Movies Adapted from Video Games: The Poll

Look, I know this isn't comprehensive but the longer I spent compiling the list the more depressing the endeavor became.

The only one of these I like at all is the first Resident Evil.

Like...why, why the fuck do they keep doing this? Will they ever learn?

Sonic 2019, baby!

are we voting best or worst here? v difficult choice either way

i have a weird fondness for the resident evil movies tbh

wing commander was funny cuz the games themselves littered their cutscenes with mark hamill and malcolm mcdowell and christopher walken and david warner but the movie's heavy hitter was david suchet backing up the cast of she's all that

i think i went to it four times

xxpost I've never seen any of the sequels. The first holds up though, so...respect.

I dunno, man, it's a series of piles giving off roughly the same amount of steam. Maybe let's go with worst because being the worst of this group might be an offense we can take to the Hague.

the warcraft movie was unusual in being an extremely respectful and faithful adaptation of a twenty-year-old instruction manual

Ok, I saw Street Fighter (no actual street fighting) and Mortal Kombat (surprisingly entertaining at the time although obvious trash) but there was a Tekken movie?

I honestly quite like the Silent Hill film. It's not an amazing work of art but it's an enjoyable little horror.

Obviously the real answer for best will be given by Detective Pikachu.

Oh yeah, I watched the DOA movie. There goes my self-esteem.

I should double check to see what percentage of these were directed by Ewe Boll. High 50s, I'm guessing. He did at least half of the Pokemons, didn't he?

the warcraft movie was unusual in being an extremely respectful and faithful adaptation of a twenty-year-old instruction manual

rampage is genuinely repugnant iirc

the list's boll corpus is incomplete: he made two more bloodraynes and a resident evil

thought at first that "rampage" was his mass shooting fantasy, unrelated to the game and mistakenly included despite springing whole from the mind of boll; but no i now see there is a rampage movie w the rock. sounds good

sorry not a resident evil. an alone in the dark. the games were similar see

oh yeah, you’re right, my mistake xp

the dwayne johnson rampage is modestly entertaining

is rampage based on a video game?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rampage_(video_game)

genuine classic

Immensely proud of myself for never having seen any of these.

Tomb Raider 2 has the astonishing shark punching sequence at the end so gets my vote

https://cdn.cheatcc.com/lists/large/yakuza%20121217.jpg

i haven't seen it so i can't vote for it anyway, but Like A Dragon is a Takashi Miike adaptation of Yakuza, so that's probably pretty fuckin wild

how the fuck am i only finding out about this now

gosh

they made a far cry movie?

oh, it's an uwe

miike also did a phoenix wright movie. i am learning a lot today

http://cdn.collider.com/wp-content/uploads/phoenix-wright-slice.jpg

the what now

the first Resident Evil is shockingly okay and it has some exceptionally well-directed moments courtesy of Paul W.S. Anderson

I actually really liked the Silent Hill movie

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rampage_(video_game)

genuine classic

― difficult listening hour, Friday, May 3, 2019 12:54 PM (twenty-eight minutes ago) Bookmark

ah i was thinking of the uwe boll movie that bizarro referenced (which isn't based on a game) rather than the rock one based on that game (which i remember)

oh man i watched that uwe boll rampage movie. i can't remember why i did that to myself. it wasn't..... terrible? like, it was, you know, morally repugnant, but it was engaging enough that it wasn't a total hate-watch.

there are two sequels. should i?

what am i talking about, of course i shouldn't

Battleship?

Battleship Pokémon

i walk by uwe boll's restaurant most days and have yet to spot the titan of cinema in the flesh

Paul WS Anderson is responsible for several of the better ones here (which is why I'm glad to hear he's making a Monster Hunter movie next year) - the Resident Evil films don't have anything to do with the games after the second one (though the second one is a very good distillation of what's good about RE 2&3).

2nd RE was also decent and as far as I ever got with the series.

New Tomb Raider was a decent if forgettable action movie, but I voted Mortal Kombat, which I really liked as a kid and I'm sure has aged horribly

I caught the last half hour of Street Fighter on TV a year ago and thought it was hilarious. Raul Julia going way over the top, way too many characters doing a few moves from the game then disappearing, Van Damme with an American flag tattoo.

Here's a good article on the making of the movie -- how it just barely came together, and how much effort the writer/director put into it: https://www.polygon.com/features/2014/3/10/5451014/street-fighter-the-movie-what-went-wrong

Resident Evil: Retribution

glad there’s some positive paul ws anderson talk in this thread so everyone will take me seriously when i say this is the best movie on the list

it’s a 90 minute recursive video game dream sequence

tbh the RE movies almost feel like ringers: they don't have a whole lot to do w the games specifically (hardly alone obv) and also the ones i have seen are actual, functioning movies, which someone at some point had an idea for, or a couple even.

gf's a big fan of raul julia's m bison turn but i did not know he is projecting it thru literally dying. also lol @ catch you ladder.

