The Big Picture: Off the Charts

[Inuprince]

I was suprised to see Bob talk about the Uncharted movie in this positive way just because it has a director with potential - and the reason I'm surprised is that in his Prince of Persia : The Sands of Time movie review - he said : the first good videogame movie has been made - ( he said good movie not fantastic - I personally love it, but anyone who doesn't like it can still admit that compared to the piles of s*** that Uwe Boll makes out of videogames like Alone In The Dark and Bloodrayne - the Prince of Persia movie was at least treated with respect and can be a fun film for most people)- okay back to MovieBob - so he stated that while the first good video game movie has been made - he's not happy because it's just a story like the 1001 arabian nights - and he would like to see a good game movie - that is based around a game world that's more original to gaming - his example was a good Mario movie that would take place in the Mushroom Kingdom so the movie would have that feeling of really coming from the game.
But even if this director makes a good movie out of Uncharted - it will be (as Bob said something like an Indiana Jones movie) - which also isn't anything really new. I know Bob knows this, but somehow the praise of chance because of the director was a little odd to me.

 

[Killing_Time]

The only game I ever played that really had a good STORY was Mass Effect. When they make a movie of that, if they screw up, there's no way in hell they can blame the source material.

OT: The Uncharted movie will suck, the end.

 

[Something Amyss]

I gotta admit, I cracked up hard at the comment that "Hollywood doesn't respect aaaaaanything."

I also have to agree heavily with the notion that Transformers didn't suck because they didn't stick to the continuity, it's because of Michael Bay.

So yeah, it's not hard to see why people think a game movie will suck, given how bad most are, but it's also a little early to drop this one. Not that I'm all that excited for it, anyway. Id rather see that Green Lantern movie...

>.>

 

[Resin213]

Good director, wonder why he's wasting his time with this steaming pile of a property.
uncharted plot was bleh, but at least they had zombies for no clear reason.

 

[Killing_Time]

Um, Bob, you do know that Valve and Bioware are western developers, right?

Wait, did you seriously just mention Valve in terms of an in-game story? They've always had horrible stories. Even Half-Life has a bland story and I love those games. In fact they made my favorite game L4D and that has almost no story at all. Biowares stories are convoluted and incredibly non-linear (exception being Mass Effect). I really think Bob is right, Western game developers can only make a good story in terms of gameplay and advancing the player from one action intensive conflict to the next. If you look at the stories in comparison to a movie story... they fall pretty flat. But I don't think they're as bad as Steven Seagal movie plots. Nothing is as bad as those...

 

[Sir Thomas Sean Connery]

Meh, Uncharted has always been a third rate National Treasure anyway. Which in turn is a second rate Indiana Jones.

 

[Jennacide]

Okay Bob, one thing you did that kinda bothers me. You can't call out Uncharted for having a story that is "good by western game standards, meaning it's about a Steven Segal movie" and then put up Solid Snake in the picture of games that could make good movies. (Unless that was some joke I didn't get) Hideo Kojima's writing isn't any better than what's in Uncharted, and it's far sillier. I won't make claims that Uncharted has exceptional story telling, but it has reasonable enough for what it is. Uncharted is basically exactly what you said it was, a new age Indiana Jones. And it's writing is very much similar to the three Jones movie. (SHUT UP, KINGDOM DIDN'T HAPPEN.)

As for the flak Russell is getting, he pretty much brought it on himself. With his synopsis of what he thinks the story should be come, and to a lesser extent his amusing reactions to being asked why Nathan Fillion isn't onboard. Which is to say, his said this: "How is Nathan Fillion?" verbatum.

 

[WaderiAAA]

I don't really see any way a Mario movie could work. Metal Gear Solid or Zelda though would be awesome.

I'm not the kind of guy who gives a movie the benefit of the doubt, I'm more of the kind who don't bother to speculate, but instead read/watch reviews once it comes out and then decides whether or not to see it.

