Popularity Surge: Video game movies have gained significant traction recently, with successful adaptations like A Minecraft Movie.
Upcoming Adaptations: Anticipated films based on Call of Duty and The Legend of Zelda are finally in development.
Franchise Reboots: The Resident Evil series is set for a new reboot, shifting focus back to its survival horror roots.
Director’s Vision: Zach Cregger aims to create a film that resonates with fans of the original video games.
Video game movies have surged in popularity in recent years. After decades of a supposed curse over the whole genre, Hollywood has started to crack the code on how to turn beloved video games into successful and well-received blockbusters. A Minecraft Movie‘s success last year was the latest example of this, with it becoming so big that a sequel has already been announced.
There are so many hit games out there that many are still awaiting their first adaptation. Some of the most anticipated video game movies, like Call of Duty and The Legend of Zelda, are finally on the brink of making it to the big screen at long last. Five Nights at Freddy’s and Sonic the Hedgehog have found recent success after their movie adaptations finally came out. Conversely, Prince of Persia, Warcraft, Need for Speed, and others have been left alone after a single film.
It’s much rarer for video games to get a second life as a movie franchise. Mario had to wait nearly 30 years to get his second shot. Tomb Raider and Mortal Kombat have been rebooted in the last decade. Even a fresh Street Fighter is on the way later this year. However, another massive video game franchise is getting the big-screen reboot treatment sooner.
From the Coin-Op Era to the Cloud · Eight Questions How Well Do You Know Video Games? “It’s dangerous to go alone. Take this.”
In November 1972, a small Sunnyvale start-up named Atari released the arcade game widely credited as the industry’s first commercial blockbuster. Designed by engineer Allan Alcorn as a training exercise, its prototype famously stopped working in a Sunnyvale bar because the coin box was overstuffed with quarters. Name the game.
✓ Correct! Pong, designed by Allan Alcorn at Atari (founded by Nolan Bushnell and Ted Dabney). The Sunnyvale bar Andy Capp’s reportedly called Atari to complain the prototype had broken; when Alcorn arrived, the cabinet was fine — the coin box was simply jammed full. Pong went on to sell over 8,000 cabinets and effectively created the consumer video-game industry. Bushnell’s earlier Computer Space (1971) is the very first commercial coin-op video game, but it sold poorly and didn’t spark the boom.
✗ Wrong. The answer is Pong. Space Invaders is Taito’s 1978 hit. Asteroids is Atari’s own 1979 vector-graphics smash. Computer Space (1971) is technically the first commercial coin-op video game ever — designed by Atari co-founder Nolan Bushnell — but it flopped at retail. Pong is the 1972 game that proved the industry could actually work.
02 The North American video-game crash of 1983 wiped out 97% of the industry’s revenue almost overnight. The two scapegoat releases — a rushed E.T. tie-in famously buried in a New Mexico landfill, and an unplayable port of Pac-Man — ran on the same now-iconic console. Whose console was it?
✓ Correct! Atari, specifically the Atari 2600 (originally the VCS). Howard Scott Warshaw famously developed E.T. in five weeks to make a Christmas 1982 deadline; over 4 million unsold copies were eventually buried in the Alamogordo, New Mexico landfill in 1983 — later confirmed as real archaeology by a 2014 dig. The crash gutted the American console market until Nintendo launched the NES in 1985, with Japan taking over from there.
✗ Wrong. The answer is Atari (the 2600). Magnavox’s Odyssey was the very first home console (1972) but had been long-superseded by 1983. ColecoVision and Intellivision were 2600 competitors that also got hit by the crash, but the headline disasters — E.T. and the Pac-Man port — were Atari’s, and Atari was the dominant brand whose collapse defined the era.
A Donkey Kong
B Duck Hunt
C Super Mario Bros.
D The Legend of Zelda
✓ Correct! Super Mario Bros. (September 1985 in Japan as the Famicom version, October 1985 in North America bundled with the NES). Miyamoto and Takashi Tezuka’s 8-bit blueprint for the genre — running, jumping, scrolling, secrets — sold over 40 million copies and was the standard pack-in NES title (sometimes packed alongside Duck Hunt on the Zapper bundle). The Legend of Zelda came in 1986; Super Mario Bros. is the title that defined the launch.
✗ Wrong. The answer is Super Mario Bros. Donkey Kong (1981) is Miyamoto’s arcade breakthrough — and Mario’s actual debut as “Jumpman.” Duck Hunt was bundled with the Zapper-pack version of the NES alongside Super Mario Bros. The Legend of Zelda came a year later (1986). The headline NES launch title is Super Mario Bros.
✓ Correct! Minecraft — over 300 million copies sold, with Markus ‘Notch’ Persson’s Mojang acquired by Microsoft for $2.5 billion in November 2014. The game launched in alpha in 2009, hit full release in November 2011, and has since shipped on every major platform from PC to Switch to phones to PlayStation. GTA V is the second-best-selling game ever (~200M+) and most profitable entertainment product of all time. Tetris versions vary by counting method but together comfortably exceed 500M; question specifies a single game where Minecraft leads.
✗ Wrong. The answer is Minecraft. Tetris is technically larger across all versions combined but fragmented across dozens of separately counted SKUs. GTA V is second-best-selling discrete game (~200M+) and most profitable entertainment product ever made.Wii Sports moved82M but mostly as pack-in.Single best-selling game ever is Minecraft.
05
A28-year-old Shigeru Miyamoto was given a salvage job in1981: convert thousands of unsold Radar Scope cabinets into aprofitable game.The result was an arcade smash that introduced both abarrel-throwing antagonist and amoustachioed protagonist named Jumpman—later renamed Mario.Name this1981 arcade game.
Sony is onthe vergeof delivering anew versionof Resident Evilto fans.The movie comes outinexactlythree months,with aSeptember18releasedateset.Starring Austin Abramsanddirectedby Weapons‘ Zach Cregger,the horror video game seriesis aboutto get amuch-needed makeover onceagain.
Sony’s Resident Evil Reboot Is Very Different From The Previous Movies
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The Resident Evil franchise has been aroundin video game form since Capcom releasedthe firstgamein1996.The survival horror storywent onto becomeoneofthe biggestvideo gamefranchisesever.So,itwas hardly asurprise when itgot put intodevelopmentas amovie.Milla Jovovichcame aboardto star ina six-film Resident Evil movie franchisefrom director Paul W.S.Anderson thatran from2002to2016andmade$1.2 billionbetween them.
The Resident Evil movies werefarfromfaithfuladaptations,largely focusingon originalcharacterslike Jovovich’s Aliceandturningmore intoan actionfranchise.That left gamerswaitingfor amore properversionofthisapocalyptic,T-Virus-infected worldtoberealized.Luckily,thatiswhat isin storeforthe new reboot.
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Sarah Parker is a research analyst and content contributor with a strong interest in business strategy, organizational behavior, and social development. With a background in sociology and public policy, she focuses on exploring the intersection between research and real-world application. Sarah regularly contributes articles that bridge academic insights and practical relevance, aiming to foster critical thinking and innovation across sectors.
