Video game movies, when will they stop sucking?!

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Permalink Reply by thejon93rd on November 2, 2009 at 8:17pm

They'll stop sucking when the studios stop being such money-grubbing assholes, and who in the hell knows when that will happen.

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Permalink Reply by AcE! on November 2, 2009 at 8:20pm

I don't care about videogame movies. The games with original stories never get picked anyway.

"Let's do Far Cry!" "You mean Rambo?"
"They should make Call of Duty!" "You mean Saving Private Ryan?"
"They should make Halo!" "You mean Aliens with... more aliens and a cyborg?"
"Silent Hill!" "Every horror movie ever made?"
"Resident Evil!" "Once again... every zombie movie ever made?"

So on, and so forth. Or..

"What about Bioshock? That game actually has some merit storywise and might actually be-" "No no no, that game can't possibly be translated correctly."

All in all, I think it's a pointless endeavor.

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Permalink Reply by 28daveslater on November 2, 2009 at 9:37pm

it's not the point I don't mind writers and directors taking liberties with the story line as long as it's for the best so even if they had to drastically change the events or even just take the base premiss of a game like bioshock I wouldn't mind just so long as they didn't fuck it up.
I'm just glad that microsoft are taking their sweet time over the halo movie and are not letting their flag ship crash and burn like for example bloodrayne, which btw I found out they've made 2 sequels too WTF?!?! there didn't even need to be one of those movies let alone 3.
I feel the video game industry is far more dynamic and inividual than the movie industry and doesn't have this focus on just churning out book adaptations and comic book adaptations but on more original ideas. we are bound to see many more video game movies in the future as hollywood burns up all it's properties like... well... wood!
so do you not feel that not only should hollywood be more thoughtful in it's adaptation process but that game developers should fight to protect their properties because these movies are coming no matter what.

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Permalink Reply by Lab Rat on November 2, 2009 at 9:55pm

Once that Leisure Suit Larry film hits the big screen, video game movies will have earned a new level of respect.

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Permalink Reply by Madness Mark on November 2, 2009 at 10:16pm

The short answer is money. The video game industry makes billions of dollars and movie producers are somehow still under the illusion that picking up the license equals billions of dollars in movie money.

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Permalink Reply by Alter_Ego on November 2, 2009 at 10:29pm

You know, I think that if they made a Resident Evil film that remained close to the source material, it could work. By that I mean it would be about a couple of cops trapped in a mansion full of monsters and no Hive, no Extinction, and NO ALICE. The character Alice ruined the movies. The games were about ordinary people in a hopeless situation with limited supplies and ammunition. But that's no problem for Miss Super Fast Super Strong Martial Arts Master Telekenetic Gunslinger Mary Sue.

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Permalink Reply by Gift of the Magi on November 2, 2009 at 10:52pm

You are also forgetting the source material. Video games DON'T translate well to a movie format because they have little plot or character development to speak of. YOU are the character performing missions and tasks and whatnot, but nearly every game does not ask you to interact in a role-playing fashion with each person or develop relationships. THey simply give you a basic outline and let you kill things over and over.

So of course Hollywood will NOT respect video games. The games are entertainment on the same level as Monopoly or poker. The only game I have ever seen that encouraged character development, storyline and plot was pen-and-paper role playing games...and look how Dungeons and Dragons:The Movie turned out.

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Permalink Reply by 28daveslater on November 2, 2009 at 11:24pm

I see what you're saying but I respectfully disagree.
it is no longer possible for a video game to be as 2D as you described. Even generic beat em ups and aracde fighters have to have story lines nowa days, no matter how flimsy they may seem. RPG's like the final fantasy series are all about character development and metal gear solid 4 was acused of being more of a movie than a game, and was fuckin awsome.
Even if the game mearly gives a basic outline that still only need act as a template which to base the movie on but they can't even get that rite for example Max Payne or Hitman, now Hitman is an example of ur point but I wasn't expecting much from it anyways.

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Permalink Reply by Gift of the Magi on November 3, 2009 at 7:53am

Not 2-D eh? So how much backstory do they do? Emotional development? Attachments to other characters? Family, friends, reasons for things OTHER than the main quests? Reactions to others? Personal involvement in the story? Even the Final Fantasy series is a little basic and flat in this regard.

Now Max Payne is a decent example of an attempt to make a video game into a decent film....but you might have noticed how MUCH the writers had to add to that film in order to make it worth seeing. Whole new scenes and characters, plus tons of character development was dumped into the film. In the end the movie did not feel much like the game at all.....to the point the game now feels like a parody of the film.