 

[StriderShinryu]

This pretty much danced around the point that most Uncharted fans have with the movie adaptation. Not that it's going to be a bad movie but that it is, as stated, a movie that sounds like it will have little to nothing to do with the game. In fact, I don't know that I've ever heard anyone complaining about the Uncharted movie's likely quality at all except in the general sense that videogame movies are usually poor. The whole point is that, if a movie maker wants to use a videogame property (or any existing IP, really), they should have some interest in and respect for the source material regardless of it's quality.

 

[TheScottishFella]

Personally I always give video game films a chance. However what really pissed me off is not casting Nathan Fillian (I know this has been said before) I genuienly had no idea who he was until I found out Mark was being cast instead. So I checked Nathan Fillian out and he seems like a stand up guy to do the Uncharted film.

 

[Gunnyboy]

Am I the only that thought the Silent Hill movie was good? It wasn't great, but it certainly captured some the atmosphere and was a good story. (Though a bit confusing at the end.)

 

[WaderiAAA]

Okay Bob, one thing you did that kinda bothers me. You can't call out Uncharted for having a story that is "good by western game standards, meaning it's about a Steven Segal movie" and then put up Solid Snake in the picture of games that could make good movies. (Unless that was some joke I didn't get) Hideo Kojima's writing isn't any better than what's in Uncharted, and it's far sillier.

I think you're missing the point. That a story isn't well-told in the game doesn't mean it has no movie potential. Like he said in another video, the book that the Godfather is based on isn't that good, but it still made for a great movie. I think that was his main point about Uncharted as well. He didn't think it had such a good story, but he still didn't think people should neglect the possibility that it could work out.

 

[dunnace]

It's not so much about not adapting the game faithfully, but more about adapting the characters. as far as I can tell from Uncharted's history, it is quite simply not about a family of treasure hunters. If it was even remotely linked to that idea, that'd be great, but it's not. So what is the point of the adaptation? Can it be a good film, sure, but it's not a video game film.

 

[TheDrunkNinja]

We're not pissed off that the story is different, Bob.

We're pissed off because Mark Wahlberg (who was in another certain video game movie that bombed) claimed he was set to play Nathan Drake over nerd idol Nathan Fillion who perfected the role that the character of Drake excels at.

 

[Jabberwock xeno]

Yet Halo, which actually has a large, morally dubious epic with interesting characters (in the books, and games if you look for clues), along with STEVEN SPELIBURG wanting to direct a movie version, doesn't meet any of those things in moviebobs eyes?

 

[mireko]

Okay Bob, one thing you did that kinda bothers me. You can't call out Uncharted for having a story that is "good by western game standards, meaning it's about a Steven Segal movie" and then put up Solid Snake in the picture of games that could make good movies. (Unless that was some joke I didn't get) Hideo Kojima's writing isn't any better than what's in Uncharted, and it's far sillier. I won't make claims that Uncharted has exceptional story telling, but it has reasonable enough for what it is. Uncharted is basically exactly what you said it was, a new age Indiana Jones. And it's writing is very much similar to the three Jones movie. (SHUT UP, KINGDOM DIDN'T HAPPEN.)

As for the flak Russell is getting, he pretty much brought it on himself. With his synopsis of what he thinks the story should be come, and to a lesser extent his amusing reactions to being asked why Nathan Fillion isn't onboard. Which is to say, his said this: "How is Nathan Fillion?" verbatum.

This confused me too. Uncharted actually makes a lot more sense as a movie than the games he referenced with that picture.

Mario and Zelda have more or less the same plot. Yes, they're great, creative, innovative, fun games, but they have very little to do with their actual plots. The things that make them work as games are also what would doom them as movies.

As for Metal Gear Solid, it's practically a movie already, but it's also so bad that it makes my organs cringe with fury.

