Board 8 > Prediction: Next decade will see video game movies as the new big thing

(+) Yeah! (+)

Hear me out

So let's look at how comic book movies ended up developing

The golden age of comics was around the late 40s, I'll just round to 1950.

It took ~40 years until the 1990s for comic book movies to really be a thing, and the ones that existed weren't really taken all that seriously. It took until the 2000s for comic book movies to really show a real effort and payoff, with franchises like Spider-Man, X-Men, and the Nolan Batman trilogy. It took until the 2010s for the MCU to show up and make comic book movies the biggest trend in blockbuster filmmaking of the decade.

Ok, so let's look at games by comparison. Golden age for games was probably around 1980? So while there were a few vg movies in the 90s, it was the 2000s when they really started showing up regularly despite generally not being great, so we can compare that to the 90s for comic movies. That puts the progression for vg movies about twice as fast as comic movies.

That's where it gets tougher though, because they've been around for ~20 years without really improving in quality until just recently, where movies like Rampage, Tomb Raider, Pokemon: Detective Pikachu and Sonic the Hedgehog (while all pretty flawed) have started to pull out of the "pure garbage" territory that many vg movies end up.

I feel like what comic movies had in the 2000s, vg movies will have in the 2020s. One movie will come along here soon as the "X-Men" of vg movies, which is considered both critically AND commericially successful, with many others quickly following suit.

By the time 2030 hits, we'll have had a few successful series. Pokemon and Sonic seem like decent possibilities for this, assuming they continue to build off the first (I mean, X-Men, Spider-Man and Nolan Batman all really had their best entries as their 2nd movie). The 2030s will see the emergence of the MCU of vg game movies; both the quantity AND quality of the films will rise significantly, with shitty vg movies being the exception rather than the norm. They'll consistently become the most profitable movies each year, and directors like Christopher Nolan and David Fincher will come out saying how they're not real films.

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I can see it.

The generation is ready for it.

But video game companies will have to care....so maybe I cant see it.

But then again you are starting to see it with Netflix shows like castlevania and the witcher.

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Yes please

Johnbobb posted...

Golden age for games was probably around 1980?

What?

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MZero11 posted...

What?

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The entire industry crashed 3 years later how is that the golden age >_>

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Uhh because thats how ages are generally classified for things

The first big boom period for a medium is the Golden Age
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monster hunter gonna break a bill y'all

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According to Wikipedia there's an upcoming movie based on Just Dance!

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There definitely needs to be a distinction between the Golden Age of Video Games/Home Consoles and the Golden Age of Arcades.
The 2000s was a bigger boom than the Arcade era, which would make the Arcade era a Silver age as is.

Also the age of the arcade ended in a near-industry killing crash.

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Hideo Kojima directed Metal Gear Solid movie?

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Give me a blockbuster God of War trilogy starring Jason Mamoa with a Marvel budget

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Johnbobb posted...

The golden age of comics was around the late 40s, I'll just round to 1950

1940 is the peak year for comic sales, so let's round to an accurate year. The late 40s is the massive decline. And 1951 is the Seduction of the Innocent, which is definitely not a time you round to.

1938-1941 are the peak years.

There's just a lot of flaws in the premise here. It took decades for movie technology to catch up to the "unlimited budget" of comic book artistry. It has nothing to do with a set amount of time.

HEY FOLKS WE'RE IN THE GOLDEN AGE OF CONVERTING JANE AUSTEN NOVELS SO VIDEO GAME MOVIES WILL BE GOOD IN 2243.

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man just let me have my fun

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Mass effect trilogy please.

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There is definitely fertile territory if studios care about exploring lore and building real universes. Could definitely see TES, Mass Effect, BioShock, and other series like that getting decent film and/or TV series.

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The upcoming Last of Us series on HBO definitely seems promising

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scarletspeed7 posted...

There's just a lot of flaws in the premise here.

Ok how about this:

Video game movies are eventually gonna get super popular because video games are already super popular.

Why are we splitting hairs as if 1940 vs 1950 makes any difference to the overall point.

turbopuns3 posted...

Ok how about this:

Video game movies are eventually gonna get super popular because video games are already super popular.

Why are we splitting hairs as if 1940 vs 1950 makes any difference to the overall point.

I really don't have any issue with the idea but no one with half a brain thinks video game movies aren't going to be popular and very successful. My issue is with a complete misunderstanding of history, and that's not splitting hairs. Saying that diminishes the value of understanding and appreciating the history of two different industries.