Gonna vote Mortal Kombat because of the soundtrack. I where I first heard Orbital and Napalm Death!

The problem with movies based on video games is that most video game stories are already cobbled together from well-worn genre film tropes*. Adapting them outside of the context of the game is usually pointless unless the filmmakers have a unique spin on it.

I do have a grudging admiration for weird train wrecks like the 1993 Super Mario Bros movie, which turns the light, whimsical world of the games into a cyberpunk hellscape populated by lizard people.

*Not a video game, but Clue is an example of a film based on a game that uses these tropes in a fun way.

Kudos to Final Fantasy for being the first photorealistic (cough) fully animated film, and for not being completely terrible. Also lol at the main character appearing on the cover of Maxim's hot 100 in a purple bikini. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Final_Fantasy:_The_Spirits_Within#Reception_of_Aki_Ross

according to memory the Super Mario Bros. movie kicks ass but i haven't actually seen it since i was a preteen

Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within is related to the game series only in the director, creatives and perhaps some of the rendering technology involved. To my knowledge, there's no borrowing of lore, though IIRC some Final Fantasy games also had a pro-environmental theme. Its a perfectly acceptable okay post-apocalyptic sci-fi action film, but its really most notable for being a trailblazer in attempts at photorealism. It's also the only film in this poll I've seen.

I've read that Duncan Jones' Warcraft is remarkably respectful of the game and its fans. Not sure it was the best use of the talents of the director of Moon, but then again, Mute demonstrated that he's not a font of original ideas.

I've read that Duncan Jones' /Warcraft/ is remarkably respectful of the game and its fans.

Genuinely love how many of the Pokemon movies are called "The Movie."

more movies should be called ‘the movie’ imo

spirits within doesn't have anything particularly to do w any of the final fantasy games but mechanics aside nor does each individual final fantasy game is the thing, so it is in the spirit of things.

more movies should be called ‘the movie’ imo

― michael keaton IS jim thirlwell IN ‘foetaljuice’ (bizarro gazzara), Saturday, 4 May 2019 20:04 (one hour ago) Permalink

I really miss “The Motion Picture”

You’re really gonna do this poll before Sonic the movie huh

the mario bros movie is so profoundly weird it's hard to really dislike. it's like a masterpiece of misdirected imagination. this behind-the-scenes article -- which features "fuck this shit" quotes from the cast before the movie had even come out -- is pretty amazing:

https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1992-08-16-ca-6865-story.html

The fungus has become a rival to the Marios. The fungus is taking over. What had once been a minor element in the video game now dangles, brown and ominous, from every corner of the sets.

"Rocky and Annabel invented this idea that the old king had gotten devolved into a kind of primal organism," producer Joffe explains, "and a few of the cells escaped and had to start from scratch and began growing into fungus, but fungus with a conscious mind."

"As each script developed," remembers designer David L. Snyder, "the fungus was sort of a metaphor for the mushroom element in a Nintendo game. In a Nintendo game, the mushrooms are the opponents for the allies, depending on what side of the game you're playing. Mushrooms and fungus are in the same family. The metaphor for the mushrooms is the fungus, and as time went on it became a character. All of a sudden, it's like a gigantic character and it became this deposed king of this world that Koopa has taken over. So it developed and we had a company go in and do a survey, and they did a report and came up with five stages of growth of this fungus."

Made of fishing lure base and hot glue by prop designer Murton, the fungus is evolving to heroic, plot point stature. The fungus is destined to be the savior of Mario Mario and his brother Luigi. The fungus would soon rule.

Many are hoping Joffe will step in and cut the fungus.

Sorry, which Burroughs novel are you quoting there?

I've read that Duncan Jones' /Warcraft/ is remarkably respectful of the game and its fans.

it is! that’s why it’s terrible!

― michael keaton IS jim thirlwell IN ‘foetaljuice’ (bizarro gazzara), Saturday, May 4, 2019 9:23 AM Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

yeah as me+bg were saying upthread this is a hilariously faithful adaptation, which i know because i read the manuals for warcrafts 1 and 2 5000x each as a kid. it takes the five pages of backstory in them extremely seriously. i don't know that that's why it's terrible-- doubt an "orcs, humans, got it" attitude would actually have yielded anything better than "finally a chance to bring to life the tragic fall of the guardian medivh, and the fateful choice of the half-orc garona 'not gamora' halforcen"-- but it isn't good.

when i was 10 i wrote and recorded radio dramas set in the warcraft universe tho. so i saw this movie.