[small]On a side note, this is bothering me: What is your avatar from? I could swear I've seen it somewhere before but I just can't quite figure it out.[/small]

[sub]Hey, everyone's already off-topic.[/sub]

 

[Rayne870]

Uncharted should be fairly hard to screw up as a movie, since one could essentially channel the Indiana Jones movies and throw on the charm and story of Uncharted.

 

[Jennacide]

Okay Bob, one thing you did that kinda bothers me. You can't call out Uncharted for having a story that is "good by western game standards, meaning it's about a Steven Segal movie" and then put up Solid Snake in the picture of games that could make good movies. (Unless that was some joke I didn't get) Hideo Kojima's writing isn't any better than what's in Uncharted, and it's far sillier. I won't make claims that Uncharted has exceptional story telling, but it has reasonable enough for what it is. Uncharted is basically exactly what you said it was, a new age Indiana Jones. And it's writing is very much similar to the three Jones movie. (SHUT UP, KINGDOM DIDN'T HAPPEN.)

As for the flak Russell is getting, he pretty much brought it on himself. With his synopsis of what he thinks the story should be come, and to a lesser extent his amusing reactions to being asked why Nathan Fillion isn't onboard. Which is to say, his said this: "How is Nathan Fillion?" verbatum.

This confused me too. Uncharted actually makes a lot more sense as a movie than the games he referenced with that picture.

Mario and Zelda have more or less the same plot. Yes, they're great, creative, innovative, fun games, but they have very little to do with their actual plots. The things that make them work as games are also what would doom them as movies.

As for Metal Gear Solid, it's practically a movie already, but it's also so bad that it makes my organs cringe with fury.

[small]On a side note, this is bothering me: What is your avatar from? I could swear I've seen it somewhere before but I just can't quite figure it out.[/small]

[sub]Hey, everyone's already off-topic.[/sub]

Exactly how I feel. And while I'll debate you actually probably could make a passable Legend of Zelda movie, Mario was tried and let's never try that again. There are so few games I feel could actually pass as movies and still remain reasonable to the subject matter if you stayed with it. One of the only ones in the past 10 years would be Bioshock. If you made the movie long enough, you could feature all of the core story and issues with stuff like the Little Sisters, show off the Big Daddies and splicer abilities, and /could/ come out with a good movie. (And a much better ending than we got.)

As for my avatar, it's an FFXI Elvaan that looks just like how I made my elvaan girl. Artist is a fellow named Neriwasabi. Advance warning, his work is almost entirely porn.

 

[roostuf]

hmm...a very compelling argument but im still going to kill it with fire.

 

[Rayne870]

This confused me too. Uncharted actually makes a lot more sense as a movie than the games he referenced with that picture.

Mario and Zelda have more or less the same plot. Yes, they're great, creative, innovative, fun games, but they have very little to do with their actual plots. The things that make them work as games are also what would doom them as movies.

As for Metal Gear Solid, it's practically a movie already, but it's also so bad that it makes my organs cringe with fury.

[small]On a side note, this is bothering me: What is your avatar from? I could swear I've seen it somewhere before but I just can't quite figure it out.[/small]

[sub]Hey, everyone's already off-topic.[/sub]

Yeah it does translate very well to a movie as the plot is very concise and easy to convey in an hour and a half, and the action/characters will be enough to carry it along nicely

Mario would be terrible movies as Mario is about platforming not story, Which is why the Mario movie was so different and a total bastard child of the games. Although still stupidly entertaining if you expect a B-Movie. Zelda has a little more hope as the story and adventure could translate a little better but I think to do it properly one would have to do Ocarina of Time and break it up into a trilogy of movies, while running the risk of a total flop on the first two movies. Essentially I think Zelda needs to be longer than a given hour and a half or even 2 and a half hour movie, but then parts would feel like filler, so it is a very fragile project.

MGS should never have a movie simply because of its own nature. And yeah the plot is hugely taxing when trying to make any sense of it.