I Was a Teenage Adventure Gamer
Books
to Movies to Games and Back
Over the past couple of years, there has been a certain
trend with decent movies/books/games. The trend might start out with a book, for
example, Dune, then it will evolve into a movie and several remakes of
that movie. Then comes the computer game. Or it might go movie, book, game, in
the case of The World Is Not Enough and Golden Eye. This week, I
want to discuss this fascinating trend and what it could mean for future adventure
games.
First on the list: Dune. The book was a sleeper, the movies
were pretty darn good. I saw the original movie on the Sci Fi Channel one day
and it blew me out of the water. And when the Sci Fi Channel did its remake of
Dune as a miniseries, I meant to watch all of it … but … I uh … forgot …
but I did manage to catch bits and pieces of it. And one day I was online and
I happened to find that Dune was available for download. The original PC
game. I downloaded it and tried it. It was an excellent adventure game. You play
the role of Paul, and your job is to visit the different sietchs and get fremen
to help mine the spice on Dune. Unfortunately, though, it was a wicked hard game
and I never did manage to complete it.
I had a friend who had a copy of
Dune II and I tried that. For the first real-time strategy game to be made,
I thought it was cool. Then I got my hands on Dune 2000. It was the same
as Dune II. And with Emperor: Battle for Dune coming out this spring,
it makes me wonder, “When will they make another Dune adventure game?”
Well, Dreamcatcher is publishing a Dune game, to be released this fall,
I believe. But will it be another Traitor’s Gate-style game?
Second
on the list: The World Is Not Enough. Did anyone see this movie besides
me? It was a sleeper. Why is it that all the Bond movies are sleepers? Why? Why?
Why? Why? The same thing happens in every movie. Bond is assigned to stop some
evil villain from taking control of the world and then he always scores with a
girl. But then again … if you were Bond … wouldn’t you do the same thing?
Now, The World Is Not Enough as a game on the Nintendo 64 is pretty
darn good. It tries to follow the same plot as the movie, but there are a few
added scenes. For example, there is a subway chase in this game. So I thought
that was pretty cool. The whole point of the subway chase was to find the woman
who was in the boat outside of MI-6 Headquarters. It’s kind of screwy, I know.
I think EA was flying by the seat of their pants when they made that level. You
know? One of those “Hmm … how can we make the game longer?” moments.
Too bad that scene wasn’t actually in the movie. It would have been sweet. TWINE
is strictly a shooter. There are some menial tasks like disarming bombs and
finding people and stuff like that.
The most memorable moment for me was
skiing along the pipeline and taking out bad guys in their little snowsleds and
those aerial attack snowsleds. Were those actually snowsleds? I have no clue what
they were. But anyway … there is one level of the game where you are not allowed
to kill anyone, just knock people out. It was one of the hardest levels of the
game in my opinion. The trick to actually beating the level is studying the routes
of guards and stuff like that.
Something I want to touch base on very briefly
is American McGee’s Alice. I just wanted to say that the game completely
blew me away. When I started playing it was like someone took a sledgehammer and
smacked me in the chest with it. It was a nice, shocking game. And did I mention
scary? I never read the original story, but my English teacher told me that American
McGee’s version is close to the story by Carroll. Which is good news in my opinion.
At least it wasn’t anything like Disney’s version of it. As a matter of fact,
if you own a copy of the Disney animated film and that is your only knowledge
of Alice in Wonderland’s world … get yourself a copy of American McGee’s
Alice. You’ll be shocked. Trust me on this one.
Something else I want
to touch base on briefly is Star Wars: Battle for Naboo. The hype surrounding
Episode 1 was amazing. The movie was released in theaters on May 19, 1999.
Weeks before, when the trailer was released, my Internet connection was slow because
people on my ISP were online downloading the trailer. I happened to download the
trailer the night before the movie was released, and I had no desire to run to
the theater to see it. If it came to the theater in my hometown, that’s cool,
I’ll go up and see it. In August, I was at my brother’s place in New Hampshire
and my brother had taken my sister to a teenybopper concert and my dad and I said
“Well, let’s go see what is playing at the local theater.” We caught
the matinee of Episode 1. It was pretty good.
Now, back to Battle
for Naboo. This game would have been much cooler if it were a crossover genre,
if it used third-person combat and third-person adventure like the Episode
1 game released by Lucas Arts the summer the movie came out. But it’s still
a cool game nonetheless.
One game I never want to see turned into a book
or movie is Messiah. No way. It’d suck … just like the game.
Remember
the Chuck Norris Delta Force movies? Those were fun, weren’t they? Ever
read the book Delta Force by Colonel Charlie Beckwith, the founder of Delta
Force? Ever played the games by NovaLogic? What a perfect setting for a nice little
time-killing game. Anti-terrorism. Now, I know, the Delta Force games are
not adventure games, but it’s nice to see what’s going on in other genres, isn’t
it? Delta Force 1 and 2 and Land Warrior are excellent games,
and they are good diversions from real life and from that pesky adventure game
that is driving you to the point of insanity because you just can’t seem to figure
out how you solve the first puzzle of the second stage.
Now, one movie
I want to see turned into a game is U-571. The perfect setting for
a game. Sneaking onboard a U-boat and stealing the Enigma code machine. That sounds
like fun to me. Really, it does. If submarines and WW2 happen to be among your
hobbies, check out Silent Hunter II when it is released this spring.
Well,
that’s all for now, folks. Join me for my next column, which is all about adventures
in other genres.
