Why Can't Hollywood Make a Good Video Game Movie? • Hacker News Board

Re: Why Can't Hollywood Make a Good Video Game Movie?

#171

Post by sp332 » Wed, Apr 11, 2018, 9:11 PM UTC

coldtea wrote: post #69

RulingWalnut wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are ~~absolutely~~ fantastic stories in video games. There are plenty of games that you play for the story and the gameplay is just meh.

Such as? Besides adventures games Infocom or Sierra style and their descendants...

That Dragon, Cancer; Portal 2; Grim Fandango; Her Story; What Remains of Edith Finch; The Vanishing of Ethan Carter; Papers, Please

And just to make the point: the only games on this list I have played and finished are Portal 2 and The Vanishing of Ethan Carter. The others, I either know of the story because people liked it so much I learned it second-hand, or the gameplay was so boring that I just quit halfway through but I put it on this list for the story anyway.

Edit: I gotta throw Paratopic in here. Played that one through twice, it's less than an hour.

Re: Why Can't Hollywood Make a Good Video Game Movie?

#172

Post by tareqak » Wed, Apr 11, 2018, 9:11 PM UTC

'tptacek: Thanks for linking that article. It was relatively short, but the interactivity made it feel even shorter to the point of painless (even slightly enjoyable). In addition, it also didn't take too long for my Firefox to load (I do use adblockers though). If traditional media tried to restructure their bread-and-butter long-form articles in a similar manner, we wouldn't be talking about their eventual demise as often, if at all.

Re: Why Can't Hollywood Make a Good Video Game Movie?

#173

Post by Reedx » Wed, Apr 11, 2018, 9:13 PM UTC

RulingWalnut wrote: post #50

dfxm12 wrote: post #26

Mostly because videogame plot lines aren't as good as we give them credit for. Videogames are great at being interactive diversions, but their stories leave a lot to be desired and are really just thin background dressing for the real reason we play videogames: for the gameplay. The most successful videogame movies tend towards genre films like Mortal Kombat (the film) and Resident Evil (the series). Of course, let's…

There are ~~absolutely~~ fantastic stories in video games. There are plenty of games that you play for the story and the gameplay is just meh.

> There are ~~absolutely~~ fantastic stories in video games.

Not really, not compared to books and movies. If you're in the mood for a good story, you would not look to games.

But it stands to reason, the medium is not well suited for it. Books and movies are excellent vehicles to tell a story. You have full and precise control over timing, pacing, what the end user is experiencing at all times, etc. Plus they've been honed for generations. Additionally, if your goal is to tell a story, you wouldn't make a game to do it (generally).

Maybe we just haven't figured it out yet with games. It's a young medium.

> There are plenty of games that you play for the story and the gameplay is just meh.

Right, but that doesn't mean it's a good story. The desire to want to know what's next is just that strong. That's why there are cliffhangers before every commercial break in a TV show. Think about how many times you've been disappointed by the result, but kept sticking around to see what happens.

Story is often just a tool in game design toolbox that is used to get players to play beyond the point they otherwise would. It works, even with bad stories.

Re: Why Can't Hollywood Make a Good Video Game Movie?

#174

Post by evo_9 » Wed, Apr 11, 2018, 9:13 PM UTC

ansible wrote: post #165

evo_9 wrote: post #150

If they pick a game worthy of making it into a movie, that would be a good start. Halo would have made a great movie but MS messed that one up and the guy they hired went on to make District 9. There are plenty of games worthy of movie treatments. Dark Souls, SkyRim, Zelda, Mass Effect, Ico, Last Guardian, just to name a few. If you start with Rampage or Mortal Kombat than you end up with equally shallow movies. Ther…

> Halo would have made a great movie but MS messed that one up and the guy they hired went on to make District 9. Indeed. Ten years ago, Microsoft could have just taking the existing plot of Halo-1 (Combat Evolved) and turned it into a movie. They could have just cast Steve Downes, Jen Taylor and the other voice actors to play their own roles. And just use the original musical score too. They would have had audiences…

I remember seeing some of the art work they'd developed and it looked fantastic. It would seem like one of the easier game-to-movie adaptation out there.

For anyone interested, the script was leaked at some point. You can read it here (I have not yet): http://www.spumonte.com/files/pdfs/Halo%20Movie%20Script%20-...

Re: Why Can't Hollywood Make a Good Video Game Movie?

