Deus Ex Movie Update

[El_Bel]

Originally Posted by Ilves

It's weird, though. What can a Deus Ex movie do that a Deus Ex game couldn't? Besides reaching a wider audience?

Have a more focused story. A game by default must be at least 15 hours long. Idealy, it should be 40 to 50.

While it's true that with that time games have way more story to tell (with all the emails and extra conversations is like watching the movie and read all the tie in books - stoy wise) and are of course way more immersive, (you are the hero, you don't just watch him) there are a lot of filler stuff for someone who just wants to enjoy a good story. That is because the game developers have to spread the story for 15-40 hours for gameplay reasons (as well as marketing, who would buy a 3 hour long game?)

Also there is the issue that some people are just not good at games. Why should they be excluded by the awesome DX universe?

Of course i would much rather have a Deus Ex game then a movie, but what i am saying is that movies have their uses!

[Ashpolt]

Originally Posted by El_Bel

Have a more focused story.

You say more focused, I say shallower and more linear.

Originally Posted by El_Bel

Also there is the issue that some people are just not good at games. Why should they be excluded by the awesome DX universe?

Because not everyone can have everything. I cant stand hip hop - should The Black Eyed Peas release a prog rock album so that I can enjoy their music too? No, of course not, that's a stupid idea. Take away a defining characteristic of something and what you're left with is no longer that thing. The "Deus Ex universe" isn't just what the developers created, part of it is made by me. And by you, and everyone else who played it.

Besides, it's not like there aren't plenty of decent cyberpunk films already, so people who don't enjoy games but do enjoy films have those to enjoy. The proper nouns won't be the same as in Deus Ex, but so what?

[Shralla]

I thought filmmakers were finally starting to figure out that a TV show is a much better outlet for any sort of prolonged, meaningful story.

[xaduha]

Yeah, how about full CG animated series? I'd go for that.



But, that trailer was pretty expensive, wasn't it?

[spyhopping]

Well, I would rather they invest the money, resources and writing power in a spectacular follow up game to HR, but I'm not complaining about it. They're probably going to invest big time in the game series from now on anyway. The biggest, most important part of the DX experience for me, is to become wrapped up in a gritty urban atmosphere and an intense story. They can deliver that in a film, even if it will be in different ways. It'll be a shorter, possibly more intense experience than that of a game.

I don't reckon they will revisit any old protagonists. Leaves them little breathing room, and they'll need a less blank protagonist than JC or Adam to drive the story.

[HallucinogenX]

I just hope Hollywood doesn't screw this one up like they screwed up other movies.They have a lot of responsibility.It's not easy to match the standards that Human Revolution has set.

[El_Bel]

Originally Posted by Ashpolt

You say more focused, I say shallower and more linear.



Because not everyone can have everything. I cant stand hip hop - should The Black Eyed Peas release a prog rock album so that I can enjoy their music too? No, of course not, that's a stupid idea. Take away a defining characteristic of something and what you're left with is no longer that thing. The "Deus Ex universe" isn't just what the developers created, part of it is made by me. And by you, and everyone else who played it.

Besides, it's not like there aren't plenty of decent cyberpunk films already, so people who don't enjoy games but do enjoy films have those to enjoy. The proper nouns won't be the same as in Deus Ex, but so what?

Imagine if they remade The Godfather as a video game. Would it make the story better to be panned out for 50 hours? No, the story in movies is not shallower, it just focuses on what is importand because they don't have to worry about gameplay. Everything is there that needs to be there. They don't have to make excuses to drag the story for 50 hours.

Linearity that comes with the movies also gives more focus. In nonlinear storytelling the writer, unless he has unlimited time and resources, has to acomodate for player choice so he can't do some things that may contradict the player choice. For example, the reason that Paul Denton was not a bigger part of the second half of the game was because the player could leave him to die. In a movie the writer could declare that Paul survives and give him a bigger role in the story. Linearity necessarily a bad thing. I mean DX is linear in comparison to Skyrim, but that just makes the story better. Not all stories have to be non linear.

"Maybe sometimes I don't want to create my own experience. Maybe I want to have an experience that's been carefully crafted by professional designers and artists." -Yahtzee

Each medium has it's own merits. Movies are just better (for the time being) at telling a story then games, with the exception of course of the original Deus Ex.


As for your other example about "not everyone can have everything" i will have to disagree to that too. Yes some things can't be done, like the Black Eyed Peas prog rock album, but if it can be done, what is wrong with letting people who can't play games, experience stories set in the world of Deus Ex? I don't believe that the defining characteristic of Deus Ex is that it is a game. Remember the threads when this forum started, about what is the core of Deus ex? Everyone had a different answer, and for a lot of people it was the story. It just happens that it was and was best served in game form.

