Video games haven’t always made the leap from entertainment system to The Silver Screen so successfully. As a point of fact video games are commonly held to be the worst performing and most critically panned adaptations to make the transition. To browse the list of games that have been transmogrified into films is to take a trip down a memory lane filled with accounting horrors, continuity errors, bad acting and horrible directing. Hollywood hasn’t given up on the process entirely though as the games industry has some of the best writers, most engaging stories and of course loyal fans.
Three of the games that people talk about most often as being representatives of the genre’s tendency to produce box-office failures are Super Mario Bros., Wing Commander, and BloodRayne. These three products cost much more to produce than they ever brought in through ticket and home video sales. How much you ask? Well for starters BloodRayne is probably the worst offender having cost a reported $25,000,000 to make but only grossing $3,650,275 in sales. Super Mario Bros. and Wing Commander both lost about ~$28 million but since they cost much more to make it’s assumed that their failures aren’t as significant as that of BloodRayne. If you’re keeping score the BloodRayne movie managed to rack up a loss of $22 million just to see Uwe Boll stomp all over the hopes and dreams of a cast of Hollywood hopefuls.
So what make the film execs and financiers so sure that the gaming industry won’t just turn out more duds and attract a new generation of d-list directors? The short answer? Some of the genre’s best stories and most relatable content has yet to be tapped. New announcements have surfaced recently that tend to give credence to a number of Hollywood rumors centered around video game movies.
Some of the developments talked about below are enough to get you thinking optimistically but make sure to remember what our optimism has gotten us in the past. Currently I’m sitting here with a basket of broken dreams when it comes to films adapted from games.
Deus Ex
The Deus Ex story has spanned over a decade of content already and the original game had been slated to begin making the transition to film screens as far back as 2002. After starting, being canceled, repurposed and ultimately put on hold the screenplay action fell silent. Then in August of 2011 Eidos rebooted the series with the critically acclaimed title Deus Ex: Human Revolution a game which hardened the new main protagonist, Adam Jensen, and showed the grittier side of Humanity’s future.
Human Revolution lends itself to a film adaptation and as such new rumors and news stories have surfaced that the licence holder, CBS Films, is looking to now repurpose this game as a film.
Adam Jensen worked to uncover a global conspiracy surrounding the proliferation and exploitation of human cybernetic modifications. In the process he fought through a veritable army of augmented enemies in Shanghai, Montreal, and Singapore. The final battle pits Adam against everything that he loved in an twist that is the stuff movie-gold is made of. It’s no wonder the Tinseltown machine is abuzz with this being made into a film once again.
Need For Speed
The closest relative The Fast and The Furious film series has in the world of games is the Need For Speed franchise. Need for Speed has a storied pedigree that dates back to Road & Track and 3DO bringing the racing simulator to PC’s back in 1994. More recently EA’s Need For Speed: Most Wanted revived a story where undercover police officers coerce a street racer into taking on a collection of legendary racers involved in a ring of illegal activities. Considering The Fast and The Furious has strayed so far from its street-racing roots it’s assumed that the studio involved, Dreamworks, wants to work on something more down-to-earth and realistic to counter the fantasy that has enveloped the sub-genre.
So yeah Dreamworks is involved and they have announced that they are happy to have the rights to the movie. Game Informer also reports that Dreamworks has stated that they are not focusing on any specific story in the franchise but it stands to reason that since the only one with an actual story is the Most Wanted series that it is the most logical choice to adapt.
Splinter Cell
Talent agencies like to make announcements because they are involved with some of the most significant “attachments” to scripts and projects within Hollywood. If an agency says they’ve completed negotiations to have an A-list actor helm an upcoming movie that usually fast-tracks the title to a higher level of production. CAA is no exception to this rule and as such Deadline reports that they have finalized agreements to have Tom Hardy headline a film based on Tom Clancy & Ubisoft’s Splinter Cell universe of games.
Tom has recently completed some high profile films (The Dark Knight Rises, Warrior, Inception) and given his performances the buzz surrounding him as a lead actor is understandable. If he plays the hero in Splinter Cell it will bring some established star power to the video game film genre which until now has pretty much been limited to Angelina Jolie in Tomb Raider.
I would give some additional amount of credence to these rumors as many Tom Clancy novels have been made into successful movie adaptations. The Splinter Cell games have proven themselves with millions upon millions in sales thereby passing one of Hollywood’s most stringent requirements: marketability.
Assassin’s Creed
On the heels of the Splinter Cell announcements another Ubisoft title has received some film adaptation news lately with Deadline also reporting that Michael Fassbender has been tentatively confirmed to be headlining an Assassin’s Creed film. Ubisoft is no stranger to managing great stories in video games and they have “managed” to guide some of their characters through dozens of game titles. Whether Fassbender will be the hero or not we can expect the film to take us back in time to explore an alternate past where Templars and Assassin’s duke it out for control of powerful technological artifacts thereby deciding the fate of the world.
With the confirmation that Fassbender is involved It certainly looks like Hollywood is banking on getting big movie stars to play key roles in video game films. This method may lead to more films like the Tomb Raider series which stands as the only successful venture in the genre alongside the Silent Hill series.
Castle Wolfenstein
Last but not least we have Castle Wolfenstein which is one of the more fantastical adaptations of the bunch listed here. What started out as a top-down shooter set in World-War II eventually morphed into a 3D shooter (Wolfenstein 3D) that had the protagonist fighting against Nazi’s who had hoped to procure an army of undead soldiers. While it has yet to be said whether or not the film version of Wolfenstein will feature Undead Nazi Zombies they were the undisputed highlight of the franchise. Since there is so much zombie love around the various entertainment mediums right now why not make the Castle Wolfenstein movie all about the Nazi Zombies?
Collider reports that during the American Film Market Samuel Hadida (Silent Hill: Revelation 3D, Resident Evil: Afterlife, etc) backed by Panorama Media had acquired the rights to produce a film version of the Castle Wolfenstein story. Since Hadida has been so keen on developing the Silent Hill movies it looks like with this news that an action/horror series set in the Wolfenstein universe is his next baby. With the style that he brings to the horror films it will be interesting to see what kind of Wolfenstein movie ends up coming out of the grinder. I’m actually looking forward to a Wolfenstein/Silent Hill crossover since the underlying story is fairly similar.
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