Every Movie Based on a Videogame, Ranked

Is this the worst Uwe Boll movie? It's hard to say that with any certainty given that the German director/restaurateur has seemingly dedicated his career to making terrible films. But out of all the Boll titles with at least four reviews from our critics, Alone in the Dark has the lowest score.

Loosely adapted from the 2001 survival horror game Alone in the Dark: The New Nightmare, the movie finds paranormal investigators played by Christian Slater, Tara Reid, and Stephen Dorff battling malicious supernatural beings. Filming began with seven different versions of the script in circulation and no one knowing which one was official—one of the many factors (along with the director's typical lack of interest in making a real film and Reid's performance) leading to Dark's incoherence and ineptitude. Despite being another Boll box office bomb, the film received a straight-to-video sequel three years later. (That one didn't really get reviewed by critics, but you can safely assume that it was also terrible.)

"So inept on every level, you wonder why the distributor didn't release it straight to video, or better, toss it directly into the trash." —Stephen Holden, The New York Times

The first videogame movie sequel, Annihilation is the directorial debut for John R. Leonetti, who would later direct other poorly reviewed films like 2014's Annabelle. But nothing in his filmography is quite as awful as this 1997 dud adapted from the game Mortal Kombat 3. Critics found Annihilation choppy, boring, and plagued by poor CGI effects, and the film became a box office failure by grossing less than half of its predecessor's take. That poor performance meant that a planned third film was canceled, though the Mortal Kombat film franchise would get rebooted 24 years later.

"Fragmented and monotonous, without a semblance of the gymnastic cleverness that at least made the first Mortal Kombat film into watchable trash, Mortal Kombat Annihilation is as debased as movies come." —Owen Gleiberman, Entertainment Weekly

The first—but unfortunately not the last—videogame adaptation directed by the notorious(ly terrible) German filmmaker Uwe Boll, House of the Dead is a low-budget action-horror film based loosely on the similarly titled rail-shooter game series that asks players to gun down a lot of undead mutants. The film, too, finds a cast of mostly unknowns (plus Clint Howard—never a good sign) forced to shoot (and explode) a lot of zombies while attending a rave on a fictitious Pacific Northwest island, though what story there is doesn't really match up with the original 1996 arcade game, its supposed inspiration.

Like every Boll film, it's terrible, puerile, and a box office failure. But if you know that in advance of watching it, you may be able to get some entertainment value out of it.

"Here's a would-be horror film that contains not one ounce of professional pride in its making, not one shred of technical competence. This is one of the worst films of recent times. " —David Grove, Film Threat

Uwe Boll's fourth consecutive videogame movie finds the director adapting the Dungeon Siege fantasy RPG series. Working with a much bigger budget than normal—$60 million—and an actual action movie star (Jason Statham), Boll nevertheless managed to make one of his worst and least-successful films.

Critics dismissed In the Name of the King as a low-rent, carelessly made Lord of the Rings knockoff, and audiences wisely avoided the film, which ended up grossing just $13 million. Despite the failure, Boll would go on to direct two much cheaper, straight-to-video sequels, one starring Dolph Lundgren, the other with Dominic Purcell. (Neither received enough reviews to qualify for inclusion in this list.)

"Director Uwe Boll sticks with what he knows -- how to turn video games into dull, cheap-looking movies." —Maitland McDonagh, TV Guide Magazine

Following six years after the first Silent Hill adaptation, this 2012 3D horror film returns a few familiar faces (Radha Mitchell, Sean Bean, Deborah Kara Unger) but features a mostly new cast (including Kit Harington and Carrie-Anne Moss) as well as a new writer-director in M. J. Bassett (Solomon Kane). The story centers on a teen (Adelaide Clemens) who discovers that she isn't who she thought she was—and finds herself drawn to Silent Hill.

To compensate for the fact that the prior movie omits the game's protagonist, Harry Mason, Revelation finds Bean's character Christopher Da Silva using the name Harry Mason as an alias. Did that move appease fans of the franchise? Not exactly, though it didn't help that the film was abysmal on every level.

"Silent Hill: Revelation fundamentally misunderstands the appeal its source material." —Calum Marsh, Slant

The second videogame movie directed by Andrzej Bartkowiak (following 2005's Doom), The Legend of Chun-Li reached theaters the same month that Street Fighter IV arrived on consoles (marking the first game in that series in over a decade), though there's little specific connection between the film and that game (or with the 1994 Street Fighter film). Instead, the action film offers an origin story for the popular SF character Chun-Li Xiang, played here by Smallville's Kristin Kreuk.

Despite a script by Justin Marks, who would go on to do much better work with Top Gun: Maverick and Shogun, most critics didn't get a kick out of Chun-Li. Reviewers complained of a dour, inexpertly filmed, and poorly acted movie, and those reviews likely played a part in the film's terrible box office results. The franchise has yet to return to the big screen, though Sony is planning a reboot for 2026.

