It’s an interesting time to write about video game adaptations, especially in light of the Borderlands disaster.
The entire point was to talk about the colossal leap forward in game adaptations from the days of the Bob Hoskin Super Mario Brothers absurdity to Amazon Prime’s Fallout.
The latter is sitting on 16 awards and nominations, while the former remains the butt of jokes, memes, and gifs to this day.
Once upon a time, Hollywood just wanted to cash in on a popular video game franchise.
Quality be damned. While the money factor hasn’t changed, Tinseltown now knows the audience is hypersensitive to adaptations of beloved franchises.
Then, in the midst of prepping for this little shindig, Borderlands rears its ugly head to muddy the waters as arguably a match for the infamy of Super Mario Bros.
Despite Borderland’s prescient mockery of the above title, the show must go on, and there are still plenty of positive attributes to point to, especially when it comes to the small screen.
The Early Days of Video Game Adaptations
Saying “the early days” is kind of a misnomer.
Historical film gems like House of the Dead, Alone in the Dark, Bloodrayne, and Prince of Persia are all post-2000 releases. There’s more, but I might fall asleep listing them.
Prince of Persia wasn’t even decent enough to just be a bad movie. They had to go the extra mile and put Jake Gyllenhall, a man who bears no earthly resemblance to a prince of Persia, in the driver’s seat.
All 4,000 sequels to Resident Evil are fun to watch if you enjoy non-surgical lobotomies and electrical shock treatments. But you have to go back to the 1993 Super Mario Bros if you really want to feel your gray matter leak out through your nose.
It was a critical and commercial failure in every respect, yet video game adaptations continued throughout the ’90s and into the new millennia.
“Moderately” better is akin to the fan base being run over by a Humvee rather than a tank. The video game generation is largely misunderstood. Hollywood was far more interested in the popularity surrounding games rather than the “why” of it all.
Video Game and Film Development are Drastically Different
Without diving into the technological intricacies of video game adaptations, there are a few major differences between movies/TV and video game development.
Video games involve a lot more backtracking. Post-production and testing are extensive, especially in games with huge, intricate stories. Designers, developers, artists, and testers collaborate extensively.
Films are linear, and that includes even the most elaborate TV series.
Scriptwriting, storyboarding casting, location scouting, and planning are nominal parts of the process.
The audience experience is markedly different as well, for obvious reasons. While movie and TV entertainment is linear, you must actively participate in playing a game.
Again, without delving too deeply into the sharply contrasting characteristics of development and participation in each entertainment venue, all of this is to say that video game adaptations are not easy — a far cry from adapting a book, comic, or graphic novel.
The Turning Point
The Witcher is the easiest of the successful video game adaptations to point to. However, it’s more of a hybrid book and video game reworking.
Castlevania was a critical and commercial success, needing only a four-episode first season for Netflix to green-light a second season. Two years later, The Witcher came along, and Arcane in 2021. All three are huge hits on Netflix.
All three also proved that the episodic format may be a better method for video game adaptations.
An episodic format provides more creative freedom to bring games with huge casts, extensive lore, and multi-faceted plot points into the world of film.
Amazon’s Fallout is a massive success, thanks to the showrunners avoiding the pitfalls of using existing characters and going with something set within the universe and lore but also apart, with new characters and a new story.
Secondly, and this is the challenging part, it means that you have to figure out how to translate to a passive medium, the essence of an interactive one. And to me, this is where Fallout has been particularly revelatory.
–Game Consultant, Tom van der Linden
On the movie side, Tomb Raider’s 2018 release proved that Hollywood can adapt a video game without turning it into a steaming pile of, well, you know.
Tomb Raider is not on the list of most successful adaptations, but it’s far better than Super Mario Bros.
Detective Pikachu did the same, though you can argue that it’s more of a hybrid, similar to The Witcher, with lore to draw from cards, games, and animated series.
Adaptations of SEGA’s Sonic the Hedgehog are moderately successful as well, enough to merit a third outing for Sonic in December.
The Case of Borderlands
We’re not out of the woods just yet, and Borderlands is another example of terrible decision-making in video game adaptations.
I haven’t seen the movie yet, so I will keep my personal opinions to a minimum, but its 10% critic and 50% audience scores on Rotten Tomatoes speak volumes.
So we could use certain things, but I didn’t want to have to be too slavish. I didn’t just want to film the game. We wanted to tell a great story on its own, but of course it’s loaded with Easter eggs for the fans. It’s a big movie.
-Director, Eli Roth
Well, fantastic job there, Eli.
There are currently seven Borderlands games on the market. These are huge games full of lore, characters, worlds, and plot points.
Condensing that into two hours is almost never advisable, yet Tinseltown continues to try. There are rare exceptions, but it’s safe to say that the episodic format is probably the future (at least the more successful future) of video game adaptations.
Borderlands serves as yet another example of how showrunners tend to disregard the vast differences between video game development and success versus filmmaking. It also sets the enthusiasm for adaptations back a step or a thousand.
The Future of Video Game Adaptations
Arcane was a fantastic first outing for Riot Games, and Season 2 is on the way this November. Christian Linke and Alex Yee (the creators behind the show) aren’t going anywhere just yet, and the first season’s success means they know their business.
Following Fallout’s success, a second season is a no-brainer. Prime already greenlit it back in April. An animated version of Tomb Raider is heading to Netflix as well, following the storyline of the reboot trilogy.
The success of Castlevania and Arcane shows that adults are more than willing to consume cartoon products and ask for more. Speaking of Castlevania, Castlevania: Nocturne will premiere on September 28, following the exploits of fan-favorite Richter Belmont.
One of the biggest franchises on the radar, however, is God of War, an immensely popular Sony franchise from Santa Monica Studios.
Similar to Fallout and The Witcher, God of War has a fan base that will tolerate zero major deviations unless they are done within character and make sense. Hopefully, Amazon is learning quickly from Fallout’s success and will do its due diligence regarding Kratos.
Ultimately, the rise of video game adaptations is almost wholly within the TV sphere, though there are sporadic helpings from the movie industry.
Fallout, Arcane, Castlevania, The Witcher, The Last of Us, and even Halo are proof positive that the small screen is a huge venue for these adaptations.
Despite decades of mediocre and downright awful adaptations on the big screen, things are looking up for those who want to see their favorite video game franchises find success on more than just one platform.
What are your favorite video game adaptations, and do you think mining the video game industry is good for TV? Let us know in the comments!