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I have been loving this series, talking about video games. It's amazing, really.
The next entry might just conclude things for a short while. It's going to depend on what games I get into, if I'm able to at all, over the course of time. Plus, I'm looking into gaming design school. I'd love to start attending within the next year or so. My main issue is I feel like I don't have the head for the science and the math behind everything. The next entry is going to be on TV shows, anime, and cartoons centered on gaming. I might even go into fanfiction again. I have no clue what each entry is going to bring me anymore, and it's thrilling!
That's another topic for another day, however. This entry is going to focus on movies that are either based on video games or center around them. Like with books, there are two types of gaming movies: the ones based on the game itself and the ones that center heavily around gaming and characters are either playing the games or sucked into them. In the first category, we have a few titles: Dungeons and Dragons (yep, they went there back in the early 2000s - such a bummer; I was hoping for something closer to the animated film out of Japan, Record of the Lodoss War); Super Mario Bros., Doom, Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within, and Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children, just to name a few. I would love to say that Record of the Lodoss War is centered on a gaming world. But I can't. It's an anime movie out of Japan that just filled that epic fantasy quest for me, so that's where I'm personally going to leave it.
In the second category, we have movies like The Wizard, which featured a young Fred Savage; Pixels, and I'm tossing in the Tron movies.
Please note: film adaptations of novels centered around gaming go into their respective categories. Ready, Player One centers on people playing a game to save their world. The movie falls into the same category. At least, that's the rule I'm following for this, so that's what I'm sticking to.
It's debatable as to what constitutes as a successful video game movie. When Super Mario Bros first hit the big screen, it flopped. While I personally enjoyed the film, it just wasn't a box office success. The same applied for Dungeons and Dragons, Doom, and Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within. Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children might be the only exception to this rule, but then it never hit U.S. movie theaters, and Final Fantasy fans will definitely disagree with me on which of the two films I've watched was the best. I never saw Doom in theaters, but I loved it. Turning The Rock into a villain was genius, and I loved his remark just before he went off-screen to die: I can't die! I'm the hero! That was dialogue GOLD for me, and, of course, Super Mario Bros, at the time, was the right amount of kitschy for me.
Of the films I've mentioned, I didn't enjoy either Dungeons and Dragons or Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within. At least, not completely, and it comes down to expectations. With a name like Dungeons and Dragons, I was personally expecting a high fantasy, epic adventure. I'd sat down to watch Record of the Lodoss War with my brother when he was home on leave, and, when Dungeons and Dragons was released, that's what I was craving for a fantasy adventure.
Dungeons and Dragons just fizzled. As I'm sure is what happened with Super Mario Bros and Doom for those who loved those games. The writers in question just didn't capture that nostalgia any of us were seeking, which makes it difficult to translate a game into a movie. (It's probably a helluva lot easier to translate a book or a movie into a game than it is the other way around, depending on the gaming series. Some franchises have obviously excelled at turning their gaming premises into books.) The setting of the game is pretty much pre-determined. Fail to get it right, and the gaming world is going to tank that movie. Fast.
That said, I'm not entirely sure how movies that feature gamers going against other gamers generally fare. The Wizard, from the bits and pieces I saw, was okay, but there isn't anything that makes me want to go back to it. Pixels relies on being kitschy, really, and, right now, it isn't as welcomed as something beyond grossly absurd, say, like Sharknado. The only one I feel that had a decent box office opening was Ready, Player One. I don't know where Ender's Game fits into this whole gaming thing, if it even does at all. That's something for me to possibly look into later. Maybe. I don't care for the author's real life stance on a few things, and that has thusly deterred me so far from delving into what could be great fiction.
I digress. My main point on this is it seems that, if the actual premise is that of the character playing a character, the movie stands to have a better success rate than something based on actual game that's well-known and loved.
Is it possible for someone to turn a beloved game, say like Super Mario Bros, into a movie and create a global success? I rule nothing out at this point. Maybe it's just the right fan getting the right screenplay down and creating that gold over someone trying to make a quick buck. Until it happens, the world may never know!
And that's it for today, my friends. Again, this is brief. It's hard to say what's going to be a success in the gaming world. Period. It doesn't matter if it gets translated into novels or into movies or even TV series. All that matters in the end when it comes to cross-posting across different media forms is capturing the nostalgia. If you can't do it, even for yourself, you've failed.
