Last night i saw the movie 'Prince Of Persia', based on the game. After turning books into movies, they've started with computer games. Immediately I thought of how great it would be if this would also happen to the Elder Scrolls. I mean, they wrote a book about it, so book why not a film where you can see and experience the great world and the epic stories of Tamriel on big theater screen? I think it's worth starting a topic about this and ask for your opinion, ideas and wildest dreams about: TES - THE MOVIE.

TES is the ultimate "Choose your own adventure" book that has already been brought before us. I didn't like The Infernal City at all when I compare it to the game, and liked it only as it was lore for the series, but it is watching someone else's story and that is what a movie would be. I like to live how I want in Tamriel and I don't ever even have to save Nirn from Oblivion if I don't want to. A TES movie would be a flopping bad mistake.

Not to mention how often they fail at these thigns. I mean, there wasn't even a single survival horror Resident Evil movie. At least the games started that way.

And Doom... need I say more?

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO :banghead: . Maybe Prince of persia is an exception but most game movies are bad as hell

The cultures and history would be an excellent source to create a movie from but the problem is for each of we perceive TES universe slightly different and in our minds its a uniquely magical place. When we see a move that interprets the world different then we do then it doesn't fit our TES world and feels wrong. For those that do not play the series a lot would be lost for not knowing the world. Its very difficult to catch the magic and make it something the general audience would appreciate.

This thread has come up dozens of times and i'll say what i always say, as long as they don't add anything new and just make a movie about a past event then i'd be happy.

Some of you may already know this but Zenimax has an oblivion trademark for theatrical productions namely motion pictures or something along those lines

Hmmm... the main quest of Oblivion was pretty standard Hollywood plot-- but I think this is just to prevent anyone from compromising their IP by producing a movie by the same name.

Um... why bother? Why, exactly, would someone need to make a movie to tell a story that had been designed around being told in a video game? This isn't the NES days where if you wanted to tell a story it was in the game manual or a tie-in movie. Games can have plots of their own now, why bastardize a good story it by twisting it into a medium it was never meant for?

As for books, first TES lore is often presented via in-game books so the world is suited to the medium. Also, your assessment of books compared to movies I find disgusting. They are different media, equal on different strengths and weaknesses. In a book it is left to your imagination to fill in little details. In a movie the details are set in stone.

it would either be fantastic or awful. either way it would be interesting to say the least

I love the fact that you are disgusted by a person's view towards how books and movies tell a story and how uniquely separate a story must be for both a game and another medium to find relevance. Ideas make it all go round, whether visually "set in stone" or left to the reader to interpret. I read The Return of the King and I saw the movie, and the idea compelled me to love them both differently, but the idea compelled me to love them. So the Nazgul flew on horses in the book and flew on serpentine wicked beasts in the movie... set to mind the fear they bring and both can tell the story.

My problem is that the ideas in TES are not to be told, force-fed if you will... we CHOOSE to see the story as we see fit. You can spend 59 hours scouring Cyrodiil for Shadowbanish wine just to make an inn keeper happy and never even know the madness of Sheogorath or see the plains of Oblivion... Neither of those elegant methods of wonder can be presented in either a book or a movie. You have interpretive rights along the way but are bound to the road itself, and yet a game can ask the question, "why take the road at all?"

I read books. And play video games. And watch movies.

I've said it before. If you like Elves and Dragons but can't be bothered to read you should reconsider how you spend your time

I heard the Elderscrolls novel wasn't too great, so I won't waste my time reading it. But that's because it was made as a game - it should stay as a game.

If you aren't a big reader, try a couple different types of books, or comics, or the back of a cereal box. Read ghost stories when you are alone at night, especially if you can find a book of "real" ghost stories. You will be more scared than any movie has ever made you. And you will either have to force yourself to continue or you will close the book in fear.

