Five Video Games That Should Become Movies

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This might be a controversial topic as video game movies are largely loathed and have only recently gotten good. Looking at you, Sonic the Hedgehog trilogy, thanks for holding up the side. I don’t think those movies were a fluke but we saw how bad it could have been with the ugly sonic from the first trailers.

AHHHHH!

The reason I say it’s a tossup is because there is so much history behind Sonic and the expectations are going to be so high. But there’s the kicker. There are a lot of different video games that you could turn into movies with their much less well known plotlines and hell they aren’t even known that well in the video game world. Let’s look at the five that I think would really work.

Blast Corps

Speed was an enormous hit. A bus that can’t slow down and if it does, it’s not going to just kill the people on it but people around them. That’s a hell of a pitch and idea.

What if you changed it that it’s a nuclear missile truck that can kill thousands, millions of people if it crashes into something in the wrong place. Enter the Blast Corps, a group of pilots and drivers that have access to a bunch of vehicles such as robots, giant dump trucks, bulldozers and cars. They need to destroy everything in the truck’s path to make sure that it doesn’t detonate.

That concept also rules. It’s high octane, ready to go for a blockbuster disaster movie. Roland Emmerich would salivate over the idea of making this movie. Also, you could make so many toys if you make it PG. Kids would love a big playset with collapsible buildings.

The tone could be kind of silly(because it’s a silly concept) and you could just have so much fun with it. You could make some of the most wild and out there characters. Just let the actors go broad and get nuts.

You could start off with them using those construction vehicles and “they’re like, we’re not going to be able to break through in time” and all of a sudden the mech comes busting through is like. “Kept you waiting, hunh?”

Get on this one, Hollywood.

Also before I move on, in the past, I’ve heard so many people give Roland Emmerich flack for making big dumb popcorn movies. Okay, the man has a skill for making good looking popcorn movies.

Look at that, that could be a painting. The main has a niche and has mastered it.

Wild Guns

A forgotten SNES game that deserves some love because it’s so much fun. It’s a western where Annie has hired Clint to help her get revenge for her father’s murder. The two of them head out and start gunning down anything in their path.

“Frank, you charismatically handsome devil, that’s been done to death!”

It has. BUT HAS IT BEEN DONE WITH GIANT ROBOTS?

Fuck yeah

There are dinosaur skeletons. There are high tech trains. There’s a giant robot crab. It is insane. Once more you can do so much with this.

You could write such good banter between Annie, who Clint thinks is this like simple rich southern belle until she grabs her guns and proves herself to him. Meanwhile, he becomes much more understanding.

Just imagine the action scenes. The two of them running around a town as robots open fire on them. The fire dying down as they gun down the robots. And with robots, you can make it PG as well, once again bringing in the kids. That’s why the foot soldiers in Ninja Turtles should always be robots cos you can go nuts on them without worry.

Also in the remake they added two more characters.

Doris that cool lady in green and Bullet that little gunslinging dog on a Green Goblin glider. This is made to be a hit.

Zombies Ate My Neighbors

Another game with a paper thin plot and a great title. Two teens, Julia and Zeke, find themselves protecting their idiot neighbors from an onslaught of a variety of monsters. They’re oblivious and keep cheerleading and barbecuing in the midst of this apocalypse.

There are zombies, you nerds! Leave the burgers

They use weapons like squirt guns, soda cans, weed whackers and bazookas to fight off zombies, blobs, evil plant monsters, killer dolls, mummies, vampires and sea monsters. You can have so much fun with all of that.

In the game you have to collect your neighbors before you can move on. Boom, a scientist invented a teleporter and it allows them to tap their neighbors and send them off. It would have a Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle vibe.

If you kept it moving with the run and gun vibe from the game it would kill as an action comedy. Sean of the Dead proved that you can do it already.

It Takes Two

What’s this? A modern game!? This would be great to be a more adult oriented video game movie. In it, two parents who are on the verge of divorce are magically turned into their daughter’s dolls. They are trying their best to get her to notice them so that they can get turned back into humans. But eventually another character named Hakim forces them to overcome obstacles to fix things between them and show how they’ve been neglecting their daughter.

This would be a fun family film that turns into a tearjerker towards the end. It would be like Up or Inside Out. Heartbreaking and wonderful. It could lead to so many great discussions.

I saw Inside Out with some parents and they openly wept. It was the discovery that they realized that they couldn’t make their children happy all the time. This builds on that with allowing them to check in with one another to make sure that they’re doing the best for each other and their kids.

Plus, you can add so much humor to it. A nice light in the darkness.

