Bit-tech has an article listing 28 (TWENTY EIGHT!!!) games currently being adapted to films. Here is that list replicated, but with my witty/dumb comments.
Cold Fear (2008)
Is that the thing on the boat? That sucked. Although I've seen films with worse plots.
Fear Effect (2008)
Nope. Don't remember that game.
Area 51 (2009)
Game Plot – There are aliens in area 51, shoot them.
Film Plot. There are aliens in Area 51. Watch someone who was in Smallville or Stargate SG1 shoot at them, and eventually escape.
Castlevania (2009)
How does one make a platform film? This will be interesting.
Clock Tower (2009)
Is this a game? A building perhaps, but surely not a game!
Halo (2009)
I thought this was cancelled? Werent there rumours Peter Jackson was to direct then the whole thing went belly up?
Kane & Lynch (2009)
Bank robbers usually make for good film material, but I think the game origin negates that.
The Legend of Spyro (2009)
Cartoon maybe….
Metal Gear Solid (2009)
this could be interesting… a nice anime film of it would be better
Onimusha (2009)
This one is CGI, probably the only genre that suits the game-to-film fiasco
Sabotage 1943 (2009)
Again, I've yet to hear of it.
Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun-Li (2009)
Anime? God I hope so.
Spy Hunter (2009)
Cock Hunter.
The Suffering (2009)
The Audience will do all the suffering (LOL I AM SO FUNNY)
Tekken (2009)
Sweet Zombie Jesus. A StreetFighter, a DOA and Two Mortal Kombat films later and they still haven't learned. Wake up hollywood suits – you can't just take every popular game and turn it into a film!
Warcraft (2009)
How would this even work?
Bioshock (2010)
I used to whinge about how bioshock could suck as a film, but its the only one on the list so far with any potential!
Broken Sword: The Shadow of the Templars (2010)
Or maybe it isn't….
Driver (2010)
Starring Jason Statham, being apparently the only actor left who can drive.
Earthworm Jim (2010)
There was an earthworm Jim cartoon I think, but I'm guessing this would be a guy-in-a-suit movie like those hilarious Martin Lawrence capers.
Gears of War (2010)
If we can successful offload that wankbag Cliffy B onto the film industry, the unavoidably awful film that results will have been worth it.
God of War (2010)
starring Brendan Fraser. Probably. Did anyone see him drunk on the Graham Norton show the other night?
Joust (2010)
Or 'A Knights Tale, The Game' The Movie. Except without Heath Ledger obviously.
King of Fighters (2010)
See 'Tekken'
Mortal Kombat (2010)
OMFG See Tekken Already
Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time (2010)
Is this with Jake Gylenhall? did he read the script at all? Hey that rhymes!
Resident Evil 4 (2010)
I have a funny story for this one. My friends 7 year old cousin has ADD, and he loved Resident Evil. After he saw it, he started writing the script for a sequel. Well, to be honest he was more drawing page after page of men shooting dogs, but apparently thats what happened in the first one. Anyway. When the second one came out, I read a review that stated that the script was so convoluted that it appeared 'to have been written by a 7 year old with ADD'. I can only assume the kid sent in his pages of canine hatred and they actually used it.
Splinter Cell (2010)
Has some potential, in a kind of a Tom Clancy writes Jason Bourne kind of way.
World of Warcraft (2011)
Wait. Wait wait wait. They're making a WoW film seperately to a Warcraft film? Oh wait! Maybe the i film will go straight to DVD, but you'll only be able to download the WoW film.
I am shocked. Shocked! Well I'm not that shocked. Hollywood is all about the dosh, and all these films rely on the same principle. Trick just enough people who played the game into going to see it to make the costs back, and hopefully a get a few quid more out of them.
So what games would make for good films? It's hard to say. I could take the moral high ground and say that there simply arent ANY games that translate to the screen properly, but then again I feel like Monkey Island would have made a cracking film, if only the guys who made Pirates of the Caribbean hadn't stolen most of the plot and characters from it.
And now that I think of it, there are a few others that would have worked.
Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis – anything would be better than the Crystal Skull. This could have come close to Crusade.
(the argument here of course, is that this wouldn't be a movie of a game, but simply a sequel to an existing film, on which the game is based)
Crimson Skies – either the PC original or the Xbox sequel. But again, Sky Captain pretty much stole its thunder.
Grim Fandango – it might be quite beetlejuice-ical, but that would be no bad thing.