1940 and 1950 make a huge difference because one year is the peak of an industry and the other is near its nadir. If one person can be educated about an industry with a rich history and cultural impact, then it will likely inform them on a variety of subjects moving forward. Being wrong shouldn't be rewarded because it came to the right conclusion.

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I lierally had just googled "golden age of comics" and used what it said for a quick reference

and like 3 years ago, saying video game movies would be critically successful would be a drastically unpopular opinion, given that until 2018, the best reviewed video game movie of all time was Prince of Persia with a 37% on RT. There's plenty of reason to argue against vg movies being "the new superhero movies" at any point

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There's really not and here's why: comic books and video games both spent their earliest users languishing in poor writing due to conventions and restrictions. Both have evolved away from that. And in the thirst for copious amounts of content from studios, streaming services and networks, it only becomes a matter of time before recognition and acceptance of what a medium's potential could be is actualized. The uphill struggle is for great storytelling to be given spotlight in any medium, video games doubly so thanks to the presence of a huge number of popular games that put stories in the backseat for good gameplay.

Now that there's monetary success behind gaming based films, the critical success will follow. And that was true 5 years ago, too. We just were awaiting more attempts at success, as well as marketing that would drive up anticipation to accompany serviceable films.

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SwiftyDC posted...

Hideo Kojima directed Metal Gear Solid movie?

Yeah MGSIV which was dope

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scarletspeed7 posted...

Being wrong shouldn't be rewarded because it came to the right conclusion.

Alright carry on

just gimme the Nintendo Animated Universe with Smash Bros. crossover events

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But just think about all those video games based on those movies.

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You know what

Good argument

I can see it

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This sounds like demand for Pixels 2

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Video games are fundamentally different from any other medium, due to the element of interaction that comes with playing the game. I don't think it's as simple as saying that comic based movies became popular and therefore video game movies will become popular.

You can never make a "movie" that allows you to engage with the story in the personal way that a video game does. If you do, you just made another video game. In this sense, movies will always have a disadvantage when trying to adapt a video game. You will always lose key elements in translation.

There's no way to know until it happens, but I don't personally think this will be the future of movies. We've already seen the rise of more cinematic games. If I had to make a 10-20 year prediction, I could see movies becoming less popular and cinematic games becoming more popular as a replacement.


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Yeah I'm not sure I believe video game movies becoming the next big thing is something "anyone with half a brain can figure out"

Detective Pikachu was freakin Pokemon, which is pretty much the most mainstream option available for a video game movie, and took a lot of liberties with the source material to make it work for a movie at that.
Sonic was bolstered by a strange marketing campaign which will be hard to duplicate, and also took a lot of liberties with the source material.

We'll probably see more respectable attempts at making big budget game based movies now but will they just work? I'm not really sure. As Maria said a lot of the appeal to video games as a storytelling medium is in the interactivity. It's not as simple as just throwing big studio money into your favorite video game series and it just clicking. I'd say there's a lot more work needed in the approach taken because comic books give you a lot more to work with in terms of making a movie than video games do-- yes they do take liberties but the structure of a comic book arc is still pretty similar to how a series of movies could play out. Video games you've basically just got the strength of the characters and you have to reinvent the entire story or be reduced to something that only has appeal as raw fanservice.

But then to further complicate that a lot of video game characters only have appeal as characters because of the players identifying with the character due to playing stuff through with them-- is Link well characterized in a way that is going to translate to the big screen? It'd be a hard sell, because Link doesn't really have enough characteristics that are defined in the games to be a fleshed out character so many interpretations of Link are going to be different among his fans, so it's going to be a hit or miss reception by default because the vision of Link as a character among his fans is going to be inconsistent.

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mnkboy907 posted...

But just think about all those video games based on those movies.

I still remember Street Fighter: The Movie: The Game

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Dragon Ball Evolution the ultimate video game based on a movie

X-Men Origins: Wolverine gets points for the game based on the movie being better than the movie was

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Lopen posted...

Detective Pikachu was freakin Pokemon, which is pretty much the most mainstream option available for a video game movie, and took a lot of liberties with the source material to make it work for a movie at that.
Sonic was bolstered by a strange marketing campaign which will be hard to duplicate, and also took a lot of liberties with the source material.

Taking a lot of liberties with the source material is the natural pathway to success with 75% of video game movies.