Bubble Bobble

Bubble Bobble is about two dragons that shoot bubbles that encase robots and other monsters before turning them into food. They are ready and waiting to become mascots and big as the minions. Look at how cute he is.

Just give them cute personalities and you are ready to go. Make a land of the dragons that they have to protect and them using their bubbles to fight back.

You would need to do a little more worldbuilding on this one though. The levels for Bubble Bobble weren’t exactly detailed.

Think of it as a blank canvas

Hell, you could do a crossover movie with the Yoshis! That would be super cute.

Summary

So those are my choices for the next video game movies. There are so many games out there that I might have to do this again and still never reach the bottom of the barrel. But who cares. This was fun.

Walk

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I listened to the song of the leaves as I crunched along the road. There was a chill running up my back that my coat couldn’t keep out. It was nice to feel, it had been a long walk and I was starting to overheat.

I was thinking of you as I listened to my music. Would you like this song? Would you think it was silly or something that was right up your alley? Would you sing along?

I remember when we sang together. Going down the same road in a car instead of by foot. That car was a lot like our friendship. Dented and old but unstoppable.

Those dents, I could never buff them out. We had done things to one another. Caused each other pain.

Sometimes you just have to live with it. Walk with the damage done to you. Was it unforgivable? Not this time. Would we forget? Probably not.

Review: Gundam Requiem for Vengeance

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I watched all six episodes of Gundam Requiem for a Vengeance over the course of two days last week. My non spoiler review is that it’s well made and very good. My spoiler thoughts are below the jump.

*SPOILERS FOR GUNDAM REQUIEM FOR VENGEANCE*

For the uninitiated, the Gundam franchise is about a world where humans have created colonies in space and that has made people on the earth and colonies turn into the Hatfields and McCoys. They are constantly at war with the colonies being represented by the nation of Zeon, who in most continuities are the bad guys because they’re constantly trying to drop colonies on the earth to create nuclear winter.

Their main advantage in the war are weapons known as mobile suits, specifically the Zaku.

They make short work of any defenses the earth and colonies can throw at them. Usually the series picks up when the earth and its subsequent resistance comes up with an even better mobile suit called a gundam.

They are usually superior in every aspect and are able to dice through most of the Zakus. And they are usually piloted by hyperemotional teenagers and lead to ponderous discussions of war and the nature of a soldier’s existence. It sounds silly and it partly is but it’s nice to have a war franchise be made by people who think that war is bad as opposed to a lot of American media, which thinks that war is just peachy-keen.

Our story starts with the four person Red Wolves squadron of Zaku pilots who are making their way through Europe. We see how well they’re able to handle themselves with tanks and other weapons barely able to scratch them. The four pilots are pretty standard issue characters. They’re brash and hotheaded and say things like “Good hunting” to one another.

During the first episode, they settle in for the night at their base and everything seems to be going well. Until, there’s an explosion and rising out of the flames is the gundam.

It’s presented in the same way that Godzilla is with similar music and an air of inescapability and unstoppability. Everything they throw at it only seems to distract it before it subsequently kills its annoyances. Red Wolf Squadron is halved and the rest of the forces are destroyed. Are two leads, Iria and LeSean set out to save what survivors they can.

The rest of the show is a desperate cat and mouse game against and enemy that outpaces all of the main characters. Iria, our main character, is a complicated woman who has her duty but knows it means letting her friends and fellow soldiers die sometimes as well as making sure she doesn’t get back home to see her son.

There is an impressive dream sequence where she is seen in her former occupation of virtuoso violinist playing on stage in a long red dress. The bottom of the dress becomes blood that’s filling up the theater while she’s applauded by an audience of dead Zeon soldiers.

The show finally ends when she discovers the truth of the Gundam’s pilot. He’s not some grizzled adult but a scared kid who is forced to fight. She tries to spare him but while convincing him to stand down another soldier comes up behind him and stabs him in the back. Leaving Iria bereft and desperate to keep fighting to make sure that no other children have to be caught up in this conflict.

It reminds me of the Admiral Pelleon quote from the Star Wars Extended Universe.

“We go to war so that our children will never know the fear of it. Then our children go to war and we realize what fear truly is.”

To sum it up, the 3D animation works well with the designs of the characters and mobile suits. It’s nice to see a show where it’s not some world ending threat but instead a few days in the lives of a group of people. The main downside is besides for Iria I didn’t really feel like I got to know any other characters. There could have been another episode just to flesh everyone else out.

But I do think it’s worth watching if you like Gundam or anime in general.

