Video Games | Should they be Adapted into Movies?

 

I have watched a fair few movies based on video games, most of which I didn't enjoy, I feel as if they never quite capture what a game can and it lets the whole movie down as a whole. I know not everyone will feel this way but I do feel like Hollywood saw a money-making opportunity only for it to flop yet they never seem to learn their lesson. The same goes for TV shows being turned into movies and one example of that was the colossal flop of Avatar: The Last Airbender, I did a review on the movie on my blog and it's obvious how much I disliked the movie. I have to admit there have been times where I have said a game would make a great movie but that's because it would but done the right way and not edited so much that it doesn't flow with the story in the game such as Beyond Two Souls and Bioshock would have made great movies but I think they would change them a lot in order for more than just gamers to want to watch the movies.

Hollywood has this problem where writers will run out of ideas of their own and instead make a book or game into a movie for some big money, but even when it comes down to movies adapted from books the books are usually a lot better. I was having a browse to see what Video games are in development this year and it shocked me a little to find that there are 42 of them, now if that doesn't show you how Hollywood is using video games to their advantage I don't know what will, some game adaptations look promising such as The Last of Us, Sleeping Dogs, Rampage and Portal but I have this nagging fear that people will end up very disappointed with the outcome. If you want to know what other game to movie adaptations are in the works.

Video games do offer some kind of escape from the real world as do movies but Video Games do it in a completely different way, allowing us to feel much more immersed in that world by playing as the main character and that's what I love about video games, whereas with a movies it's much more of a step back and it's you looking in having no control which isn't always a bad thing but it takes away being able to make your own path and doing things your way and as much as I love movies this is why I prefer games over them. For example games with multiple endings will always draw me back so I can choose a different path and play through the game again, how exactly will an adapted version of a game to movie be able to do this? They will have to pick one ending or stick to it unless it comes out on Blu Ray/DVD with the multiple endings which will just show the same story with an adapted ending, whereas in a game you take a different path and that can change an ending. Although I'm not the biggest fan of games that are turned into movies I do believe that it can be done right sometimes, it just depends on how much they change for the movie, for it to be successful I usually think that they need to keep in a good chunk of what the game is about for it to work.

This post isn't all doom and gloom because there are some really cool games that have been adapted into movies that I personally enjoy Super Mario Bros the movie, it had a lot of humour and was fun but I know to some this is a very bad example of a game adapted into a movie as the majority of people I have spoken to about it hated it, but come on Yoshi is adorable! Another that I loved was Silent Hill, it actually scared me when I was younger and the way it was all brought together by the costume department was amazing especially the Nurses, they hit the nail on the head with the outfits. One movie that I was hoping that I would love was Assassin's Creed, I don't know what exactly it was that didn't keep me hooked but it didn't feel like Assassin's Creed for me, the animus was a huge change and was weird apparently they felt they had to change it because the audience would get bored with the way the original one was, where Desmond lay down and was hooked up to the animus but I beg to differ.

Here is just a list of games adapted to movies that I did enjoy:

• Hitman
• Super Mario Bros.
• Silent Hill
• Street Fighter
• Lara Croft: Tomb Raider
• Resident Evil
• Warcraft
• Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time
• Pokemon

This is out of a list of a fair few but these seem to be the main ones I can name from the top of my head, are there any I have missed that you like?