Digital Cowboys: Episode 117
Posted on : 07-08-2009 | By : Alex Shaw | In : Podcasts
10
Some Other Castle on why video game movies suck so badly.
We’re very happy to welcome the two smart and sassy ladies who host Some Other Castle, now a proud member of Platform Nation.
We have some pretty fantastic news this week. You’ll have to listen to find out.
Elaine Stryker and Leah Haydu run what has fast become one of our favorite shows; Some Other Podcast, and we get to know them a little here, mining their experience with terrible video game movies to discuss why they always turn out to be turkeys. We get to the root cause and look at how they’ve progressed from the likes of the mid-nineties Street Fighter (bloody awful) to the recent Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun Li (arguably worse).
We also ask them an updated set of our eight questions and even get into some heated Room 101 debate.
The music for the end credits was (and always has been) our theme tune: Love Song, provided by Mark Tschanz. His voice is truly amazing and we strongly urge British listeners to seek out his album Blue Dog on Amazon.
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About possible terrible films:
I heard that inFAMOUS is getting a movie deal, thinking about it there would have to be two films, one where Cole is good & one where he is evil
There are only a handful of games – or should I say, “properties? – that I can think of that might work or bring something unique to the table. The three, of the top of my head, are: Bioshock, the Oddworld series and Zeno Clash.
Now, bear in mind that I’m not saying that a film should necessarily use the plot of any of those games, only that those worlds are imaginative and distinctive enough on their own to be exploited cinematically.
Games like Gears of War, Resident Evil, Dead Space, Mass Effect, as well as many others, may, on the face of it, seem like good foundations for a movie, but the issue is that these types of games, which we might claim to be “cinematic”, are highly derivitive and seek obvious inspiration of films. What then happens is something akin to a serpent eating its own tail, something regurgitated and swallowed so many times that the end product comes out like watered down mush (pardon the disgusting analogy).
Interestingly, a game based off one of the Final Fantasy worlds – I’m thinking of FF7 right now – could probably work in the hands of an auteur like Hayao Miyazaki and made as an anime.
first off, great show, guys. my two favorite subjects (movies and games) at the same time. thanks for the nerd-boner.
as far as a game i’d like to see as a movie: goddamn “Metal Gear Solid”, as directed by Predator/Die Hard-era John McTiernan. “Dead Space” by James Cameron. and George A. Romero’s “Resident Evil” (the way it was originally supposed to be).
p.s. that other post was supposed to read as “PS-me-too” sorry bout that.
Now, i know at some point i will regret this, but occassionaly (oh so very, very occasionally) you play a clip of something in between sections that i really want to hear more of – case in point in this episode. One of your segment breaks i know, but i dont know where from.
Any chance of a song list?
Cheers!
Yeah, the bumper music is always very cleverly thought out. I started laughing when I heard the riff from PUSA’s “Kitty” on this episode. Could there be a track more apropos to play for Some Other Castle? No way.
All the Tori Amos made me grin on the wives episode as well.
Ok, the wives episode drove me Insane. Purely on the basis that after going on about equality for Women in games (etc etc etc) then making EVERY SINGLE LINK on the wives episode a female vocalist kinda ruined the point to me that they should be treated the same….
Although I do understand where you are coming from, the whole point of the episode was to show the positive side of women in gaming and I for one think that Tori Amos and Marian Call highlight a strong female presence.
As we are frequently told by the many female guests we have on the show, women want to be treated as equals but we shouldn’t forget that they are still women. So pink is good and so is Marian Call.
I wonder if we did a show on Gaming Blokes and played Metallica & Iron Maiden, whether we would have women complaining about that too.
Tony
Speaking as one of the participants of that show, I thought the significance of having Marian Call and Tori Amos was that they were women who were also geeks, which is sort of what the episode ended up being about.
I think my issue was that it seemed an over-feminisation of the entire item, which was about gamer wives / girlfriends, and more than stood up on that in its own merits.
It only annoyed me because it was otherwise excellant, and this seemed (to me) just to be too far – Its the Pink argument again – Absolutely, pink can be great for girls, but it doesnt need to be forced down our throats.
I appreciate that its personal taste, I’m not trying to start a row!
And a gaming blokes episode would be just awful! Imagine that… Guys talking about videogames for an hour…
On a side note, I won’t be publishing music lists, but email me the time-code for the songs you want to know the name of and I’ll let you know.