Every style of movie has a couple of stinkers, however the online game film style has greater than its fair proportion. Movies like 1993’s Super Mario Bros. and 1997’s Mortal Kombat: Annihilation are nonetheless legendary for the way really terrible they’re, and for the way badly they miss the attraction of the supply materials. Luckily, Hollywood’s observe report has improved considerably in recent times, with the Sonic the Hedgehog sequence and The Super Mario Bros. Movie exhibiting a greater manner ahead. Even so, there are nonetheless some stinkers on the market. We’re taking a look at you, Borderlands…
Hollywood retains making an attempt, that is for certain! And it might be fairly onerous to sink decrease than the next 12 abysmal online game motion pictures anyway…
Super Mario Bros. (1993)
Super Mario Bros. is form of the online game equal of 1987’s Master of the Universe, in that it is a very flimsy adaptation of the supply materials and spends far an excessive amount of time on Earth. We’re unsure what offends us extra – the ridiculous tackle King Koopa and his Goombas or the truth that Mario and Luigi wanted devices to assist them leap and stomp.
Double Dragon (1994)
The Double Dragon video games are about two brothers transferring from left to proper and beating up lots of of thugs. That’s not precisely the stuff nice movies are manufactured from. We must admire this movie for its try and create a post-apocalyptic, punk-flavored model of Los Angeles, however each facet of Double Dragon is so low cost and poorly executed as to make it unwatchable.
Mortal Kombat: Annihilation (1997)
After a string of dangerous variations, 1995’s Mortal Kombat proved it’s doable for a sport franchise to outlive the transition to the large display. Sadly, that success was under no circumstances replicated the second time round. Mortal Kombat Annihilation is a colourful prepare wreck that crams in each character from the video games for no different purpose than as a result of it might probably. The CG results have been abysmal even by 1997 requirements. At least the late-’90s techno soundtrack nonetheless holds up.
Wing Commander (1999)
Wing Commander will need to have appeared like a logical sport franchise to adapt, on condition that the PC video games have been already notable for his or her use of FMV cutscenes. Yet someplace between buying and selling sequence veteran Mark Hamill for Freddie Prinze Jr. and Matthew Lillard and botching the look of the alien Killrathi, Wing Commander utterly misplaced contact with the attraction of the video games. What was left amounted to little greater than a low-budget bundle of sci-fi tropes.
House of the Dead (2003)
Director Uwe Boll turned synonymous with dangerous online game motion pictures within the early 2000s, and House of the Dead was the primary of many misfires. There’s little doubt an excellent film to made out of the video games and their mixture of violent zombie gore and B-movie cheese. House of the Dead, sadly, did not come even near realizing that potential.
Alone within the Dark (2005)
Boll adopted up House of the Dead with the much more dreadful Alone within the Dark in 2005. Where the video games helped beginning the survival horror style and impressed franchises like Resident Evil and Silent Hill, the film is simply very, very dangerous. It’s not simply one of many worst online game motion pictures ever made, however a transparent contender for the worst movie of all time.
BloodRayne (2005)
2005 may be the worst 12 months ever for online game motion pictures, as Boll additionally unleashed BloodRayne upon unsuspecting audiences. There was treasured little to salvage right here, and we’re nonetheless unsure how Boll roped in actors like Ben Kingsley and Michael Madsen for this schlocky, oversexed vampire film.
Postal (2007)
If any Boll movie can rival Alone within the Dark because the worst online game film ever made, it is positively Postal. As it’s, the supply materials did not provide the strongest basis to construct on, consisting largely of hyper-violent motion and shock humor. The movie merely accentuated these qualities, ensuing within the online game equal of parodies like Epic Movie and Disaster Movie.
Max Payne (2008)
On paper, 2008’s Max Payne sounded fairly swell. It tailored a popular shooter franchise, featured a bankable star in Mark Wahlberg and mixed the trendy gunplay of The Matrix with the visible sensibilities of Sin City. Sadly, a bloated script and awful performing ensured that Max Payne turned yet one more adaptation that did not stay as much as its potential.
Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun-Li (2009)
1994’s Street Fighter is a good distance from good cinema, nevertheless it has a sure campy appeal. The identical cannot be stated for 2009’s Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun-Li. With poorly executed struggle scenes and not one of the colourful extra of the video games, there’s simply nothing about this adaptation that screams “Street Fighter.”
Silent Hill: Revelation (2012)
Flawed although it’s, 2006’s Silent Hill stays one of many higher makes an attempt at translating a well-liked online game sequence to movie. But like Mortal Kombat: Annihilation earlier than it, Silent Hill: Revelation misplaced contact with mainly all the pieces that made its predecessor stand out. Rather than channeling a way of terror, Revelation merely collapsed beneath the load of its flashy, hole motion scenes.
Hitman: Agent 47 (2015)
2007’s Hitman may need made this listing if not for the truth that it was finally “topped” by the 2015 reboot, Hitman: Agent 47. Agent 47 makes an attempt to be an over-the-top motion film worthy of the ’80s classics, nevertheless it’s just too bland and formulaic to depart any form of lasting impression.
Monster Hunter (2020)
There’s a case to be made for together with any of the six (!) Paul W.S. Anderson-directed Resident Evil motion pictures on this listing. But we’ll spare that sequence in favor of spotlighting Anderson’s much more disappointing follow-up challenge, 2020’s Monster Hunter. This 90-minute movie feels not less than twice as lengthy because of its badly meandering plot, awful CGI, and an limitless sequence of storytelling snafus. It’s an adaptation that can not seem to resolve if it is geared toward Monster Hunter newcomers or hardcore sequence followers, and so it in the end serves neither group.
Read IGN’s Monster Hunter evaluate.
Borderlands: The Movie (2024)
If not the outright worst film on this listing, Borderlands might be probably the most disappointing. We had excessive hopes for this adaptation, given the involvement of huge names like director Eli Roth and stars Cate Blanchett and Jamie Lee Curtis. But the top result’s an unpleasant mess of a movie and an actual waste of the colourful sci-fi supply materials. No one concerned appears to be having a lot enjoyable on this drab Guardians of the Galaxy wannabe.
Read IGN’s Borderlands evaluate.
Recent online game motion pictures embrace A Minecraft Movie, which scored a 6 out of 10 in IGN’s evaluate, and Until Dawn, which scored a 5 out of 10 in IGN’s evaluate.
What’s the worst online game film you have seen? Vote in our ballot and let’s talk about within the feedback!
Jesse is a mild-mannered workers author for IGN. Allow him to lend a machete to your mental thicket by following @jschedeen on BlueSky.
