Wednesday, September 3, 2008

Books, movies, etc I'd like to see licensed into games.

I'm sure there's lot of other things that could be added to this, but here's some movies, books, and video games I'd like to be made into pen and paper rpgs:

Harry Potter: This seems like an obvious starting place. Come on, picture character creation: What house did the sorting hat place you in? Do you favor charms, curses, maybe broomsticks? prophecy? I'm not the biggest Potter geek, but I have to give the series credit: the world is lavish, and I want to run around Hogwarts, and Diagon Ally. 

Night Watch: This is a Russian book/movie series. Personally, I enjoyed the first novel, but preferred the movie series. It sounds like a basic mythology (but is very well executed): There are Others who are light or dark. Over time, they realized they'd destroy each other if they continued to fight. They have a treaty, of sorts. The light watches over night, and the dark watches over day. They make sure neither side gets to powerful. The world and magic of the world is flavorful enough that it could be its own game franchise. Really though, there's no reason why you couldn't just adapt the World of Darkness (Mage specifically) to play a Night Watch game. 

The Kingkiller Chronicle (The Name of the Wind): So far Rothfuss has only released the first book, but The Name of the Wind has wowed both the press and legends in the fantasy field (Ursula K. Le Guin, Orson Scott Card). The series has hardly begun to explore the rich mythology of the world but we already have humans, fey, as well as darker, stranger creatures (I love the Chandrian) . We have an academy (great base location for any game), cool magic: sympathy and whatever knowing the name of something is called (it's been awhile since I read the book). I'm anxious to see where the series goes, but also anxious to see if a game gets made based on this series. 

Kingdom Hearts: I like this series too much. Really though, the game offers up many fun, classic Disney worlds, as well as original worlds. You have standard Final Fantasy classes, as well as the Keyblade wielder. 

Who Framed Roger Rabbit? I'm not kidding. Film noir world + Cartoon world = two unique worlds that offer players the ability to be vastly different kinds of characters. The one problem: What the hell would you do in this game? 

The Matrix: Another obvious choice. Next. 

Sandman: Obvious as well. Damn.

Okay, I'll just say there's any number of other fantasy books or vertigo comic book series that I'd like to see made into games. I really don't need to catalog everyone of them. Anything you'd like to see made into a game? 

12 comments:

rev said...

I love Nightwatch...I had forgotten about it for some time...definitely would be good for mining some material from...

Donny_the_DM said...

Death gate cycle by margaret weis and tracy hickman.

Final fantasy?

Alien (totally survival horror)

D20 modern: 28 days later.

I have so many more, but it looks like my brain downloaded some encryption software last night...

Anonymous said...

Donny,

While I don't care for Weis and Hickman much, I agree that the Death Gate Cycle would be great as a setting. I'm always a fan of visiting different worlds in a game.

For those who haven't read the series, the setting is a series of worlds, each dominated by one of the major elements (fire, water, earth and air I think). They were created from one core world which was destroyed in the process (I think it is suggested that the core world was earth, but I'm unsure). They work something like a massive machine with each world relying on the others. In the "center" there is a prison/labyrinth of immense proportions used to house the enemies of the world breakers.

While I think the books are pretty heavy-handed, I really like the setting quite a lot.

Zach L said...

Final Fantasy already has a pen-and-paper version. It's very, very math intensive; not bad at all, and very flexible (I actually used it to run a Resident Evil campaign -- I absolutely adore the item creation rules), but it's not quite intuitive enough.

It's available for free at http://www.returnergames.com/

And, relating to the post: oh man. Night Watch. That... wow. That's one of those things that you hear, and your first thought is -- "why didn't I think of that?"

Anonymous said...

As far as Sandman goes, Nobilis did a really good job of providing that style of game... though it wasn't licensed and therefore didn't use those characters, that universe, etc. One could very easily play a Sandman-themed game with it, though.

And Final Fantasy... wow, I'm surprised to see the Returners are still around. And working on a third edition. I remember working out a proposal for chargen over 10 years ago, when the group was just getting started. They ended up only using a few elements, though, and favoring a much more complicated system than I'd have liked, so my involvement quickly ended.

Haven't thought about that game in years...

Lunatyk said...

I for once am not a big fan of licensed material...

Unknown said...

I'd be interested in seeing a P&P based off of the Disgaea series. Dozens of different Classes and hundreds of different netherworlds to explore. You should check out Nippon Ichi's games, a lot of them would be interesting as P&P's.

Unknown said...

Also, isn't original Final Fantasy based off of old school D&D?

Anonymous said...

I would like to see Hellboy.

Stuart said...

There is a Powered by GURPS Hellboy game...

Jack said...

reply to Scott,

You're right! Nobilis is inspired by Sandman... and really it'd be easy to play a game using the Endless... or being more creative and creating your own Noble. Nobilis is the best game that I own yet have never played.

Also, I forgot about Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell. I love that novel, and that world, and though you could just play a Victorian Age Mage (using Changeling for Fae stuff) I'd love to see a sourcebook for that world.

CaptainChants said...

Did you say... HARRY POTTER!

Yeah I'd be all over that shiz if they ever did that.

You know I'm not much of a gamer and all, but Who Framed Roger Rabbit would be amazing!