Movies, Games & Videos

[directhex]

Following on a little from Dareos' thread:

It's pretty clear that in this crazy modern world, games are mainstream. Hollywood stars play WoW, games are getting movie treatment courtesy of people like Disney... they're everywhere

It's fair to say that there's no limit on where games can make an influence on other media.

So, following on from that, what do you think would be better with more games? Obviously, " a movie of $FOO" is an easy answer, but why? How would you alter the material to better suit it? Or, more interestingly, what about non-movie stuff? How about a TV show? Or a series based on a game? Or something as left-field as the orchestral Videogames Live show?

What needs moar games?

[Knoxville]

As far as movies/tv based on games I think much more attention needs to be paid by the studio as to what they're actually buying. Games are a medium unlike almost any other, what can make a game great is often as dependant on the mechanics of actually playing the game and being involved in the action as it is the story pushing you along but a good film/t.v show has none of that interaction, it has to rely entirely on the story. Doom is a fairly good example of this, the storyline is next to none existant "numerous beasties from hell have appeared, you're the last person left, grab a rocket launcher and do what you do best" for a game that can be enough because you're involved in the action but for a film that kind of storyline is the stuff of b-movies not blockbusters and it's not enough to keep an audience involved for an hour and a half.

A mini-series might well be a better way to treat some licenses, Left 4 Dead would make a great six part HBO/FX special imo, there's not much story to the game but there doesn't have to be if each visit to that world is only 30/45 minutes long, each week you follow four survivours as they get thrown from frying pan to fire to frying pan again until it all ends horribly/happily ever after sounds like good t.v to me even if it is a little cliched.

What I'd really love to see done well though is televised competition gaming, get a bunch of top level COD4/Arma/CS players, throw them against each other on some custom maps and make a good show of it, It's been tried before but never with any great success infact the best televised gaming competitions I've seen recently are for Starcraft of all things...

[kalniel]

Birth control.

[GheeTsar]

Bring back Patrick Moore and Dominic Diamond!

Or at a push, Steve Preistley.

[Output]

I hoped this was a bit of reminiscing about the old ITV show with the same title

I think Knoxville has said it all really, particularly the mini-series part. I like the idea of televised competition gaming (which has been done before by XLeague/Pulse, but which I think has disappeared now, like Knoxville indicated), but it would obviously need to be done just right.

[Rob_B]

What I'd really love to see done well though is televised competition gaming, get a bunch of top level COD4/Arma/CS players, throw them against each other on some custom maps and make a good show of it, It's been tried before but never with any great success infact the best televised gaming competitions I've seen recently are for Starcraft of all things...

I for one would not watch that if you paid me, surely that is just the same as you Doom comments ie you're not involved & there is no storyline (?)
The market for that is pretty small, I also remember a show that did that but it promptly stopped after a very short run as it was, to be frank, boring. TV needs to make money for the companies involved & this format just doesn't.

Now, if you have a TV show (lets say BF1942 or something) which at the end of every episode had a battle about to start, for the next week online players fought to 'win' that battle, the next episode shown left off from there & the story went on from there until the end of the 'War' which concludes the series.

It could also be repeated quite a bit as there could easily be different outcomes every time extending the life of the show (although granted they'd need to make lots of episodes that may never get shown) When released on DVD you could choose the next episode from the menu based on who you wanted to win each battle & get a different story/ending each time.

It's like those books you used to get 'turn to page 42 if you slay the dragon, turn to 86 if you run away' only you could have a say in the story by playing a game.

You get involved, the company makes money selling the game & the TV rights then DVD sales...win-win!

Royalty cheques in the post please Mr TV Producer man (no, seriously, I need the money..)

[Knoxville]

I for one would not watch that if you paid me, surely that is just the same as you Doom comments ie you're not involved & there is no storyline (?)
The market for that is pretty small, I also remember a show that did that but it promptly stopped after a very short run as it was, to be frank, boring. TV needs to make money for the companies involved & this format just doesn't.

Now, if you have a TV show (lets say BF1942 or something) which at the end of every episode had a battle about to start, for the next week online players fought to 'win' that battle, the next episode shown left off from there & the story went on from there until the end of the 'War' which concludes the series.

It could also be repeated quite a bit as there could easily be different outcomes every time extending the life of the show (although granted they'd need to make lots of episodes that may never get shown) When released on DVD you could choose the next episode from the menu based on who you wanted to win each battle & get a different story/ending each time.