Okay, I’m back

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It’s been about two weeks and I’m fully in my apartment alone, dug in like a tick. Boy, oh boy, do I love it.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m still on good terms with my old roommates. But there’s just something to be said about coming into my apartment, immediately throwing my pants away and just enjoying having to answer to no one. I’m never going back.

It took me about two days to get my apartment completely in order. I had it all planned out in my head before I started so that helped me get everything in its right place. I have a closet for my hobbies, I have a great utility closet and I have the nest.

The nest is a large futon mattress that I can put up into a little couch or its original mattress form. I did it this way so my bros can come over for sleepovers. The kitchen has the main downside in that the oven is very old and not as good as I wanted. I also don’t control the heat, which is weird.

But a home is like a pet, it’s never perfect but that’s what makes them so special. I’m never going back to living with people until I fall in love with someone.

My mental state just feels so much better too. I have so much more energy and ability to do things. I can’t way to really dig into my hobbies. Last night, I was pushing through my exhaustion to finish a wonderful glitter unicorn puzzle.

I also know that it’s important when living alone to stay social. You can get weird if you’re left alone. Well, I’m kind of getting burned out by people. I’ve been hanging out a lot with people to the point that I could kind of use a break.

If nothing else, I’m going to start doing this blog and it’s only going to get weirder.

Moving On

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Since the last post on this page, I have moved into my own apartment for the first time in my life and I’ve celebrated a birthday. This is my first post in this apartment.

It’s a strange thing to walk into a home and know that everything inside of it is yours alone. It reminds me of when I was a kid and started working for the first time at 15. The Playstation 2 had just come out and I had seen the groundbreaking Grand Theft Auto 3. A game bigger than anything I had ever seen before, with 3D graphics and it allowed you to go anywhere.

I wanted it so badly. I had saved up enough money from my part time job at McDonalds. I was so scared and nervous back then being around people. I would honestly want to do that again now. There were so many big personalities.

But anyway, I was a little bit persistent for my dad to drive me to my local video game store. He eventually did and then we had to go get the composite cables for it. My dad was a good sport about it. But I remember holding that PS2 in my hands and I said to him.

“This is mine. I earned this. No one can take this from me.”

And that’s how I feel sitting in my apartment. I took a risk going back to school and through some hard work and a lot of luck, I’ve landed a job that can keep me afloat. The apartment is mine to do with what I want. I’ve built a reading nest in my living room. The temperature is mine to control. I can walk three feet into my apartment after work and my pants are gone. It’s a wonderful feeling.

The other thing I can do is be creative in a way that I never was before. I got self conscious playing my guitar when my roommates could hear. Now I can play whenever I want as long as I don’t bother my neighbors. Fortunately, the soundproofing seems to be pretty good. I haven’t heard anything from them but I don’t want to push buttons.

It’s a nice feeling and I’m going to chase it.

The Spider-Man Factor: Make Your Hero Suck(a little bit)

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Batman prepares. Batman is always prepared. Superman can do anything. These are the reasons that these characters are loved and people think they’re boring. They’ve lasted for so long. But it’s also been said they’re hard to write for.

There is a problem in DC where super powers can become so godlike that it becomes hard to think of challenges for them. The great cry in every MCU movie is “Why don’t you just call the Avengers?” well, in DC it becomes “Why does anyone try anything when Superman is around? Or Shazam? Or the Green Lanterns?”. There are so many massive threats that it’s ridiculous that anything other than God coming down to throw down with the heroes of Earth.

Marvel understands this and has kept most of their heroes “street level”. They are only able to do so much. It’s why people can become fearful of mutants. Some mutants are known as Omega level and that means that they can destroy the world if they so want. In my eyes, that just means that they’re on the same level as Superman.

When Spider-man fucks up, you can say, well that’s just who Spider-man is. He’s powerful, super strong and fast. But you could probably kill him with a small army and some air support. There’s a reason that his villains to bring him down didn’t need to ascend to god level, they just had to come at him all at once.

You can see this in Supernatural, the boys hunt monsters and all these things for near two decades during the run of the show. However, they’re still idiots and that makes them compelling. Because even the best fuck up.

That’s how you should be able to write Batman and Superman but people think of them being too perfect. Too powerful. That’s why one of the most loved versions of Batman is the one from the animated series. He’s a human. He’s smarter and stronger than the average human but he can still get stabbed by the Joker.

We don’t want Gods. We want good people doing good things. A hero shouldn’t stand above you but with you. They should be selfless and kind and inspire you to do the same. There is of course some variation to keep them interesting but that’s what a hero does.