I read, quite a bit... but that was harsh. I have never read a Star Trek book, but I love Vulcans and warp drives... I have never read a sci-fi book at all, but I loved the Matrix and Star Wars... I also think that fairies are quite a neat idea and Labyrinth was hilarious in their portrayal, but I am not going to sit and read a Tinkerbell pop-up book to make myself worthy of existence... There are people who can love what ever they want because they know as little or as much as they need to, and then there are people who think they are better than all the rest because they have so much more invested, and it "means more to them" than a lowly outsider... and I am sure there are shades of gray in-between... but we all have a right to be here, and no one is forcing you to reply, but we all love these awesome things, no matter how we are acquainted with them.

So? Then just take it as the main character of the movie is his own character and that's how he does things. He could be a wizard, a warrior, a thief, whatever. Just because he (or she!) doesn't do what you would have done means absolutely nothing.

People argue that, as a choose your own adventure game, TES could not possibly be a movie...yet that's exactly why it would be so much more simple for it to be a film. It doesn't need to follow the plot action for action, because some people don't even do what others do in their games. The same goes for the main character of the film.

If one really didn't want to affect anything, then it could be a past event, like the war between the nords and chimer/dwemer, which culminates in all their deaths and the conversion of the dunmer, which could lead to another film with the war between Cyrodiil and Morrowind and the eventual armistice. If they wished, this could lead to a Morrowind film.

In addition, its not as if the general details of the main quests ever vary. The only game that allows one to officially do that was Daggerfall. Granted, Morrowind has the back door, but that really isn't the way the ending is spun.

Okay, let's do this then: Oblivion- Opening Scene: Patrick Stewart comes down and says, "I had a dream about you... well come on and lets get you outta here!"

Then:

"I am a priest, and although the Emperor is dead, I have been secretly raising his heir!"

Then:

"Holy crap! Hell is coming out on Earth... ((cough)) I mean Tamriel!"

Then:

"Oh you are the chosen one... ((cough)) I mean heir! Let's get you to the mystics!"

Then:

"Stop the devil... ((cough)) I mean Mehrunes Dagon from taking over Earth ((cough))... Tamriel... wow it must be my allergies as I am coughing so much..."

Then:

"The mystics told me I can become a dragon and stop him!"

Then:

"Stop him!"

Then:

"I stopped him, now I am dead."

-SCENE-

Wow... great screen play... yeah I left out the battle of Helms Deep ((COUGH)) Bruma... but who cares... it was a GREAT GAME!!! Not a great movie.

The first thing that I will say is that fairy tales have existed as a written record for a thousand years. Science fiction had existed for maybe 100 years before the advent of radio and later TV. There is a special connection between fantasy and literature.


And if you refer to books with an expletive as a prefix, I will politely ask you to use more appropriate terms

Hey Keltic Viking, I am really not trying to attack your statement or anything like that, and when I read what he wrote, I had the exact same reaction cause I totally love my books... It was just such a visceral response to reducing the population of his "kind" that needed a little defense, cause I get your point fully, but he also has a TON of value and is a person too. I can see history and culture playing a part, heck, Icelandic folk have living mythos of elves in their woods. You don't need to be an archeologist to enjoy Jurassic Park... you don't need to be a marksman to enjoy Halo, you don't need to be literate to enjoy Navi in the Ocarina of Time.

I'd like to point out that for the Prince of Persia, they just found a white guy to play the title character. I don't know if that says a lot for the video games to movies genre.

This will be my last post, I don't want this thread to turn into an argument on any terms.

I can't argue that he is a person. So was Hitler. Hitler also hated plenty of books.

When you refer to what is arguably the greatest invention of modern man as a " **** book" I would suggest you explain yourself, such as by saying "I don't have the time to read" or "I never found pleasure in reading personally" I might accept that, but that is not the phrasing he chose.

However, perhaps he was simply exaggerating for the point of hyperbole, perhaps he is young, or he has another reason why he might use that phrase for a purely theatrical purpose. But I find it literally (heh) offensive and see an indifference to reading as a cause of concern in modern society

That says more about Oblivion's plot line than for its transition between game and film.