#175

Post by sp332 » Wed, Apr 11, 2018, 9:13 PM UTC

rarec wrote: post #142

coldtea wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Such as? Besides adventures games Infocom or Sierra style and their descendants...

Supergiant Games in general have quite a nice, concise story. Bastion in particular still sticks out.

I'd even hesitate to put Transistor on the list because I liked the gameplay so much. I played it through 4 times to get a platinum trophy on PS4. But the story is pretty cool, and I dreaded that ending every time.

Re: Why Can't Hollywood Make a Good Video Game Movie?

#176

Post by Joeri » Wed, Apr 11, 2018, 9:14 PM UTC

shwetank wrote: post #49

dfxm12 wrote: post #26

Mostly because videogame plot lines aren't as good as we give them credit for. Videogames are great at being interactive diversions, but their stories leave a lot to be desired and are really just thin background dressing for the real reason we play videogames: for the gameplay. The most successful videogame movies tend towards genre films like Mortal Kombat (the film) and Resident Evil (the series). Of course, let's…

I disagree. You have games like The Last of Us, The Uncharted Series, Yakuza 0, and even the latest Wolfenstein game having very well made and engaging stories which I think can translate well on film.

Uncharted are some of the most cinematic games I’ve played, only topped by horizon zero dawn, but I think their storylines are just a little too flat to translate into an interesting movie. It would be like an indiana jones knockoff.

Horizon on the other hand... The opening sequences you could translate scene for scene. It would make a great movie.

Re: Why Can't Hollywood Make a Good Video Game Movie?

#177

Post by __david__ » Wed, Apr 11, 2018, 9:16 PM UTC

megaman22 wrote: post #93

I recently spent a lazy Sunday morning watching the Doom movie. It was a lot better than it had any right to be, in my book - I haven't played Doom 3, but by the standards of action-sci/fi-horror movies starring The Rock, it was excellent. I also thought the WarCraft movie was very good, but there I did grow up playing the hell out of WarCraft: Orcs and Humans, and reading and re-reading the manual with the backstory…

Doom could have better. They gratuitously changed the plot, which is funny because Doom has practically zero plot at all. And they managed to change it without improving it in the slightest—for the purposes of the movie, they could have easily gone with the "opened a portal to hell" and the rest of the movie would have been the same. Their changes were really dumb and completely pointless which was really frustrating.

Also the first person part at the end was unnecessary and just wasn't good cinema (compare to Hard Core Henry which was 1st person but it worked because they really committed to it).

Re: Why Can't Hollywood Make a Good Video Game Movie?

#178

Post by debacle » Wed, Apr 11, 2018, 9:19 PM UTC

Can anyone tell me why the Warcraft movie was so awful? I felt like, out of all of them, that one would at least be pretty good, but it felt worse than a Warcraft 3 cutscene.

Re: Why Can't Hollywood Make a Good Video Game Movie?

#179

Post by debacle » Wed, Apr 11, 2018, 9:22 PM UTC

evo_9 wrote: post #150

If they pick a game worthy of making it into a movie, that would be a good start. Halo would have made a great movie but MS messed that one up and the guy they hired went on to make District 9. There are plenty of games worthy of movie treatments. Dark Souls, SkyRim, Zelda, Mass Effect, Ico, Last Guardian, just to name a few. If you start with Rampage or Mortal Kombat than you end up with equally shallow movies. Ther…

I don't think you could make a good Zelda movie about Link, though. It would have to be told from a different perspective.

Re: Why Can't Hollywood Make a Good Video Game Movie?

#180

Post by CM30 » Wed, Apr 11, 2018, 9:23 PM UTC

jakebasile wrote: post #111

ebbv wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Kinda cheating to call the Spirits Within a video game movie. It was titled Final Fantasy but was a wholly unique story and new characters and everything.

I did say "arguably". I know it's not a direct translation but to be fair many video game movies don't directly translate the source game either. For another example, see Final Fantasy: Advent Children which is a sequel to Final Fantasy 7. It's pretty enjoyable.

Most video game movies probably shouldn't directly translate the source game, since what works in a game and what works in a movie are so different.

And to be fair, most films based on other media don't directly translate their source material either. Oh sure, novel based films do, but most comic book movies seem to have plots written specifically for the movie, with elements from various comic issues mixed in. And most based on TV series usually have new stories too.