It’s something that I try and put in my writing. I write the person first and then figure out what their power would do to them. Would it make them good? Bad? Corrupt? That’s up to what happens when I put finger to key and pen to paper.

One of My Favorite Moments in Teen Writing

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My buddy Donnie and I have been recording episodes of our podcast I Hope I Can Make It Through for some time. For those that don’t know, it focuses on the show Degrassi the Next Generation, which focuses on the kids from the earlier Degrassi iterations. If you look at it a certain way, the whole series is about Emma Nelson. Her mom, Spike, was a teen mom in the first series and we see her grow up in the Next Generation.

And that’s what brings me to one of my favorite moments. It comes from the episode, Coming of Age. You see, Emma Nelson is an opinionated environmentalist and activist. Her friend, Manny Santos, who deserves far better than she ever got, just kind of wants to have fun and chase boys.

In this episode, Emma starts experiencing mood swings and doesn’t understand what’s happening to her. At one moment, she finds herself sitting on a bench. She gets up to go to class and Manny yanks her back down. Emma has started her period for the first time and it’s stained her white skirt. They walk awkwardly to the restroom, Manny trailing behind her, holding a magazine against the back of her skirt.

They don’t have any spare clothes so Manny goes looking for her. Emma hears someone enter and it’s the queen bee, Paige. When Emma tells her it’s her first time, Paige’s tune changes immediately. She says that she has a spare pad and offers it to her. They discuss growing up and Emma laments no longer being a kid. Emma worries about becoming Paige and with a characteristic bit of wit Paige responds:

Paige: Please, you wish.

Manny returns with a giant pair of gym shorts. They go to class to give a book report in front of the room. Manny desperately holding up the giant pair of shorts. Two boys, Toby and JT who would get better when they get older joke that Emma might have wet her pants. Emma snaps back that she got her period for the first time and it’s perfectly natural. They proceed to give their book report.

I love these two scenes. Girl friendships! Girls supporting girls! Awkward high schoolers. It has everything. For me, that’s when this show really shines. Manny and Emma don’t interact as much as they get phased out for the next group of characters. However, I’ll always remember this as the peak.

When Do We Start Putting Neo in Front of City Names

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For the most part, it’s only been used for Neo-Tokyo from Akira. It’s such a cool prefix to depict a city that has been through something and is now firmly in the future. Unfortunately for Akira’s Tokyo, it had to go through a terrible event.

Same as Neon Genesis Evangelion where Tokyo is now Tokyo-3. Still cool but not as cool as Neo-Tokyo. Now, what are we going to do etymology-wise with the various cities in America, which are already new versions of English cities and towns. Let’s run through a few and see how we feel.

Neo-Boston- I feel like this is a good start. It does make me think of people screaming about the Sox but they’re wearing like Geordi LaForge glasses. Would Boston make a good spaceport? I think so.

Neo New York City- That’s just ungainly. I think it would be best if it was Neo-York City. Actually, typing that out that I’m not so sure about that. Then it feels like it’s giving all the joy to York and ignoring the whole part of New York City. NNYC. Okay, reneging on what I said before, I think that Neo New York City is the way to go.

Neo Intercourse- Yes, yes, yes. This is the way to go. So, for those who love map based humor, knows that there is a town in Pennsylvania called Intercourse. Renaming it Neo Intercourse gives it the idea of future love sex. Let me touch you with my cybernetic arm. Then we’ll plug into the net with our VR headsets and engage in a roundtable about funk music.

Neo-Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch- Okay, this one is a no brainer. We need to find a way to make this town’s name even more confounding and long. Really put the following gentleman through his paces.

Neo London- This is also a home run like Boston. It feels like all the bleak futurism of London comics is coming starkly through with this name. There would definitely be zeppelins.

I’m going to revisit what the future versions of cities would be like but how do we arrive? In the altered words of David Byrne, how do I get there? Well, I think we need to move away from a pessimistic outlook that leads to Neo-places.

I think when a city becomes utopian and producing renewable energy that’s the badge of honor they get. Greenways, windmills and solar panels.

Join me soon in Neo-Silent Hill! Where Pyramid Head has a hoverboard and iPhone.

A High School Reunion

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I show up hoping that for once in my life I’ll impress someone

It’s important tonight, out of spite

I wish that I could see the people I want

But they don’t show up to these things

Instead, the rest of us talk about

What could have been

And what was

They play songs that were new back then

They make us a little sad

Like the memories we’re bringing up

I think about the ones that didn’t make it

One in particular

I wonder if she thought about me at all

It’s still all about me

Maybe I deserved this bittersweet ending