Daggerfall could work very, very well (and because all endings happened, it wouldn't matter which the story choose). Even better, if the director/writer was awesome enough to have the ending represent all events happening at once with the dragon break (the story never shows the Agent give the totem to a specific person, then Numidium is shown activating and releasing a wave of timelessness. Cosmic oddities are shown all around, with a narrator speaking about the power and awe of it, so great, that time itself was broken in twain).

Actually if they did a movie version, they would show the Warp of the West as it happened. Multiple Numidiums laying waste to the countryside, Akatosh being ripped apart, the King of Worms ascending to Godhood, and then all warping into one as the Jills put it back together.

Since it was your last posting on the topic (which actually makes me sad because I really do like reading what you have to say, I actually agree with you on so many levels it isn't even sarcasm here), I will say that to take it personally, you must be a book.

You are Mr. Keltic Viking the Book.

What you have said makes me happy in that I am not the only one who thinks that wordsmithing has value yet in the annals of man. I watch man today and see the iphone in hand and ease of life. We will never live in the world where ideas are written... yes you heard me. Read me... words are a past we will soon forget. Someone just used a gesture to scroll up or down on this thread I am sure.

I love you Mr. Viking, because you say the things I feel, but I am more than a feeling thing, I am a thinking person... and I know what it means for people to be DRIVEN by STORY and COMPELLED to FEEL and it means that (CENSORED) Books are not popular... that ideas worthy of life, will seek life, and in the end LIVE.

Mr. Keltic Viking, it is an idea I talk about, not a reason to stop posting your feelings... I love what you have to say, and I read some of your other posts in other threads... you make me happy too.

Sounds like the Matrix in reverse.

Though, check my edited post, I mentioned the director doing this very thing.

You know Mr. Sylt Stryder, flattery will get you everywhere. I have also read your posts and found you an intelligent and reasonable fellow.

For those reasons, I apologize persoanlly to the OP for any remarks I made. I have a cynical side to me that is often indifferent to other people, and I respond to unmalevolent statements I disagree with in a very malevolent way.

And just as it is wrong to dismiss books without adequate reason, it is wrong to dismiss the a movie of the same subject without that same reason.

So here is my argument against why we should not have a TES movie.

The Elderscrolls is a game. And despite my admiration of books, from what excerpts I have read, the Elderscrolls novels were themselves fairly poor representations. I feel a movie would suffer the same problems and more so. I pose the same question as you, why would you want to read a book when you can watch a movie, why would you watch a movie when you can play the very character you are watching on the screen?

Also, it is a fantasy world. To put real actors into orc, elf, or troll make up, and to use special effects to replicate the physical manifestations of magic use would create a level of unreality that is hard to ignore, and the more successfuly this is done, the more it will resemble the Lord of the Rings.

So, in order to avoid that, I would instead try the animated route. However, just as a live action TES would resemble LOTR, an animated version might resemble Avatar.

I only consider these to be bad as imitation of a previously popular movie will lessen the originality of TES, not that either of those two movies were not visually impressive.

Finally, there are so few games that have been properly made into movies that I cannot name one, as a fan of both mediums.

PS. It has occurred to me that I never actually read the Lord of the Rings, but did enjoy (at least for the visual spectacle) all three of the movies. However, I have read all of the Harry Potter books, and seen only several of their theatrical productions. Obviously the LOTR books are of a greater literary substance, but I didn't enjoy the story enough itself to warrant the several hours it would require to read, but would really love to see what it looks like when an orc is stabbed in the face. So I can agree that in some situations a movie is more enjoyable than a book. But if we must genralize I will say that the written one is the greater of the two.

It's not like Morrowind explained how the Agent broke the dragon to be able to give the totem to everyone. I hear it involves a wind-up monkey and happy thoughts.