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Honestly I thought the main issue with Tomb Raider was the liberties they took. The casting was perfect, but spending too much time building unnecessary backstory and not enough time adventuring on the island was what ultimately held it back

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meanwhile movies like Rampage 100% needed to take liberties to even be a feasible movie

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Johnbobb posted...

meanwhile movies like Rampage 100% needed to take liberties to even be a feasible movie

Which is my point of 75% of the time. Donkey Kong, Star Fox, Zelda... we could have pretty decent movies for them all, but you need to retool a lot of the narratives to work.

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I don't want a movie to depart too much from source material. It's part of why the Mario and Street Fighter movies aren't good.

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Mario needs to depart pretty heavily from the source material by having dialogue.

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scarletspeed7 posted...

Taking a lot of liberties with the source material is the natural pathway to success with 75% of video game movies.

My point isn't that it isn't the natural path to success, just that that it being the natural pathway inherently makes a video game movie more difficult to hit the right spot for than one based on a book or comic book, which comparatively must take much less liberties.

Like you basically have to make an original creation for so much of it, while at the same time being faced with the scrutiny of people who had different visions for what you did based on their experiences with the video game which needed gaps filled in. You limit your potential gains of drawing from the existing fanbase pretty heavily due to doing that while at the same time alienating people unfamiliar with the material. This is less of an issue as the quality of the movies increase and as gaming becomes more mainstream, but I don't see it being a given games are going to touch anything the MCU did. More successes than we'd seen in the previous decade, sure, but to expect more is bold in my eyes.

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Lopen posted...

My point isn't that it isn't the natural path to success, just that that it being the natural pathway inherently makes a video game movie more difficult to hit the right spot for than one based on a book or comic book, which comparatively must take much less liberties.

The Joker. The entire MCU.

Bye.

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scarletspeed7 posted...

Mario needs to depart pretty heavily from the source material by having dialogue.

No, it doesn't need to turn Bowser and the Koopas into evolved dinosaurs or make Toad some dude with a shrunken head.

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Reading would be your friend on that post!

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The Joker did, which hey, one movie out of dozens good job because I disagree the MCU took nearly the number of liberties that video game movies need to or have.

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Lopen posted...

The Joker did, which hey, one movie out of dozens good job because I disagree the MCU took nearly the number of liberties that video game movies need to or have.

Thanos was entirely rewritten as a character. Ego was entirely rewritten. Starlord was significantly altered. Ultron was designed by someone else entirely. Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver were not related to HYDRA. Also they are Jewish/Romani. Whiplash was completely redesigned in IM2. Hela didn't kill Odin. Spider-Man was not Iron Man's protege. Everything Mandarin. Every movie has radical departures. Every single one of them. Just because you don't know them, doesn't mean they don't exist. And what's more? I embrace changes in those movies. Because it keeps the characters fresh and interesting by and large.

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Oh I see we're doing the thing where you assume no one knows anything about what they're talking about because you're a comic nerd

Bye

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Lopen posted...

Oh I see we're doing the thing where you assume no one knows anything about what they're talking about because you're a comic nerd

Bye

Quite the opposite. Everyone but you. Or else you wouldn't have gambled on a patently absurd statement!

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HEY YOU KNOW WHAT WOULD BE FUN HOW ABOUT A TEKKEN MOVIE THAT'S ACTUALLY GOOD

so much interesting lore potential there

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I could have sworn there was a Tekken movie. But I honestly can't remember if I've seen one.

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scarletspeed7 posted...

Reading would be your friend on that post!

I got what you were saying but you can add dialogue without doing damage to the actual source material. They had a cartoon show that proved it.

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Let's put it another way

While I know less about comics than you, I knew about all of those changes before you mentioned them aside from specifically how Starlord was altered (unless it's just that Ego isn't his dad in the comics)

None of them compare to the hoop jumping Detective Pikachu had to do to make a plot out of Pokemon that would actually do well as a movie. Like not even a little. There's basically nothing about Detective Pikachu that isn't a completely original creation aside from the designs of the Pokemon themselves. Changing little things about the plots of the movies or details of the characters, yes they do have to make changes for it to gel well as a movie and it isn't a direct retelling of events or characters, but they also lay upon a foundation of events and details about the characters that will appease that fanbase-- that makes that fanbase react in a way that is more receptive to change rather than a defensive one out of the gate where the thinking is the creators are just writing fanfiction that isn't really related to the source material whatsoever.

I'm not saying it can't be done, but it's really tricky and something I think is much easier for a movie based on a comic book, and one that video game movies will continue to struggle with even as their budgets increase.

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