It's like those books you used to get 'turn to page 42 if you slay the dragon, turn to 86 if you run away' only you could have a say in the story by playing a game.

You get involved, the company makes money selling the game & the TV rights then DVD sales...win-win!

Royalty cheques in the post please Mr TV Producer man (no, seriously, I need the money..)

I remember a few shows on an obscure cable channel (bravo iirc) that did it and you're right it was like watching paint dry in the rain, depressing and rarely entertaining but there must be a way of getting it right.

Maybe as opposed to pitting the players against each other make them work together against a scripted series of events and a more horde style scenario? Bringing in more players could also make it more entertaining imo and a wider audience gets to enjoy actually playing the game. Having ten teams of say six players with a competition level player as the team leader all with separate objectives in different places on the map that need to be completed to force the enemy back and move the line. Every week new challenges are devised in line with a story with one team on defence one team on the attack, choose players that are entertaining to listen too over comms and that viewers will actually become attached to, have a couple of people commentating in between and because they have set objectives it's all the easier to set up good viewing angles around them and make the action look good for a tv audience.

You could tie in a story in a similar way to what you've suggested by having episodes of pure story and then a sister show that replays the highlights of the battles themselves that's say half the length almost like the big brother highlight shows.

I'm not sure it could be done well but I definitely think there's potential.

[Cheapy]

The only show featuring a game I can remember was Time Commanders on BBC2. Used a version of Rome Total War and 4 people played on the big battles of the ancients. No plot or story in it though so nothing to keep you watching one week from the next.

I think the only problem with using any FPS to make a show is how fast paced it can get and how do you keep track of what every player is doing?

I like Rob_B's idea of using open ended games to decide how the show progresses so you can get a bit of audience participation going on. I couldnt watch a entire eposide of somthing that was just game graphics for me it would have to be filmed using real people and plots to make you bond with the chacters.

[directhex]

Man, I let my thread rot, I suck.

Okay, here's my idea:

Music.

Games have brought us a whole bunch of experiences, and one of those experiences is the joys of music. From 8-bit bleeps and bloops such as the Mario theme 99% of the population have memorized, through to 40-piece orchestral works like the title theme to Halo; from fan-made remixes as found on ocremix.org, through to licensed awesomes in games like Guitar Hero or the GTA series; from leftfield madness like tracks from Katamari, to "inspired by" silliness like Mr Bungle's take on Zelda: the world of games is filled with auditory delights.

I reckon there's more than enough awesome game music out there to make for a compelling radio show, and with the quality and variety on offer, that it would be compelling enough even for non-gamers. Shove it in Nigel Ogden's slot on Radio 2, fill it with music, interviews with industry folks, and perhaps even a little banter - and I think there's a real winner for society right there.

Actually, I might start a new thread for ideas, i.e. "which game-related music would you listen to on its own, by choice?"

Oh, and I hope you all watched Charlie Brooker's Gameswipe, the latest game-related show to air: http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode...ers_Gameswipe/

And if you actually want more game-related stuffs, consider poking the BBC via http://faq.external.bbc.co.uk/questions/contact/

[kalniel]

I reckon there's more than enough awesome game music out there to make for a compelling radio show, and with the quality and variety on offer, that it would be compelling enough even for non-gamers. Shove it in Nigel Ogden's slot on Radio 2, fill it with music, interviews with industry folks, and perhaps even a little banter - and I think there's a real winner for society right there.

Sounds terrible!

Cool to do a retro spot for nostalgia's sake perhaps, and who knows? Classic FM routinely play film scores which I usually find awful as well.

[Salazaar]

Gamerscores.

Attached to major events and achievements in life, both in and out of work.

Got a promotion? 50 points.

New baby? 50 points.

Threesome? 10 points.

Threesome without having to resort to paying at least one participant? 100 points.

Etc...

[Prime]

the bottle to come home late, drunk, forget your keys - knock on the door and awake an angry wife, give her enough time to notice the lipstick on your collar and say 'Your next fatty' as you slap her behind and walk in
PLATINUM TROPHY!

a game where you control a person or nil value - like lets say inmates off deathrow, GAMER's pay to control these people in an FPS/TPS death match and after a certain ammount of victories that inmate gets set free and the GAMER gets hella endorsements! we could call it: Blowy Upper Arena Deathmatch's or something, but i totally came up with it!

[Salazaar]

What sort of stupid idea is that? You couldn't sell that kind of idea to the most derivitive, coke fueled producer hollywood could come up with. Even Uwe Bolls would think twice.