Video games and movies have been adapting IP from one another since the beginning. Games jumped on the chance to bring big franchises like Star Wars to home consoles, while it took a little longer for any original games to get their first big-screen adaptation. In both cases, these translations from one medium to the other was not a smooth one. In fact, some of the worst games and movies you can find are adaptations. And yet, year after year, we keep trying. Thankfully, on both the movie and game front, we’re starting to get more hits than misses.
It was a long time coming for video game movies to be anything more than a cash grab meant to capitalize on a popular franchise. So many of these movies felt like a director just took a look at a game’s box art and made up a story from that. Now that gamers themselves are making movies, and even bringing in the original creators to help, we might be entering a golden age for game adaptations. That said, there are some big stinkers from the past upcoming projects like the Borderlands movie can take a few lessons from. These are the worst video game movie adaptations I could find that completely disrespect the source material.
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1Silent Hill: Revelation 3D
In my restless dreams, I see that film
I’m a defender of the original Silent Hill movie. It isn’t one of the best adaptations anymore, but for the time it was high on the list. It did have a lot of problems, not the least of which was its insulting reason for replacing Harry with Rose as the protagonist, but had its moments where it did capture the vibe of Silent Hill. Revelation is the kind of torture you would expect to find if you were to go to Silent Hill. It has no respect for the lore, characters, monsters, and worst of all, the viewer. It has weak jump scares, no sense of atmosphere, and a fundamental misunderstanding of what Silent Hill is about. It isn’t just the worst video game movie but might be the worst movie I’ve ever seen.
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2Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City
Why is it Resident Evil of all franchises gets so many adaptations? The original series of films was Resident Evil in name only, so Welcome to Raccoon City promised to be a faithful recreation of the story. Unfortunately, it tried to cram both the first two games into a single film. That leads to way too many characters needing to do too many things in far too little time. There’s just no time in the film to be scared, which is kind of the point of Resident Evil. It feels like it’s just trying to get from one point to the next, dropping bits of fan service, and hoping the fast pace distracts you from realizing how paper-thin the characters are. By trying to be more faithful, it ends up feeling worse for how little justice it does to either of the Resident Evil games.
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No ripping or tearing
Adapting Doom into a movie is a fool’s errand from the jump. This was before the 2016 reboot added a bit more lore, but even now there’s no point in basing a movie on Doom. It’s Doom! You know, the game where you’re sprinting around mazes blasting demons while heavy metal music thumps in the background. Doom the film has to create characters and a scenario for monsters to show up on Mars, all of which is dogwater. All the marines are one-note and cliche, and the whole thing with the genetic experiments causing monsters is mind-numbing. It even makes the BFG look lame. And don’t even get me started on the FPS section. Sorry, Rock, but not even you could save this one.
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4Monster Hunter
They made it an isekai
Just like Doom, Monster Hunter is all about the gameplay. I will admit there is more story to draw on, but no one is playing these games for the plot. We just want to fight giant monsters to gather their parts to make new weapons. There was a way a movie could be a little cool by focusing on a group of hunters tracking down a Rathalos or something, but Monster Hunter went in a completely different direction. It follows a group of soldiers in the desert who are transported through a portal to the world of Monster Hunter. And yes, things only get worse from there. The costumes and action all look cheap and nothing really happens between the beginning and end.
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5Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time
Save yourself the time
If there was one thing to get right about a Prince of Persia adaptation, it would be the prince. Spoiler alert, but Jake Gyllenhaal is not even close to being of Middle Eastern descent. No offense to him as an actor, but this wasn’t a role he should’ve been offered. Casting aside, the movie itself doesn’t feel like a PoP film, but just any generic action-adventure film with weak CGI. It feels like a watered-down, off-brand Prince of Persia that is embarrassed to be based on a game. I admit there are some cool parkour moments, but that’s about all the good I can say about it.
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