I rather enjoyed the Hitchhiker movie, for the most part. Sure, there was a lot of different things going on, but I actually kind of liked that. As someone who can pretty much recite pertinent parts of the book series verbatim by now, it was kind of refreshing to see a movie based on a book I knew so well, and still have a couple suprises in store for me. (Plus I think it helps that the series overall is notoriously inconsistence and Doug Adams was even fairly outspoken about playing loose with the existing canon in every new incarnation of the series.) I also liked most of the casting choices, even though I had my doubts until I actually saw the movie (plus Zooey Deschanel's pretty adorable, so that always helps.) I thought casting Freeman as Arthur Dent worked pretty well, also (though I liked him in The Office and Hardware, so I might have been a bit biased.)

But I also kind of take the opinion that a movie translation actually shouldn't be a 100% faithful and verbatim reproduction of the original. If everything's going to be the same, then usually I don't see the point of it all. There's been some rare exceptions (Fear and Loathing and A Scanner Darkly being good examples of being word-for-word accurate while still being relevant as a movie,) but generally unless you're bringing something new to the table with the movie, then I just don't see the point. Lord of the Rings, for example, I thought suffered a bit because they did try to stick so close to the story. I think it's a marvelous movie, and it's kind of neat seeing it visually represented - but I did get bored quite often because I knew exactly what was going to happen.

Anyway, back to the topic at hand - I just hope they don't try and condense one of the games down to a movie or TV medium if they go through with making a Fallout movie. Especially for a game like this, where every player is going to have had their own unique experiences with the game. Plus, there wouldn't be much point - any videogame movie is hoping to cash in on the existing fanbase, most of which will have played the game. What's the point in me paying $8.00 to see a story I already know?

Much better to just take the basic elements (Vaults, retro-furustic aesthetics set in a post-apocalyptic world, Supermutants, Power Armor, etc) and weave those elements into a new story that's not trying to just recap events in earlier games. If they just tried to make a new story that happens to share a common setting with the existing videogames, then I think it might hold some promise. But I'll probably forego seeing it in theatres if it looks like it's going to try and stick too closely to one of the existing stories. I might rent it later on (I rent a lot of movies, though - just to have something to watch on the weekends,) but I wouldn't hold out much hope for it being terribly good.

There's also the matter of just how good you expect a movie to be in the first place. I wouldn't expect Doom, or Dead or Alive to have very compelling storylines, for example. I enjoyed both of the movies, however, because they weren't really trying to be anything other than what they were (DOA, for example, being about the same thing the videogame is - which is having lots of scantily-clad babes bouncing around in skimpy clothes and doing lots of high kicks.) I don't hold videogame movies up to the same standards I would a Kieslowsky(sp) film or an indie movie, for example. If I saw a Fallout movie that represented the iconic aesthetic values of the game, had lots of gore, and some morally-questionable decisions (and kept me entertained along the way,) then I'd consider it a success.

Like the recent Mutant Chronicles movie - it had a lot of action, gore, and an interesting and visually-compelling art aesthetic, while at least not completely butchering the existing canon. So I consider it to be a good movie. I'd have been very suprised if it ended up being anything more than your standard sci-fi action movie fare, but I'm not going to consider it any worse for not trying to do anything more than that.

I agree, but for different reasons: normally, a very faithful adaptation of something in a different medium does not work because it just does not fit that context. That is why the first four Harry Potter films don't really work - they are mere illustrations of the books, rather than films that succeed as films. The fifth adaptation was the first to get it right - just take the tone and spirit of the books, and create a working film out of the main events in the plot, rather than trying to shoehorn in every detail. The trailers for the sixth look extremely promising.

As to videogame stories as film scripts, there are two major elements at work, in my opinion:

1. video/computer games are a very young medium. We have had over 100 years of cinema, maybe 400 years of mass printing, and barely three decades of games. Games are at about the same stage of development as cinema in the 1920s - which is in itself incredibly exciting and fascinating, because of its huge potential, but that potential is mostly unrealised. If the Fallouts were movies, Fallout would be 'Intolerance' and Fallout 3 would be 'The Jazz Singer'. (I'm not talking about themes or content here - just their historical places as "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant".) The Fallout games are pioneering works of a future age.

