I went to see the new batman film the other day and while watching I felt a pang of sadness in my heart.

No it wasn't to do with quality of the film (I actually quite liked it) I thought of the inevitable film tie-in, which will inevitably be terrible.

Its such a shame because someone could put some effort in make an awesome stealthy batman style game with a new story and everything and it'll probably be brilliant. Instead they churn out these game riding on the coat tails of the film and making a few extra pounds...

What does everyone think? And what films could make great games but ended up making something diabolicly awful?

Rusman:
I went to see the new batman film the other day and while watching I felt a pang of sadness in my heart.

No it wasn't to do with quality of the film (I actually quite liked it) I thought of the inevitable film tie-in, which will inevitably be terrible.

Its such a shame because someone could put some effort in make an awesome stealthy batman style game with a new story and everything and it'll probably be brilliant. Instead they churn out these game riding on the coat tails of the film and making a few extra pounds...

What does everyone think? And what films could make great games but ended up making something diabolicly awful?

They're not releasing one. It was under development by Pandemic Studios is Brisbane but now it's rumoured that the plug has been pulled.

And the games are targeted at gullible kids that are trying to catch the fad rather than gamers.

Cars was a horrible tie-in thingy.

marketing... just plain old milking
trying to steal cash from kids who think playing as their heroes is cool,wich could be spider mand the movie was an ok movie based game.
bust most of the time it's a cash-in attempt with a seriously tight deadline. most games come out unpolished and flawed.
wich is a pity because so many movies could've been great games.

The games are put out under strict deadline to coincide with the Film's release. Usually they're made by hack developers who only found out they were making the game 18 months-2 years before the games release date, which only sounds like a long time.
Realistically, to put a development team together, do the design work, write the code then actually build a game out of it, it's not very long at all.
They tend to have pretty limited budgets too.

GoldenEye didn't come out until 2 years after the movie.

fix-the-spade:

GoldenEye didn't come out until 2 years after the movie.

Yeah and that was brilliant. Damn these kids if they stopped buying them there would be no market and some good developers could make some awesome ones like GoldenEye...

Movie tie in's are done poorly because developers know someone will be so impressionable and gullible that they will buy it. So it will be done poorly because of how many impressionable people there are. It's just more cash cows, and more often then not the tie in will be done by EA, the main cause for lack of good games out in this day and age.

The only good movie tie in's were Goldeneye and ironically enough those two Lord of the Rings movie tin in's which put you in the thick of it which were done by EA >.< before any of that Third Age bullshit of a game.

Don't get me wrong as I would LOVE to see a great Batman game done, but i don't see that coming. The only good Superhero games i've played were X-Men Legends 1 and 2.

Sometimes a game experience is unique to the individual user, as their imagination fills in a lot of the blanks, so a game based film is inevitably going to disappoint most people.

EDIT: Sorry, it seems I got the question backwards.

From what I've read and heard, its a combination of:

- low development budgets
- greater emphasis on looks than gameplay
- tight deadlines coordinated with the IP's release, not the development status
- little support from the IP holders
- a "good enough" attitude, from viewing the game as primarily a tie-in or merch

One of these wouldn't be fatal; in combination, though... *shudder*

-- Steve

edited to add: I wonder how much 3rd-party/blind testing tie-in titles get, given that they often contain spoilers for the IP in question? If they skimp there, that might explain a lot of the crapware movie tie-ins.

Well I heard theyre still making it but they halted the project cos they thought Dark night wouldnt do well in the boxoffice and theyve only really done the first level. If this is true at least now they can take the time to make a good game

Hookman:
Well I heard theyre still making it but they halted the project cos they thought Dark night wouldnt do well in the boxoffice

That makes no sense, every man and his dog could see that The Dark Knight was going to do brilliantly at the box office. The Heath Ledger factor alone meant it was going to do well.

Revelo:
Don't get me wrong as I would LOVE to see a great Batman game done, but i don't see that coming. The only good Superhero games i've played were X-Men Legends 1 and 2.

Oh yes, X-Men Legends were great games. Though strictly speaking not movie-based the movies most likely helped make the games popular.

Tron 2.0 was an excellent movie-based game, in a way. Actually it was planned to BE a movie sequel to the original Tron, 20 years later, but when they decided to put the story into a game, they did a good job on creating what is probably the most un-disney disney game I've ever seen ^^
I still wonder why it never was as popular as it should have been.

Does anyone remember Enter the Matrix? This was a bold game that ran alongside the two Matrix sequels, telling the story of the two characters Ghost and Naomi, who have very small roles in the actual film. It had some really stand out moments and the story alone added a lot of new information to the Matrix trilogy, but the gameplay wasn't great (I enjoyed the combat but the shooting was not great, and the driving sections were poor). The game was overseen by the Whatever-you-call-them brothers, and definitely shows the potential that games based around a movie have, if people are committed to making them to high quality. However there is little need to make games such as Enter the Matrix as movie tie-in games are bound to sell regardless of their content, just because they carry the name of the latest blockbuster

yes enter the matrix was rather enjoyable but because of the fact that we see a movie and "put ourselves in a game"(not literally but...) we get let down by the game, i mean take Transformers, great movie, great game potential but the game sucked, the sam can be said about Ironman. which is why i have completely given up on movie and tv tie-ins

I think there is one simple reason. They are almost always rushed. Take the Dark Knight for example. I am positive that if they had started working on the game as soon as the movie was confirmed, which was a good couple of years before it was out, they could have made a great game. as for Pandemic, I was happy they were taking there time to polish it and get things worked out, and I am disappointed by the rumored plug pulling ( if it is still a rumor).

Simple remedy:

Do every movie tie-in with LEGO.

Or get it right like Goldeneye or Scarface

The only movie tie in that I'm remotely looking forward to is the Quantum of Solace one.

Is EVERYONE here ignoring Spiderman 2? Absoloutly sublime, ranking just under Psychonauts and FFX as my top three PS2 games.

Rossmallo:
Is EVERYONE here ignoring Spiderman 2? Absoloutly sublime, ranking just under Psychonauts and FFX as my top three PS2 games.

Have you ever played the pc version of spider-man 2... well you shouldn't it's right there with erh. other licenced crap

Its because films and games don't translate terribly well. A blockbuster is usually only about 2 hours long if that, so trying to pad that out into a 10+ hour game isn't easy, especially when the developers are usually given strict deadlines to release the game with the film, meaning the gameplay is padded out with samey, uninspired crap.

khululy:

Rossmallo:
Is EVERYONE here ignoring Spiderman 2? Absoloutly sublime, ranking just under Psychonauts and FFX as my top three PS2 games.

Have you ever played the pc version of spider-man 2... well you shouldn't it's right there with erh. other licenced crap

Tried the PC version, and the difference in quality between the two was like the difference between night and day. The PS2 Version is awesome, but the PC one gives me nightmares.

what about the starship troopers game?anyone remember that?

Uncompetative:
Simple remedy:

Do every movie tie-in with LEGO.

I quite agree, Although I haven't played the Lego Indy one yet, the star wars Lego games where brilliant.