Top 5 Franchises That Need Video Game Adaptations

Sometimes you hear about the latest film adaptation or a video game based on the latest blockbuster and you can’t help but groan at the inevitable rush job, but some things are screaming for an adaptation and would fit well in another media. Adaptations into video games have been very hit and miss (okay more miss than hit) over the last 30 odd years, here’s looking at you ET, but there’s a lot of untapped gold out there, here are a few that could be fantastic:

5) The Hunger Games

The latest young-adult fiction fad sweeping the world is hugely popular, and the recent film adaptation cleaned up at the box office. The premise is 12 boys and 12 girls between the age 12-18 are putting into a carefully designed area and forced to kill each other to survive, with only one victor allowed to live. They are provided with a variety of weapons such as swords and bows, but also are able to make traps in the environment or master the arts of disguise and deceit. As a televised event, there are sponsors who support the most popular candidates. This game could have a robust campaign as you play a prolonged game, going through the training, drumming up support for your life and finally putting your survival talents into practice. Not only this, it would make for fantastic multiplayer in an escalated arena game, with more environmental hazards and higher weapon rates to speed things up. Take some tips from the Assasin’s Creed multiplayer or attempt to tear through the competitors in close combat fights.

4) Battlestar Galactica

It was a tough toss up between this and Firefly for which space series should get a game but I don’t want anything to spoil Firefly for me so… Please, please, please Bioware, you know you want to make this. There are so many great aspects of this show that would make a really engaging game. There’s the heavy politics side that Bioware would no doubt handle well, the exploration side would be really cool, the suspicion of who is or isn’t a cylon and choosing where the fleet go and when could have serious consequences. There’s the whole space combat aspect with Starbuck and the Cylons which would be the action break to stop the political stuff becoming overbearing. One of Bioware’s main strength is in creating a strong universe, or in the case of Star Wars, developing on one already there. They could do wonders with this franchise. DISCLAIMER: I’ve only seen up to halfway through 2nd season of this so if anything I’ve said doesn’t fit with the world, don’t spoil anything for me!

3) Adventure Time with Finn and Jake

Ever wondered what it would be like to snort a rainbow? Watch Adventure Time and I imagine it will be a relatively similar experiences, ridiculously colourful and just plain ridiculous, this show is kind of an ode to video games anyway. It’s all about Finn the Human and Jake the amorphous Dog as they go on rad quests and righteous adventures. It’s completely crazy, and if that could translate well into the game it would be a winner. I can see Telltale doing a really good job with it, with the actiony side of Deathspank, the typical humour of their games and the show and Jake’s shape shifting would be good for puzzles. I pretty much just want to be able to mess around in that world with Hot Dog Princess, Ice King and Lady Rainicorn.

2) Blade Runner

The Blade Runner world is fantastic, but I wouldn’t want to live there. The answer: An immersive, dark recreation of the design that created such a memorable atmosphere in the film, but without having to go outside in all the rain with the high chance of being attacked by sentient androids. Imagine LA Noire, but you’re a Blade Runner hunting down replicants in the future dystopian Los Angeles. Admittedly if any of the characters from LA Noire tried the “Voight-Kampff” test they’d be caught out in about 0.0001 seconds but the premise works and I’d love to run through that world, chasing down leads and suspects!

1) Inception

While the film was undeniably awesome, this concept just works so well as a video game! The level designers would have free reign with the dream worlds the could create, and maybe there would be a level creator/editor as well. There are plenty of objectives, retrieve this information, kill this person, steal this totem, go inside the mind of a crazy person, there are so many amazing possibilities when your landscape is the human mind. There would be a risk reward aspect, the more outrageous things you do in the dream world to help you, the more the subconcious tries to evict you. Director Chris Nolan said “One thing we are looking at doing is developing a videogame based on the world of the film, which has all kinds of ideas that you can’t fit into a feature film,” so there’s still hope, he said it would be a long-term project.

Here are just five of many, many franchises that would be amazing to play. This list could have easily have been a top 20 without getting close scraping the barrel of mediocrity. Sure it’s a bit risky, but maybe as we see the games industry continue to grow, we’ll see more and more of these properties branch out into the gaming space. What franchises would you like to see get a video game adaptation?