2. Most of the games adapted into movies have become the movies they deserve to be. Yes, I think everyone has enjoyed not falling to their death in Tomb Raider before, but did it really deserve to be anything other than b-movie tosh? Really, really? Doom became a b-movie because Doom is a b-movie. About the only game with a really solid plot that's had a film (to be fair, I've not seen) that is apparently less than the game it came from is Max Payne - but then again, I can point to a hundred sub-standard crime thrillers that have happened to have come from books rather than games. The only reason there are more good book adaptations than game adaptations is because there are more books.

All in all, I wouldn't get my hopes up a huge amount for an Oscar-worthy Fallout film (if one is even made). It's a game based on b-movies, so any film adaptation is likely to be itself a b-movie.

But then again, I love b-movies.

Exactly. You're not likely to get much more than a light action romp out of a Doom movie, when the game it's based on is pretty light on plot (as it only exists to provide context for what basically amounts to running around and shooting monsters.) Anyone who didn't like the game for it's narrative quality probably isn't going to be terribly impressed by the movie. I'd even argue that some games really don't necessarily make sense as fodder for movie adaptations (Mario Bros, for example.)

Those games that actually do posess some sort of narrative structure make more sense (Hitman, or Max Payne, for example.) I rather enjoyed the Hitman movie, as I felt it succeeded as a movie. And even then, I enjoyed it mostly in the same way I do the Transporter movies, or maybe La Femme Nikita, etc. A predominantly action-oriented movie with a nod towards some human interest thrown in. Which is about all the game amounted to as far as it's narrative, as well. Max Payne, I just didn't like as an action movie. I also thought it fell short in adequately capturing the graphic novel feel of the videogames (which, while still being on the level of a good action movie, is notable as a videogame for actually being comparatively literate) and lost a lot of it's charm in the translation.

Agreed. The potential's there in the same way any movie has to be emotionally compelling, intelligently directed, and all the other key features of an Oscar-level film. But I also wouldn't be going into the movie theater expecting any more narrative content than I would a Mad Max movie. (Which were good movies, but not exactly Oscar material, either.)

I don't agree with the above im afraid. Was it a good Max Payne Film? Well I guess ti depends what you were expecting.. because it was NEVEr going to be a recreation of the Games as opposed to a movie based on a games character. If you read any of the big reviews of the movie they all tend to say the same thing.. i.e Good movie, but not really anything like the Max Payne games per se. Personally I do not see that as a bad thing as we dont need a 100% reproduction of the games because we already have THE GAMES.. lol

Max Payne for me was like the X-Men Movies, it was a "version" of what we know and love and as a movie it wasn't that bad, it may not have been what some people expected but that in and of itself does no mean it was a bad film or as you state garbage.

In the same way a Fallout Movie would be a "version" of Fallout it would be Fallout but it would also be different based on the director and script writers personal vision for the story. In exactly the same way as Fallout 3 was different from Fallouts 1 and 2, but it was STILL Fallout (though some disagree).

I actually think Fallout has the BEST potential for a good film. Just IGNORE the story of the game and make something in the Fallout world, which would be fine considering the open-world nature of the Fallout universe.

All this Uwe Boll bashing has me remembering how cool he actually is. He challenged a bunch of critics to a boxing match a while back. They all accepted saying they wanted to beat the crap out of him for some of the films he has put out. Uwe Boll DESTROYED his opponents. It was hilarious. Anyway. Pretty cool guy. Terrible films though.

Beat the hell out of them, I saw it. :rofl:
[on video]

I see massive potential here for Fallout to transform into a true "franchise". The issue here is it's treading on very sensitive territory. Videogame-to-film adaptations have mostly failed (In the Name of the King (Dungeon Siege), Super Mario Bros. (I don't consider this a TOTAL failure, it just twisted the original content so far outside the norm), or Mortal Kombat), but some rare examples succeed (Sonic the Hedgehog (Sat AM version)). If it keeps the same dark humor and deep writing as the Fallout games, it could be a good watch. I could easily picture this as an animated prime-time series on advlt Swim or maybe even HBO or Spike TV, visual style kinda like the Todd McFarlane stuff or like the Fallout 3 concept art. Live action would tread a dangerous line and start to look like a Mad Max knock-off, but that could be half of the subject of Fallout, since it pulls a ton of influence from those movies.