Maybe this is the route such films must take. Strip mine the idea of the game, and do your own vision for the film. Ignore the fine points and most of the story and write in something new-ish.

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Permalink Reply by 28daveslater on November 3, 2009 at 4:00pm

oh your finished?... then allow me to retort.
you talk about max payne as if it was a good movie, this cannot be tolerated. Max Payne the game was a simple revenge concept, which was all it needed to be, and what they did was add a load of crap to it that made absolutely no sence. now I would never choose to make a Max Payne movie simply because it would be generic, all though their are loads of those films that are good that don't need to add a lot of extra rubbish to make them individual and instead rely on good writing something that was sevearly laching in the Max Payne movie. examples of which are Gladiator, Death Wish, Kill Bill and Unforgiven to name but a few.
games that focus on character development: KOTOR, KOTOR 2, Fable, Fable 2, Fallout 3, Prototype, Final Fantasy (I do not accept that you think any of the final fantasy series falls short of making you root for, empathise with or hate any of the characters and if I had the time I would write the back stories for every FF7 character in detail, but I don't feel like writting 20 something pages atm), any of the GTA franchise, the million and one JRPGs that are floating around and the list goes on.
And what character development did you see in Rush Hour 2 or Dawn of the Dead for example? and those are movies that many including myself find extreamly good.

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Permalink Reply by Gift of the Magi on November 4, 2009 at 7:12pm

Funny, you mentioned my least favorite Final Fantasy game (Yeah, I din't like 7. Just LOOKING at that sword made my arms ache. Imagine trying to sell just that part to a studio, much less an audience)

Max Payne worked (barely) but if you noticed I didn't call it a good movie. You're right, it WAS a basic venenge plot, just like the game. The KOTOR games might have a chance as a mini-series IMHO but not a film (Do you really want all those speeder bikes races in it? Or the 2 murder subplots? Or the bizarre droid crime lord?) Fallout at its core IS pretty basic: Teenager has to find missing dad, runs into 2 factions trying to control radioactive wasteland, dies turning it into a paradise.

I think maybe we confuse subplots and 'mini-missions' as character development....but in a game context these are mainly to either build up your abilities or show off cool cutscenes. The other problem you run into with the games you just mentioned is making them understandable and believable. Final Fantasy TRIED and FAILED. Even Advent Children did not sell well beyond the hard-core gamer market.

Is Dawn of the Dead or Rush Hour 2 good? No. Is Gladiator, Unforgiven and Kill Bill good? Yes. Why? The crafting of the characters, the emotional draw, the magnetism of these larger than life people. Unforgiven was realistic, bloody and unrelenting. Gladiator gave us a believable hero that fought and bled before our eyes NEVER giving up. Kill Bill was a wild fun ride.

I actually do hope someday someone will make a good movie based on a video game, but if the game itself is the only source material, then it's unlikely. Games are meant to be played, not watched. And Hollywood so far has ZERO respect for the format beyond getting money from the fanboys.

Oh and FYI? Yeah I'm a bit wordy. But I feel the only way to respect the question you posed to us is to give you as complete a thought or opinion as I can. Anything LESS would put me in the same catagory as a Hollywood exec, eh?

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Permalink Reply by 28daveslater on November 4, 2009 at 7:43pm

THANK YOU! a man who reads my entire question.
you know I totally agree with everything you just said. and when I brought up those games they were more an answer to your character development question rather than would they make a good movie, although the way you put the fallout 3 plot line does actually sound like it'd work. and i again concer with the KOTOR tv series idea that could actually work too, it'd be a fuck site better than that clone wars shite. with the character development thing I was actually thinking about the morality system rather than sub quests and how it affected your relationships within the game.
I think the key word that people are failing to understand is "based" and I've said this like 3 times already but it doesn't have to actually be the original story it can be a prequel or sequel or the back story of a lesser character I don't care just as long as it doesn't suck thats all I'm asking for. The director doesn't have to be amazing, the cast doesn't have to be amazing and the budget doesn't have to be huge just don't suck!
as an example take Advent Children it didn't appeal to a mass market cos it's far too anime esk for western audiences but the fans liked it and I think if square had made a film about vincents back story, instead of that god awful dirge of cerberus game, that could of been awsome too. But I have to say you're something of a rarety, someone who's played more than one Final Fantasy game and who doesn't like 7, they should put you in a zoo as a one of a kind and all the japanese kids could come and look at you.
oh and I couldn't help but laugh that you left Death Wish out of your praise section.

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