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Video Game Movies

Discussion in 'Off-Topic' started by Dark Lord Stan, Jul 25, 2014.

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Do you like Video Games movies?

  1. WOO! Video game movies!

    1 vote(s)
    10.0%
  2. Yes?(Post why :P)

    0 vote(s)
    0.0%
  3. Meh.

    4 vote(s)
    40.0%
  4. No?(Also post why :D)

    1 vote(s)
    10.0%
  5. Burn all the video game movies.

    4 vote(s)
    40.0%
  1. Dark Lord Stan

    Dark Lord Stan The Recoloring Master

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    So there is a lot of movies that are based on or off video games. Sometimes they are the games turned completely into movies. What are some game movies you know of?
    Also this is happening:
     
  2. Doctor Frohman

    Doctor Frohman New Member

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    Games that are turned into movies are fuckin'... terrible.
     
  3. OdinOnlineAlive

    OdinOnlineAlive New Member

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    Super mario bros. the movie is the bomb. It is on par with the works of Sergei Eisenstein and Stanley Kubrick.
     
  4. Finestein Goodlad

    Finestein Goodlad Wizard Mod

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    All the Lego movie.
     
  5. FFPLEASE

    FFPLEASE DANK MEMES

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  6. Terallis

    Terallis Dark Matter of Fact

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    Not placing a vote because I'm rather undecided. There are good ones and then there are bad ones. I rather enjoyed the very first Resident Evil movie, for instance. Kiiinda liked Apocalypse. Though, after that, it just got really horrible. I also gotta admit that I enjoyed DOOM, even though it lacked any real story. Though, that may be why I enjoyed it. DOOM never really had much of a story aside from "HELL HAS BROKEN LOOSE! SAVE EVERYTHING!"

    Other movies I found were rather well executed were:

    -Prince of Persia (aside from lacking the sand creatures, it kept pretty close to the story)
    -Silent Hill (not the second one)
    -Mortal Kombat (the first one, only)

    But then there are a lot more bad ones, than good, I suppose.

    -Mortal Kombat: Annihilation
    -Double Dragon
    -Alone in the Dark
    -House of the Dead
    -Bloodrayne
    -Street Fighter (both the base movie and The Legend of Chun-Li)
    -Postal
    -Wing Commander
    -Super Mario Bros
    -Hitman
    -Dead or Alive
    -Max Payne
    -and more

    However, despite the overall reputation of video game movies, there are a number coming out that I'm REALLY looking forward to. Mind you, some of them are unconfirmed, but have a lot of stuff indicating their release.

    -The Last of Us
    -Ratcher and Clank
    -Dead Space
    -Watch Dogs
    -Assassin's Creed
    -Sly Cooper
    -Halo
    -Uncharted
    -Heavenly Sword
    -Bioshock
     
  7. Pie4Pigs

    Pie4Pigs Bleach Connoisseur

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    The possibility of a Portal/Half-Life movie is being discussed by Valve, isn't it? And a Fables movie. Fables is a comic, but it had The Wolf Among Us come out recently to popularize it.
     
  8. Chronicle

    Chronicle nobody knows why he's still here

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    Awesome summary.

    Can confirm that Prince of Persia rocked. Not only does it keep pretty well to the plot, but, hey. It's just a good movie in general.

    super mario bros was amazing i have that on dvd and you shut up.

    i kid it's awful

    Another movie that I really enjoyed (though it's bloody short) was Assassin's Creed: Embers, which is a prequel to Assassin's Creed II. A really interesting thing about it is that every single major actor in the movie is, in fact, the same person who provides the facial model for their character in Assassin's Creed II. (Except, oddly enough, Ezio. But he's a minor character in it, anyway.) It's kind of surreal, but also REALLY cool if you played the game - you'll recognize pretty much everyone instantly. I recommend it.

    Important question: Do animated movies count? Because I know there are a few video game-based ones. For example, there's at least one movie based off the Halo series which my Halo-fanboy relative swears is great. Not sure if you can trust him, as an objective source, but they seemed pretty nice from what I saw.

    I also frequently see a Dead Space animation around here - Dead Space: Downfall. It's sold in pawn shops a lot, but I have no idea if it's good or not. Been tempted to pick it up.
     
  9. Terallis

    Terallis Dark Matter of Fact

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    THere were two Halo related stuff, to be fair. One was Halo Legends which was just a large number of short films, kinda like The Animatrix. The other being the mini-series that was made into a movie, Halo: Forward Unto Dawn, which told the story of the very beginning of the Covenant War.

