Weekend Reading: Seven Movies that Should Be Games

The game industry keeps growing, making us, the real gamers, some of the happiest people in the world. Analysts predict that this growing process will never stop, that soon the game industry will be bigger than music or movies – the biggest form of entertainment, actually. Still, there might be a long way before our games become the biggest thing in the world and we are more than happy to wait, while playing some quality titles.

We all love them – quality titles. This term, however, has become a kind of cliché – nobody really knows how a "quality game" should be like, feel like, look like – there's no definition for it –, but we surely know one thing: what "non-quality game" means. We receive tens of poor games every year and some developers seem to come from another planet or something similar – they just can't get it. A good example for such poor quality games would be any title inspired by a movie. Now look back and try to find the latest game you played that was inspired by a movie. Was it quality? Probably not. However, these low-quality titles keep being released. Why is that? Because of short production time (since they have to be released at the same time with the movie itself), relatively low budgets and not enough time for beta testing. There might be other factors but these three are the most important.

So we, here at Softpedia, have decided to check through our diaries and find some great movies (at least from our point of view) that should be turned into great games. Their main advantage? The movies are already released, so it's no time-pressure on the developers – this means that we'd finally get our "quality games" inspired from Hollywood flicks. Let's check them out!

Action-adventure Game – 10,000 BC



It's not really "300" when it comes to special effects, story or public reception, but it would still be an absolute stormer as an action title. D'Leh would be the next big thing as a game hero – he's strong, witty and charismatic, yet he has that "human-touch" that makes him... uhm... human. He's not a superman, he's not fearless, he's not even that great leader who knows how to handle words. No... he is a character in a world he doesn't know, fighting for only one thing: his love.

Both us and the game developers love to insert a love story in a video game. 10,000 BC comes with one of the easiest love stories to be exploited: we have an absolutely beautiful girl (Camilla WILL appear in EVERY cut-scene, you know?) and a man ready to fight against beasts, humans and gods just to save her. Of course, we would do the same. So just imagine how cool it would be to run through those forests, fight against all the dinosaurs, hunt mammoths and explore the pyramids. An entire world, filled with dangers and thrills is hidden in the 10,000 BC universe and an action-adventure game should be created. Result? An AAA title!

Casual – Pulp Fiction



This game would totally rock the casual game world, even though it would basically be the same thing people got over and over again (but that never seems to be a definite "No-no" on the public’s part, so it should be OK). However, the most important thing is how Pulp Fiction, the casual game, would bring the same experience: just imagine what a real revolutionary title this one would be – the first M rated casual game where all the mini-games should be aberrant and have no real purpose – just fill the screen with blood and you're done!

Here are a few mini-games one should never miss when playing Pulp Fiction – The Casual Game: Getting Medieval (on someone's butt), barefoot dancing and the classic – Royal with Cheese Eating. It would be nothing but magic. And madness.

Sports – Forrest Gump



It is one of the most appreciated movies in the history and we really are wondering how come no Forrest Gump game hit the market until now. Things should change and a revolutionary concept would be the result: Forrest Gump – The Game would be nothing but a really strange racing title. It is meant for glory. Fabulous. Revolutionary! Why? Well... there would be only one time mode in the game (Time Trial) and, of course, just one character: Forrest himself.

It might seem boring, but it is not: every 60 minutes of playing in real life would make your Forrest look a bit older – he'll grow a beard and so on. And, even better, the game will never end: you will have to run forever, without a goal in mind, without a reason. So... run, Forrest, run!

Point and click adventure - One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest



This one would definitely be big. It would have some things modern point and click adventures don't: first of all, a solid, great story, strong characters and mind-bending quests. And since mental institutions always fit well with the genre, One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest is the perfect candidate. Even though there will not be too many places for you to explore, you'll still have to interact a lot with great, powerful characters you will soon start to love. And if you think that organizing a bus trip in a mental institution is easy, just wait for somebody to develop this game and you'll see: it is not!

RPG Game – Taxi Driver



The story of Taxi Driver is partially the core of the role playing games. Or, at least, it should be: we'd have a troubled hero and a whole world of decadence in front of him. We should also have a clear delimitation between day and night – each allowing our character to do specific things (most of the fun will happen at night – if you were wondering) and a lot of NPC's to interact with (ALL sorts of interactions, if you know what I mean...).

Finally, Travis Bickle, our main character, should become some sort of a Duke Nukem for the RPG games – "You talkin' to me?" will definitely be the game's motto and, even though there will be no alien pigs to shoot at, hacking pimps and all sorts of low-lives will prove to be a really entertaining thing to do.

FPS Game – Cidade de Deus (City of God)



First of all, City of God – The Game, would be a true first person shooter (you'll have to play it for about 20 years, you know, in order to get everything out of it – not 6 hours of crappy shooting for 60 bucks, okay?) Second, since it has a Spanish name (Portuguese, actually), it's already cooler and different from what companies are offering now. You'll have to shoot everything and, especially, everybody – in a gory experience where only one thing will matter: your own survival.

Did we mention that half of the game will have an underage character as the hero? Just imagine the controversy surrounding this title when it would launch. Guaranteed success and a huge game. Why is nobody developing it? – this beats us.

RTS – Fight Club



OK, we know that Fight Club already exists as a game – but there are two reason we're choosing it for the best option for RTS games: first, because we're talking about a real game not a pseudo-beat'em up low quality PS2 game and second – because it really is hard to find a good movie suitable to be turned into a real time strategy game.

So we consider that Fight Club would be the perfect option – more like a tycoon game than an actual RTS title, it will allow you to create tons of soap factories (the level of detail on the entire production will be super high!) and you'll battle against one perfect faction: yourself. This means that everything you will do will be done by the AI as well. Wouldn't that be something? Annoying, we know, but at least nobody will be able to conduct rush attacks after the first five minutes.


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