I think a TV show would be the best thing honestly, Movies are hard to really do well from video games/comics, as you can either get to far away from the source (Hitchhikers guide to galaxy) or walk to lock step inline with the source (The Watchmen).

I could totally see a TV show and have thought about for awhile, the Pilot would start out like Leave to Beaver Black and White with stereotypical 50's family and show how it was a 50's version of the future aka they have a Mr. Handy. Then at the end of the episode they are forced to go into the Vault and the bombs drop Dr. Strangelove style to the Inkspots.

The next episode would be about descendent of the family leaving the vault, but the vault would still be shot in black and white and when he leaves in reverse Wizard of Oz the wasteland is shot in color. He would def have a pshycic dog not only as refrence to a boy and his dog but as away of explaining to the audience what things are in the wastes.

A part at the beginng of the episode would be like the random encounters in the Fallouts, him running from rampaging brahmin, the Whale and potted plant in the middle of nowhere, scorpions playing chess. It should def be based more around the old star treks/good X-files, where its mostly the random things/people he encounters in the wasteland and very little main story line. Though having the "Eddie Haskel" from the orginal pilot turning into a ghoul and being the antagonist would be interesting and not take up to much of the show.

Interplay sure was stupid. They let the only cash cow they had go. Look at the money they would be reaping in now. Movies! TV! Oh joy.

To be honest if it was still with Interplay, it probably wouldn't of been finished anyway, they were in a bad shape and alot of their devs had left. Plus interplay sadly does not have the mainstream audience that Beth now has, so i doubt it would of been such a success. The original fallouts put together only sold 50k(Both of them put together) in the UK for example.

Part of the reason of F3's success was the very well done marketing campaign and because Beth were already riding high after the sucess of Oblivion.

Sadly being an excellent game, never guarantees $$$.

Totally agree.

I think it would work better as a sort of Twilight Zone sort of set-up, where each episode would focus on a single aspect or storyline from the series' lore. Such examples could include:

-The origins of the Andale family.

-How the Brotherhood of Steel broke up.

-Gob's journey to Megaton

-Tenpenny rebuilding his Tower.

-The founding/adventures of Reilly's Rangers.

-How the Temple of the Union came to be.

-The chronicle of a man mutating into a ghoul.

-The story of Jericho.

-What went on in Vault 92 or 108.

-The journey of the Android.

And so on. The point of this concept is to keep things fresh and diverse, so that the viewer gets a fleshed-out vision of the Wasteland. Keeping to one character or just a few central characters would narrow it down, and we wouldn't get to see some of the creepy, exciting, humorous, and bleak layers of the Fallout universe. Also, make it a miniseries, so there's less pressure to minimize advlt content.

Any source for these figures?

Heh I've heard so much negativity about this game, what was so bad about it?

I'll be honest, I'm not that up-to-date on the Fallout canon (Interplay's FO1,2 and Tactics), I've only played Fallout 3. I have them, but I find it difficult switching gamplay from FPS to all those little isometric pixels.

So in turn I can't quite comment on how a Fallout movie/TV series (I'm not too optimistic about the latter anyway) will turn out. I've never seen a good game-based film, apart from maybe Silent Hill, but again I've never played the game so I have no comparison.

I would like to see a great movie based on a post-nuclear world. An up to date one that is; I've seen 'A boy and his dog' and 'Where the Wind blows'.

Frankly I just hope they've filed the trademark to protect the name rather than do something with it. I'm not really negative, I just enjoy the game so much that I wouldn't want a movie to ruin that.

If it is going to be a movie, it ought to be a A-grade production or it would become something like the weird dragonball crap.

How exactly does one go about getting the license to something gamesas owns? I thought I heard they weren't interested in licensing their products. Well, except for more video games, like with New Vegas.

The great thing about Fallout is that it's a big universe. They don't have to adapt ANYTHING, really. They can go and craft a story within the Falout universe that works well for film or television. A lot of the trouble with adaptations is that a strict retelling of the story in a new medium generally doesn't work, I think. Given enough freedom, I think a movie could really turn out well.