A Retrospective Look into Video Game Movies Part 1

Image credits to Rotten Tomatoes

Video game movies don’t have a great reputation. Though some may have been profitable it doesn’t mean that they’ve had good reviews. I’ll be discussing five of these movies in part one of this multi post series. I’ll also be going in order of when the movies were released so the oldest ones will be first.

Super Mario Bros.

The movie that started this trend was the Super Mario Bros. Movie. It released in theaters in 1993. If you played any of the games then you were in for quite a shock. Bowser was a human and Goomba had large bodies, small heads, and wore trench coats. Truly a baffling movie. I know if I was a kid I’d be terrified of those “goombas” on the left.

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Rotten Tomatoes has this movies sitting at a 24% while IMDb has it at a 4.1/10. According to IMDb, the movie grossed an estimated $20,915,465 while the budget was an estimated $48,000,000. Judging by those numbers this movie was a box office flop. They didn’t even make half of their money back. Let’s move on to the next one.

Double Dragon

Double Dragon is based on the original arcade game by the same name. This movie released in November of 1994. From the reviews that I read the reasons why it did poorly was a combination of script writing, directing, and the fact that they were trying to make a move from a beat em up game. It currently sits at a 3.8/10 on IMDb with mostly negative reviews, while earning a 13% on Rotten Tomatoes. This was one of the cheaper produced movies with an estimated budget of $7,850,000. This move like the previous did not make back production costs by only making $2,341,309.

Street Fighter

This movie is based off of the fighting game series of the same name. This movie released in December of 1994. One again if you played the games then be ready for some disappointment. The biggest change made in the movie is that two of the most well known characters from the game series, Ryu and Ken, are reduced to being con artists. They also easily join M.Bison, the main villain. As of now this movie sits at a 4/10 on IMDb and a terrible 10% on Rotten Tomatoes. The estimated budget was $35,000,000 and the movie grossed an estimated $99,431,786. Even though this movie profited the reviews are still mostly negative. A trend that I’ve seen with these movies so far is that they bring in money based on the name then they surprise the audience with a story far from the original content.

Mortal Kombat

This is based on the video game series by the same name. From what I have seen this is one of the few movies to closely stick to the source material. This is the first video game movie so far to have a little more positive than negative as their review sits at a 5.8/10 on IMDb. It has a 48% on Rotten Tomatoes. The estimated budget of this movie was $18,000,000. The estimated gross of the movie was $122,195,920. I would say that this movie was the firs successful video game movie both in reviews and with money made. I say this because a majority of the ratings are mediocre scores, far outweighing the negative ratings. I attribute its success to actual sticking to the source material. Unfortunately the sequel didn’t fare as well rating wise.

Mortal Kombat: Annihilation

This movie serves a sequel to the previous while still bringing in elements from the video games. This movie came out in 1997. One glance at the rating percentages show that this sequel has far more negative reviews than positive ones. After reading some reviews one reason for it’s poor reception appears to be because this movie tried to adapt its story from several games instead of one. Another review noted that one of the major characters had switched actors. This movie currently sits at a 3.7/10 on IMDb and an abysmal 2% on Rotten Tomatoes. This is the lowest score of all these movies so far. It fared better money wise costing an estimated $30,000,000 while making an estimated $51,376,861 at the box office. Though this movie made back its money you can tell that it had some consequences. One such consequence was that this movie did not receive a sequel. This movie also made far less than its predecessor.

Summary

In conclusion I believe that the movies listed in this part one of my retrospective failed except for the first Moral Kombat Movie. I believe that deviation from the source material is to blame. I think if there was justification for the changes than these would have been better received. Thank you for reading as always and if I made a mistake let me know and I’ll fix it.. Be sure to comment your thoughts below and if you enjoyed this content hit the like button. Be sure to follow me on twitter @realgamerwithg1 for updates on posts.