    As for Dead Space, yeah. Dead Space: Downfall has been around for a while. It's a prequel to the first Dead Space. But they are working on a live-action movie for the series, apparently.
     
  10. Liraxus

    Liraxus New Member

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    Movies based on games always end up like books.

    "Eh, the game was better."

    Then you have stuff like the Chronicles of Riddick where it turns out the game was better than the movie.

    And I am ashamed at all of you for not mentioning Wreck-It Ralph at all.

    I am however looking forward to the Ratchet and Clank Movie, it looks absolutely gorgeous.
     
  11. Felonious

    Felonious Restart Monkey

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    I was going to mention Wreck-It Ralph, if only because it's a great movie. Even if it's not a direct translation of any video game, it was a good 'Video Game' movie. However, I think of Video-Game to movie adaptations, there are a TON of misses, and a few hits. I always have a bit of skepticism in me when I hear about one getting made.
     
  12. Terallis

    Terallis Dark Matter of Fact

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    Yeah. I am skeptical about new ones, but I also carry hope for them when they could prove to be good. Not that the hope really leads to much usually, but it sometimes does.
     
  13. Chronicle

    Chronicle nobody knows why he's still here

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    The problem with video-game-to-movie adaptations, very frequently, is pacing.

    If you bought a video game that lasted for an hour and a half, and you paid any reasonable amount of money for it, you'd probably feel pretty cheated. There's a reason for that. Video games are meant to be detailed, enjoyable, interactive experiences, often very nonlinear in their progression and designed to give you a lot of "bang for your buck" in terms of time to money, particularly with triple-A titles.

    Similarly, you would probably never sit through a 30-hour-long movie. Movies are meant to be compact, to really "wow" you, to really tell a big, sprawling story in no more than two hours, maybe two and a half hours. (In most cases. Longest film I've seen was... Well, any LoTR film. So, three hours or so.) They're designed to give you a lot of "bang for your buck" in terms of experience to time, particularly with triple-A titles.

    The significant problem here is the total difference in formatting and what's expected. With big, popular games, you typically aim for a lot of playtime and details for the amount you're paying for the game. If Skyrim were 5 hours long with two sidequests, people would riot. Maybe literally. But with movies, it's kind of the opposite: They've only got a limited amount of time to deliver the most detail, the most intrigue, and the most engaging story that they can.

    When a game-to-movie adaptation is done, this tends to be a problem. There's simply not enough time in the movie to get everything you want out of the game. The most common issues you see are either that the movie just doesn't include enough of the material from the game - making it feel unfinished and incomplete, and often riddled with plot holes - or it tries to include too much, making it convoluted, confusing, and... Often filled with plot holes.

    Same issue applies to video game adaptations of movies, but in reverse. There's just not enough material to be drawn out of the two-hour movie for a ten-hour game. Often results in a lot of grind or ridiculous side-quests and stuff.

    TL;DR: Movies and video games have a lot of issues with their vast differences in format, which is why it's hard to adapt one into the other. It's why we've seen very few successful video game-based movies, and perhaps even fewer successful movie-based video games. And it's why I will remain warily pessimistic about any new projects for either of those things.

    Because it's really, really hard to get it right.
     
  14. Felonious

    Felonious Restart Monkey

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    It's really the same issue books face when adapted to movies. Movies are snappy, short. They can't possibly cover everything in a volume of text or in a video game. Couple that with a handful of bad directors and their 'creative input' and well... You have Uwe Boll.
     
  15. Terallis

    Terallis Dark Matter of Fact

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    Usually why when a book or video game gets the rare adaptation into a TV series, it tends to be a lot better. Mainly due to the fact that they actually can pace it a lot more accurately to the book/game.
     
  16. Chronicle

    Chronicle nobody knows why he's still here

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  17. Felonious

    Felonious Restart Monkey

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  18. Doctor Frohman

    Doctor Frohman New Member

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    Is it wrong that I watched the entire thing and loved it?
     
  19. Twitch

    Twitch Wayward Star

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    Street Fighter is one of the greatest movies ever.
     
  20. DeltaV

    DeltaV New Member

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    The Last of Us was already a better story than half the movies I've ever seen. If the movie version makes it a generic zombie apocalypse action film then someone will die.