Cognition Dissemination: The Gaming Industry’s Steady Embrace of Hollywood

Anyone who’s been playing video games for decades likely remembers the bygone era of licensed games, days that faded with the passage of time for good reason. Good adaptations of movies and TV shows existed, but for every quality one, there were several more dubious examples. When production costs and resource demands for big-budget AAA video games first rose, companies responded by offering small mobile cash-ins for most movie tie-ins late in the PS3/360 generation instead. Main big-budget adaptations have since become larger and more unique efforts.

Batman is the best example of this phenomenon. The last movie to receive an adaptation was Batman Begins, in which most of the cast reprised their roles. But instead of making adaptations for sequels The Dark Knight and The Dark Knight Rises, the license holders at Eidos (and later Warner Bros.) crafted their own unique universe starting with Batman: Arkham Asylum. Other adaptations have followed in the footsteps of those titles thanks to how well the Batman Arkham games sold, while plenty more are planning adaptations for the future. Needless to say, these types are only getting more popular over time. In fact, they’re getting too popular.

Two titles were recently announced by the newly-established Lucasfilm Games. Bethesda and MachineGames are working on an Indiana Jones title, the first serious gaming effort since Indiana Jones and the Staff of Kings in 2009. Ubisoft and Massive Entertainment are working on a new story-driven open-world Star Wars game, confirmation that Disney won’t be renewing the Star Wars license with EA when it expires in a little over two years. EA has only released four Star Wars games and has cancelled three in the last eight years, assuredly less than Disney wanted. It makes more sense for them to take the same approach they’ve already applied to the Marvel games for future titles, though EA still has Star Wars games in development.

The announcements of these games means it’s unlikely that future installments in the Wolfenstein and Tom Clancy’s The Division series are in development at MachineGames and Massive Entertainment, respectively, given the number of resources required for game development these days. These adaptations could sell considerably more than the last installments in both franchises, but two unique gaming properties could go to gaming purgatory in the process.

Those aren’t the only Hollywood adaptations announced recently. IO Interactive announced a James Bond 007 title a couple of months ago. They’ll be a perfect fit for the game considering the Bond-like elements in their own Hitman series, but working on Bond means that franchise will be placed aside for the time being. This isn’t a big surprise considering the newest Hitman games haven’t set the sales world on fire despite their qualities, and they outright stated how the recent release of Hitman 3 is “the dramatic conclusion to the World of Assassination trilogy.” But again, we’re at least temporarily losing another unique game franchise.

With the announcement of these titles, other upcoming initiatives like Eidos Montreal’s Guardians of the Galaxy, and recent releases like Square Enix/Crystal Dynamics’ Marvel’s Avengers, the Insomniac Spider-Man games, and Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order, several companies are retreating to the safe and warm arms of Hollywood franchises. The potential that fewer installments in unique gaming properties will be made in favor of adaptations is a hell of a thing to see at the beginning of a new console generation.

A number of established franchises could be put on the backburner because even several of the largest development studios don’t have the resources to focus on those and licensed games. Insomnaic having the option to work on Spider-Man games and their own Ratchet & Clank series with the upcoming Rift Apart makes them an exception.

Game adaptations of Hollywood properties will take up a larger portion of the software library in this new console generation, but I’d be a bad liar if I said I was completely against them. You’ll see more editorials across the internet lamenting the reduced number of new or unique installments in AAA game franchises in several publications, and this is hardly the first one. But I’m looking forward to the Indiana Jones and Bond games (I posted about the latter for a reason), and I still want games based on Wonder Woman and The Mandalorian. There’s nothing hypocritical here; it’s possible to be both concerned about the lack unique gaming titles while wanting good licensed games.

It’s ironic and hilarious to see this happening just as Hollywood is pursuing more adaptations of video game properties — especially Sony. The Uncharted movie starring Tom Holland and Mark Wahlberg is still on the way, following a delay into 2022, while other initiatives like a The Last of Us TV show are coming. The Sonic the Hedgehog, Tomb Raider, and Pokémon Detective Pikachu movies will also get sequels at an unspecified point in the future. This is particularly funny in Tomb Raider’s case, another franchise put on the game development backburner (alongside Deus Ex) for licensed Marvel games.

We’re not that close to reaching the serious issue of there being too many game adaptations of Hollywood franchises, but we could if the gaming industry isn’t careful. There remains the grim possibility that AAA development could get so expensive and resource intensive that this will be the only way for big-budget games that aren’t part of massive franchises to profit. Combine that with the reduced number of unique gaming franchise installments, and adaptations could eat up a big ratio.

It’s a good thing there will be plenty of mid-tier and indie games coming, a trend that thankfully won’t be stopping in the near future.