Lastly the story of Deus Ex is quite unique and just because there are other cyberpunk movies out there, i haven't found anything close to Deus Ex. I think the public deserves to know about our world, even if they can't play games.

[Jerion]

Originally Posted by El_Bel

Imagine if they remade The Godfather as a video game. Would it make the story better to be panned out for 50 hours? No, the story in movies is not shallower, it just focuses on what is importand because they don't have to worry about gameplay. Everything is there that needs to be there. They don't have to make excuses to drag the story for 50 hours.

Linearity that comes with the movies also gives more focus. In nonlinear storytelling the writer, unless he has unlimited time and resources, has to acomodate for player choice so he can't do some things that may contradict the player choice. For example, the reason that Paul Denton was not a bigger part of the second half of the game was because the player could leave him to die. In a movie the writer could declare that Paul survives and give him a bigger role in the story. Linearity necessarily a bad thing. I mean DX is linear in comparison to Skyrim, but that just makes the story better. Not all stories have to be non linear.

"Maybe sometimes I don't want to create my own experience. Maybe I want to have an experience that's been carefully crafted by professional designers and artists." -Yahtzee

Each medium has it's own merits. Movies are just better (for the time being) at telling a story then games, with the exception of course of the original Deus Ex.


As for your other example about "not everyone can have everything" i will have to disagree to that too. Yes some things can't be done, like the Black Eyed Peas prog rock album, but if it can be done, what is wrong with letting people who can't play games, experience stories set in the world of Deus Ex? I don't believe that the defining characteristic of Deus Ex is that it is a game. Remember the threads when this forum started, about what is the core of Deus ex? Everyone had a different answer, and for a lot of people it was the story. It just happens that it was and was best served in game form.

Lastly the story of Deus Ex is quite unique and just because there are other cyberpunk movies out there, i haven't found anything close to Deus Ex. I think the public deserves to know about our world, even if they can't play games.

Interesting. Deus Ex as a game experience is very much tied to player choice; it takes the medium's defining characteristics of interactivity and reactivity (Ashpolt's Phasemonkey article on this very issue is relevant here) and runs with them. However, the game's universe is, with the primary exceptions of the world-changing climactic choices at the finale of each game, largely independent of the games themselves. Deus Ex games structure the "What" of their plots fairly rigidly, leaving the "How" up to the player, right up to the very end, where the player has a rather dramatic choice with directing the last "What Happens" moment in the story. So...since the three games are set roughly 25-30 years apart from on another, and granting that a) there is no such event yet set in the canon the years preceeding DX:HR, and b) these events/games are far enough apart for any major differences in game-based player choices to be hypothetically hand-waved, there is plenty of room for a dedicated story in the universe, while remaining distinct from the events in the games themselves. A linear story can be told in this universe. James Swallow's Icarus Effect is an example.


Now...if only they find the right people to do it.

[Ashpolt]

Originally Posted by El_Bel

Imagine if they remade The Godfather as a video game.

They did, and it was terrible. I'm not trying to say movies are inherently bad because they're short - I love movies as much as the next guy - but everything has its appropriate medium. For The Godfather, it's film (I'm aware it was a novel first, but the film is widely regarded as better than the source) and for Deus Ex it's games.

I could respond to the rest of your post point by point, but to be honest it'd just be different ways of reiterating that last paragraph. We'll just have to agree to disagree on this one.

[El_Bel]

I'll agree that we disagree then. I'll give one final example though, not for arguing, just as a thought experiment. How could you tell an Anna Navarre story, or any other story of a strong Deus Ex character in a Deus Ex game?

I believe that it cannot happen, a DX game requires a blank state character to work, so the player can make his choises. I mean why give the player the freedom to go non lethal, when Anna would kill everythingin sight? If the player goes non lethal, who is he? Is he the last remnant of conciense in her brain? Or if you take away the freedom from the player, so you can have a stronger character is it a DX game at all? Isn't a movie a better medium to tell stories about strong characters?

And of course lets not forget that Human Revolution had a very very linear story, and in my opinion only one* (hidden) ending. What does that mean?



*whatever ending you choose, the secret ending happens and then we have DX.

[JCpie]

Translating video games to movies isn't really a great idea, and fans of the original will almost always be critical of it, however just because a video game's characteristics can't be translated into a movie, it doesn't mean the setting can't be.