I don't think it's too controversial to suggest that faithfully adapting the narrative of a videogame into a feature film will almost always result in a fucking terrible feature film.

when i was 10 i wrote and recorded radio dramas set in the warcraft universe tho. so i saw this movie.

there aren't really any narrative-focused games in the source material of this entire list, hmm

also what the fuck there was a ratchet and clank movie?

that threw me too. might as well make a banjo-kazooie movie.

this is some real-ass fandom dlh, respect

lol i'm just lucky i was out the other side of it before WoW happened.

can anyone who has seen the prince of persia movie (alfred?) tell me whether or not it features jake gyllenhaal plunging to his death over and over again, each time chuckling in voiceover that no, actually that did not happen

You have to rewind the tape for that.

Obviously the real answer for best will be given by Detective Pikachu.

― emil.y, Friday, May 3, 2019 7:34 PM (two days ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

i have seen detective pikachu and i can confirm: it's a decent popcorn movie

Film based on the Siren/Forbidden Siren series is supposed to be quite good. I've never seen it.

First Streetfighter animated movie made an effort with the fight scenes, a really belting KMFDM tune and I later found out In The Nursery are on it (I don't think this was the official Japanese soundtrack but I really cant imagine Chun-Li/Vega fight without KMFDM).
It's a bit embarrassingly melodramatic and the whole thing with M Bison radicalizing Ken makes me laugh now because that's how I imagine political radicalization happens now. That trend of videogame characters turning evil is so dumb, very reminiscent of 90s superhero comic dumbness.

Streetfighter Alpha was one of my unhappiest film watching experiences ever. Main bad guy is not from the games, it's quite depressing and nasty to see Birdie get the shit kicked out him so much. Akuma doesn't even fight, maybe in the sequel but I'd lost interest by then.

Also, Dan Hibiki gets stabbed in the stomach and that felt really wrong too. Have to wonder if the writer was a fan of the games or just wanted to brutalize characters he didn't care for (something asshole comics writers do)

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

Fans "restore" Super Mario Bros. by adding in 20 minutes of extra footage found on a VHS copy. One of them is the guy who made the "recobbled cut" of The Thief and the Cobbler, and here's an interview with him.

https://slate.com/culture/2021/06/super-mario-bros-movie-restoration-morton-jankel-cut.html

not gonna lie, i’m kinda stoked to watch this

Not really played much Silent Hill buy enjoyed the film quite a bit!

The second SH film isn't too bad, either. If the strongly-rumored 2021 SH reboot is PS5 only and gets good reviews, I'll be incentivized to buy a PS5.

I GOT ARRESTED FOR BEING A PLUMBA

movie predicted Trump

I sort of skimmed over the news, but a name popped out to me: Garrett Gilchrist. It suddenly came back to me that I interviewed him maybe 15 years ago for something, because he was the guy that painstakingly restored the original Star Wars trilogy using the best available materials back when you couldn't get the theatrical versions on home media. He also did "Deleted Magic," iirc a sorta doc of all extant (then) unreleased Star Wars stuff.

The second SH film isn't too bad, either

wow @ just encouraging people to watch SH:R3D like this

has one of the worst kit harrington performances on film and also malcolm mcdowell in a big chain suit for five minutes

i watched street fighter the other day, amazingly entertaining film, were resident evil not so great i would've voted for it

or silent hill, tbh, which i think i finally saw after this poll happened? adapts the atmosphere of the games flawlessly and twists the story just enough to feel like its own thing

one of my favorite movies of all time tbh

WHO WANTS TO GO HOME?
AND WHO WANTS TO GO WITH *ME*?!!!

I thought Silent Hill was outstanding

DOA: Dead or Alive is surprisingly fun garbage that successfully translates its source material to screen better than virtually all the other movies on this list. Plus, it has Eric Roberts as the big bad who wears computerized Oakleys that give him superhuman fighting ability.

Still think Doom is enjoyable trash

glad lots of people like the SH movie. I'm quite picky about horrors but I thought it was great, although I have friends who are fans of the game who didn't like it as apparently it wasn't true to it or whatever

although the only thing i didn't like about the SH movie was the fact Sean Bean's character was totally and utterly superfluous to the plot. I guess he only served as a device to show there was a real world beyond the Hill and that people were looking for his wife and daughter

Need a Battletoads movie

although the only thing i didn't like about the SH movie was the fact Sean Bean's character was totally and utterly superfluous to the plot. I guess he only served as a device to show there was a real world beyond the Hill and that people were looking for his wife and daughter

― Urbandn hope all ye who enter here (dog latin), Friday, June 11, 2021 8:48 AM (forty-one minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

he was written into the movie bc producers thought it needed a male element. ultimately my feelings about that are "ew" and "wow what could've been." regardless... i kinda like his role, he is just absolutely clueless about what the women in his life are going through

I had no idea there even was a video game when I saw Silent Hill and I thought it was "just" a really good horror movie. The atmosphere alone is amazing, and some of the monsters are genuinely frightening.