Many cannot imagine their lives without good-old video games. In the last ten years, the video gaming industry has grown tremendously fueled by technologically-advanced games and impressive gaming gear. Today, video games are everywhere, in almost every household. While gamers rarely think about the history of video games, it is important we briefly examine how everything started. To do so, we have to go back to the late 1950s.
The very first game called OXO was crafted in 1952 by A.S. Douglas who at the time worked on his doctoral dissertation at Cambridge. The OXO game is a very simple game reminiscent of a tic-tac-toe game. Six years after OXO was born, William Higinbotham created the very first video game.
William Higinbotham’s Tennis for Two was also simple, as back in the day technology was very limited. When discussing the history of video games, we have to mention Steve Russell and his iconic Spacewar! game.
The space-themed game was crafted for the Programmed Data Processor-1 which back in the day, was the most advanced computer. Spacewar! was also the very first game accessible on multiple computers. In 1967, Ralph Baer and his team created the multi-program gaming system called The Brown Box.
The device enabled playing video games on television. A couple of years later, the very first home video gaming console called Odyssey was introduced by Magnavox.
In the following years, the video gaming industry introduced quite a few iconic games, such as Atari’s legendary Pong, Space Invaders, Pay-Man, Donkey Kong, and Flight Simulator. Older folks definitely remember legendary Nintendo games Metroid, Legend of Zelda, and Super Mario Bros that are still around and very popular.
Some of these games, alongside newer releases, inspired movie production companies, so over the years, we enjoyed quite a few amazing video game movie adaptations. Further, we take a look at the best movies inspired by video games released in the last three decades.
Sonic The Hedgehog – 2020
The iconic Sonic the Hedgehog video game was released in 1991 by Sega. Over the years, several games in the series were released by Sonic Team, SIMS Co., Sumo Digital, Gameloft, and BioWare. Sonic The Hedgehog movie hit the industry in 2020.
The movie is directed by Jeff Fowler and written by Josh Miller and Pat Casey. It stars Jim Carrey, Neal McDonough, Adam Pally, Natasha Rothwell, Tika Sumpter, Ben Schwartz, and James Marsden.
The plot revolves around a blue hedgehog that has a superpower. More specifically, beloved Sonic the Hedgehog can run at supersonic speeds. Longclaw the Owl that takes care of Sonic gives him a bag full of special rings that open doors to other planets. Sonic decides to travel to Earth using one of the special rings and a series of misadventures occurs.
Tomb Raider – 2018
Published by Eidos Interactive and Microsoft Studios, Tomb Raider is one of the most video game series. The very first Tomb Raider game was released by Eidos Interactive in 1996. The iconic game follows a young and ambitious archaeologist Lara Croft.
In the original game, Lara was hired by a wealthy businesswoman to uncover the Scion of Atlantic’s long-lost artifact. The Tomb Raider movie released in 2018 stars Alicia Vikander as Lara Croft, Dominic West as Richard Croft, Walton Goggins as Mathias Vogel, Daniel Wu as Lu Re, and Kristin Scott Thomas as Ana Miller.
The movie plot does not share many similarities with the original Tomb Raider game but is based on the newer Tomb Raider game from 2013. The movie starts with Lara Croft working as a bike courier. Soon after we learn that her father Richard Croft is missing.
Lara is convinced her father is still alive. As she searches for answers, she stumbles upon her father’s research into the Yamatai Queen Himiko. In his video message prerecorded for Lara, Richard advises her to destroy all the evidence of Himiko. Lara as curious as she is, ignores his message. Without revealing too much, Tomb Raider is a great choice for all fans of adventure movies.
Super Mario Bros – 1993
In the video gaming industry, there is no more beloved and iconic character than Super Mario Bros. The original Super Mario Bros game was released in 1983 by Nintendo. The developer introduced quite a few Mario Bros games in the following years. We even met Mario’s brother Luigi in one of the games.
The Super Mario Bros movie was released in 1993. Directed by Rocky Morton and Annabel Jankel, the movie stars Bob Hoskins, John Leguizamo, Samantha Mathis, Dennis Hopper, Fiona Shaw, and Fisher Stevens.