The next entry might just conclude things for a short while. It's going to depend on what games I get into, if I'm able to at all, over the course of time. Plus, I'm looking into gaming design school. I'd love to start attending within the next year or so. My main issue is I feel like I don't have the head for the science and the math behind everything. The next entry is going to be on TV shows, anime, and cartoons centered on gaming. I might even go into fanfiction again. I have no clue what each entry is going to bring me anymore, and it's thrilling!
That's another topic for another day, however. This entry is going to focus on movies that are either based on video games or center around them. Like with books, there are two types of gaming movies: the ones based on the game itself and the ones that center heavily around gaming and characters are either playing the games or sucked into them. In the first category, we have a few titles: Dungeons and Dragons (yep, they went there back in the early 2000s - such a bummer; I was hoping for something closer to the animated film out of Japan, Record of the Lodoss War); Super Mario Bros., Doom, Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within, and Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children, just to name a few. I would love to say that Record of the Lodoss War is centered on a gaming world. But I can't. It's an anime movie out of Japan that just filled that epic fantasy quest for me, so that's where I'm personally going to leave it.
In the second category, we have movies like The Wizard, which featured a young Fred Savage; Pixels, and I'm tossing in the Tron movies.
Please note: film adaptations of novels centered around gaming go into their respective categories. Ready, Player One centers on people playing a game to save their world. The movie falls into the same category. At least, that's the rule I'm following for this, so that's what I'm sticking to.
It's debatable as to what constitutes as a successful video game movie. When Super Mario Bros first hit the big screen, it flopped. While I personally enjoyed the film, it just wasn't a box office success. The same applied for Dungeons and Dragons, Doom, and Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within. Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children might be the only exception to this rule, but then it never hit U.S. movie theaters, and Final Fantasy fans will definitely disagree with me on which of the two films I've watched was the best. I never saw Doom in theaters, but I loved it. Turning The Rock into a villain was genius, and I loved his remark just before he went off-screen to die: I can't die! I'm the hero! That was dialogue GOLD for me, and, of course, Super Mario Bros, at the time, was the right amount of kitschy for me.
Of the films I've mentioned, I didn't enjoy either Dungeons and Dragons or Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within. At least, not completely, and it comes down to expectations. With a name like Dungeons and Dragons, I was personally expecting a high fantasy, epic adventure. I'd sat down to watch Record of the Lodoss War with my brother when he was home on leave, and, when Dungeons and Dragons was released, that's what I was craving for a fantasy adventure.
Dungeons and Dragons just fizzled. As I'm sure is what happened with Super Mario Bros and Doom for those who loved those games. The writers in question just didn't capture that nostalgia any of us were seeking, which makes it difficult to translate a game into a movie. (It's probably a helluva lot easier to translate a book or a movie into a game than it is the other way around, depending on the gaming series. Some franchises have obviously excelled at turning their gaming premises into books.) The setting of the game is pretty much pre-determined. Fail to get it right, and the gaming world is going to tank that movie. Fast.
That said, I'm not entirely sure how movies that feature gamers going against other gamers generally fare. The Wizard, from the bits and pieces I saw, was okay, but there isn't anything that makes me want to go back to it. Pixels relies on being kitschy, really, and, right now, it isn't as welcomed as something beyond grossly absurd, say, like Sharknado. The only one I feel that had a decent box office opening was Ready, Player One. I don't know where Ender's Game fits into this whole gaming thing, if it even does at all. That's something for me to possibly look into later. Maybe. I don't care for the author's real life stance on a few things, and that has thusly deterred me so far from delving into what could be great fiction.
I digress. My main point on this is it seems that, if the actual premise is that of the character playing a character, the movie stands to have a better success rate than something based on actual game that's well-known and loved.
Is it possible for someone to turn a beloved game, say like Super Mario Bros, into a movie and create a global success? I rule nothing out at this point. Maybe it's just the right fan getting the right screenplay down and creating that gold over someone trying to make a quick buck. Until it happens, the world may never know!
And that's it for today, my friends. Again, this is brief. It's hard to say what's going to be a success in the gaming world. Period. It doesn't matter if it gets translated into novels or into movies or even TV series. All that matters in the end when it comes to cross-posting across different media forms is capturing the nostalgia. If you can't do it, even for yourself, you've failed.
