horror/action movie, Max Payne a hardboiled film noir, Tomb Raider a female version of Indiana Jones...with guns, Street Fighter a martial arts film....its all laid out for them, they just need screenwriters and director who care and who care to actually play these things to understand them.

 

[MadVillainy]

Making crappy movies isnt a VGM exclusive problem. Maybe hire good directors who actually care about the subject matter (Assassin's Creed), don't make it laughably generic (Prince of Persia), and don't have them get ridiculous amounts of interference from people who don't know what they're talking about.
At the very least just make the characters interesting.

 

[Drizzle]

comes out in march

Spoiler

[YT]clU0Sh9ngmY[/YT]

 

[Kahran Ramsus]

If we're talking anime then you're talking about a different medium to live action. What translates to animation doesn't always work for live action. I'm just saying we've got enough proof to suggest that regardless of the level of the film makers abilities live action video game adaptations have always struggled. Law of averages would dictate at some point in the last 30 years we would have had at least a handful of respectable movies to show as examples, and yet we have zero. So, the question comes back to the mediums themselves. Whether they are actually compatible is a valid question, and at present the evidence points to them not being so.

There have been numerous successful animation to live-action films as well.

But let's go back to the three points I mentioned.

How many live action video game films actually avoided all three problems?

I can think of only western movie that did so. This past year's Warcraft. One. That's hardly enough to say it can't be done. And even it is a borderline example, because they made the poor choice of adapting the first game instead of the far better Warcraft III or World of Warcraft.

Ace Attorney is live action and quite entertaining, so it can be done.

 

[Kahran Ramsus]

Oh, and I should add that Clue was based off a board game and was fantastic.

 

[The Guard]

I think it has more to do with the target audience than anything. They seem to have the same target audience as many action films, and let's face it, most action films aren't great.

I don't think it's an accident that many video game movies come across as kind of "B". I think studios think that's what people want from that kind of a concept. Shoot em up/sci fi, full of easy thrills and sex appeal. And let's face it, many video games use that formula, too.

Studios want them to be accessible, so they tend to make them kind of loud, dumb, and broadly plotted.

 

[MadVillainy]

Oh, and I should add that Clue was based off a board game and was fantastic.

Pirates of the Carribean. Based off a ride.

And before says anything about the sequels. The first one was dope.