Over the last couple of decades, there’s been a discernable cycle of creativity (or lack thereof) in Hollywood. It goes like this:
- Find a director or a screenplay with some degree of originality
- Throw some money at the project and hope it pays off
- If a=yes, make as many clones of said project as the public can stomach
When GOTO 1 is no longer an option, the Hollywood establishment falls back on the tired practice of “remaking” old movies and television shows, often with no respect for the original property. We’re then treated to a few summers of half-baked retreads until something new and bankable comes along.
In some respects, the videogame industry is quite similar. Sequels are easier to make than new concepts, and it’s far safer to fall back on proven formulas than risk it on new ideas. If you’ve got a movie license, then it’s even easier: just smack some tired old game mechanics together and string along the story.
Recently, we’ve seen a more subtle approach to this. Many of the last year’s high-profile games have been subtle and perhaps not-entirely-intentional remakes of bad 1980-1990-era movies. Case in point:
- Lost Planet = Starship Troopers
- Dead Rising = Dawn of the Dead (the good one)
- Crackdown = Robocop
- Gears of War = Aliens
None of these are direct adaptations, but the comparisons are easy and obvious. In the case of Dead Rising, Capcom even went so far as to put a disclaimer on their packaging disavowing any resemblance to Romero’s classic film.
I think this is actually a good idea. In fact, I say it’s high time we started mining the intellectual and aesthetic motherlode of cinematic goodness that Hollywood gave us during my teenage years. There’s plenty of classic cheese that still hasn’t made it to videogame consoles, so allow me to make some suggestions:
C’mon, this one’s easy. Take Rockstar’s Grand Theft Auto engine, but make it about grumbling, alcoholic weirdos who have to take deadbeats’ cars away in a crumbling urban distopia. Plus, it’s damn time Harry Dean Stanton got his due in a videogame.
Let’s admit it now. Duke Nukem: Forever is never going to happen. So, let’s stop waiting and crying about it and make it the way we all knew it was supposed to be: with Rowdy Roddy Piper decimating hordes of ugly aliens. This is the movie that spawned the classic phrase, “I have come to kick ass and chew bubblegum. And I am all out. Of bubblegum.” There’s more testosterone and semi-homoerotic-pro-wrestler male bonding in five minutes of this movie than an entire night of Telemundo wrestling. This is the game Gears of War was meant to be.
John Carpenter’s great “lost” film. At first, it seems a typical closed-room scenario where the protagonists have to fend off hordes of Satan’s minions, but the script is shot through with tons of techno-babble and a suprisingly feasible scientific explanation for evil. Also, it has Alice Cooper. Give this the same treatment as Resident Evil 4, and you’d have a darn good game.
An early classic featuring John Cusack and Tim Robbins as aspiring music-video directors. Any film with a soul band called the Swanky Modes demands to be on as many media formats as possible, and this could be a good mix of Guitar Hero and The Sims.
I mean, c’mon…it’s got Robert Urich! Have Squaresoft give it the epic RPG treatment, and this would be a galaxy-spanning game of Xenosaga proportions. Except without the philosophical undertones. Or the giant robots.
It’s got Chunk. Need I say more? This has great potential as a platformer, plus the Asian inventor kid could pull off some great Metal Gear Solid antics with all that stuff he comes up with (“That’s right, I said, ‘booty traps!'”).
Who didn’t love Steven Spielberg’s heartwarming story about a stranded alien and Elliot…what? Oh. Seems it’s already been done. Never mind.