In the movie, Luigi and Mario who both work as plumbers in New York City leave everything behind as they travel outside Earth to another dimension. There, a stunning princess is held hostage by King Koopa. As expected, their journey does not go as planned.
If you are a fan of video games, Werewolves Within from 2021, Pokémon Detective Pikachu released in 2019, Monster Hunter from 2020, Warcraft from 2016, and Rampage released in 2018 are excellent video game movie adaptations.
Thanks to the Marvel Cinematic Universe and DC’s extremely poor attempts at copying it, comic book properties have never been more successful! Ten years ago, nobody but hardcore comic book nerds knew Iron Man’s real name, or Harley Quinn’s origin, or even the simple fact that Thor is a Marvel superhero and not just a Norse god. Today, we’re all familiar with Tony Stark’s eccentric antics in and out of his suit, we all know about the abusive relationship between the artist formerly known as Dr. Harleen Quinzel and her puddin’, and many of us ponder what would happen if a baby tried to lift Mjolnir. But how many of us have actually sat down and read a comic book featuring any of those characters? Despite the fact that only his three solo movies – not counting all the other movies he’s appeared in or had starring roles in – made over $2.5 billion dollars at the box office, the latest issue of Iron Man’s solo comic book series that I could find any sales information about, “Invincible Iron Man #11”, 
There’s a popular quote circulating around that goes something along the lines of “Born too late to explore the Earth, born too early to explore the Galaxy”. Honestly, to me, that quote is little more than justification for people who don’t want to do anything with their lives because they can’t be great explorers (even though there’s still the ocean, and plenty of uncharted regions on the planet), but that’s not really why I brought it up. The point that I was trying to make is that the human spirit is one that thrives on exploration, to the point where the “fact” that there are no more things left to explore is enough to bring people to depression. But what if I told you that, aside from the examples I gave you just now, there’s still one more place that you can explore? One more uncharted frontier that you could begin exploring right away? I am, of course, talking about cyberspace.
Okay, okay, fine, I know – I’ve spoken about the Avengers 
While Marvel has very recently made the promise to go back into console gaming with titles like the PS4 “Spider-Man” game and the Telltale project that’s not currently announced, for the last few years their output has mostly been on mobile devices and PC. Some of those games have been GREAT (“Future Fight” I believe I’ve mentioned on this blog before as one of the finest examples of a mobile game ever, and “Contest of Champions” is immensely popular, to the point where it makes something like $8 million a month), while others… Not so much (stop trying to make “Marvel Heroes” happen, Marvel, it’s not gonna happen). But you might not have even heard of one of their cutest mobile offerings, which, while not a great game in and of itself, is some of the most fun I’ve had with a Marvel product in ages… And that’s saying something!
Marvel’s 2006 event comic event “Civil War” was one of the company’s biggest ones, scoping across the entire Marvel universe. Pretty much every single Marvel hero who was alive and on Earth at the time was involved in one way or another, whether in the main books or in their own spinoff series. At the time, “Civil War” received universal critical acclaim for completely shattering and reshaping the Marvel universe and presenting a fresh new perspective on the hero vs hero conflict (remember – up until that point, the classic formula of hero vs hero fights involved only fighting for a bit before teaming up against a bad guy, and there was no bad guy in sight during “Civil War”). While fan opinion on the story is more mixed these days (and with good reason – some of the content within is pretty questionable), the fact that its 2016 movie adaptation 
As some of you may or may not know, I’m a bit of a gambler. I say “a bit” because I’m not really someone who claims to be able to beat the bank and make thousands or whatever, but I do sometimes hit up the casino (both the physical and online one) and generally tend to have a very good time. My favorite casino game of all time is roulette – I love that you can employ a strategy, but at the same time the result depends entirely on luck, which keeps things nice and fair. Still, I rarely have much of a strategy when playing – my go-to option is to bet on my lucky number, but also on a color, so that I can keep my wins more or less balanced while I wait for that lucky strike. This strategy rarely works out in my favor, though, as by the time I reach the point where my lucky number is drawn I’m pretty much back where I started.