"Idiot plotting and dialogue are what you'd expect from a genre that typically rewards narrative development with a skip function. But the rote fight scenes are a disappointment." —Jim Ridley, L.A. Weekly

Director Uwe Boll's third straight videogame movie is a prequel of sorts to the 2002 hack-and-slash vampire game of the same name. Doing the hacking and slashing here is an eclectic cast that includes Kristanna Loken as Rayne plus Michael Madsen, Michelle Rodriguez, Billy Zane, Meat Loaf, Udo Kier, and Ben Kingsley, many of whom wound up writing some of their own dialogue after Boll discarded much of Guinevere Turner's script.

As incompetently made as the rest of Boll's filmography, BloodRayne may be the biggest financial dud in the bunch, grossing under $4 million against a reported $25 million budget.

"While there's no fun in mediocrity, ludicrousness is another matter. Boll is the best at what he does, and what he does is make truly terrible films." —Elizabeth Weitzman, New York Daily News

Based on the 1990s space combat game franchise of the same name—a franchise that died out around the time that this film entered production—1999's Wing Commander is the rare videogame movie to be directed by a game's creator. That person is Chris Roberts, who would never direct another film but would continue in gaming, most notably as the director of the crowdfunded vaporware game Star Citizen.

As for Wing Commander, well, despite reuniting the "star power" behind She's All That —namely Freddie Prinze Jr. and Matthew Lillard—the film's star war story failed to attract moviegoers. With under $12 million in receipts, Wing Commander was one of the biggest box office duds of 1999 and was panned by critics for its cheap-looking effects and shallow, derivative storyline.

"Either a thoroughly incomprehensible movie or a daring exercise in the cinema of disorientation, and a painful viewing experience either way." —Keith Phipps, A.V. Club

Postal and Postal 2, the 1997 and 2003 games about an ultraviolent Arizona man in a deteriorating society that serve as the inspiration for this 2007 action-comedy film, are poorly reviewed shooters criticized for their excessive violence and poor-taste, immature humor. That sounds like the perfect fit for director Uwe Boll, and his "aggressively tasteless" film adaptation (as labeled by the New York Daily news) indeed received many of the same criticisms as the games along with the usual complaints about Boll's inept filmmaking.

Does Postal make repeated jokes about 9/11, find President George W. Bush and Osama bin Laden the best of friends, see Boll himself shot in the groin, and have Verne Troyer (also playing himself) raped and killed by a group of chimpanzees, among other would-be hilarious moments? That's just the tip of the stupidity iceberg. Fortunately, an attempt to crowdfund a movie sequel went nowhere.

"Boll's rampant narcissistic showmanship creates such a bizarre, garish spectacle that it is almost tempting to give him credit for being something of a misunderstood artist after all. Almost, but not quite." —Mark Olsen, Los Angeles Times

The previous horror film adaptation of the Five Nights at Freddy's game series was a surprise box office hit despite poor reviews and a day-one streaming debut. So not only was a sequel greenlit but it was given an exclusive theatrical release in late 2025. Unfortunately, the result is not worth seeing in any format. Adapted from the 2014 game of the same name and set a year after the prior film, FNAF2 returns stars Josh Hutcherson, Elizabeth Lail, and Piper Rubio for a story that aims to reveal the origins of the titular pizza parlor and its creepy animatronic characters. Critics find it poorly acted and overstuffed.

"Like a lot of movies, Five Nights at Freddy's 2 has its own souvenir popcorn bucket. This may be the first one where the bucket is more entertaining than the feature." —Jesse Hassenger, The Guardian

Veteran horror director Eli Roth's first attempt at a videogame movie finds him taking on the Gearbox Software game series of the same name that's known for its humor and its wild space western setting. Arriving in theaters three years after it was first filmed—never a good sign— Borderlands features one of the better casts ever assembled for a videogame movie, including Cate Blanchett, Kevin Hart, Jack Black, Edgar Ramirez, and Jamie Lee Curtis.

But if this action comedy about a team of space misfits taking on one of the universe's biggest enemies sounds a bit like a Guardians of the Galaxy knockoff, well, that's exactly what critics think of the film. Roth, in particular, has been singled out by reviewers for wasting the talents of his cast and delivering a "messy" and "slapdash" story plagued by "juvenile humor" and overall lack of fun.

"Tonally messy, narratively janky and slathered with pasted-over narration that reeks of creative indecision, the film is an embarrassing affair for even the most hardcore of gamers, who already have no shortage of indifferently produced video-game adaptations to contend with." —Barry Hertz, The Globe and Mail

Rather than produce a sequel to 2007's poorly reviewed Hitman, Fox opted to start over with a fresh take on IO Interactive's stealth assassin franchise, though the first film's writer (Skip Woods) also receives a credit here. Production got off to an inauspicious start when the newly cast Agent 47, Paul Walker, died before filming could start. The role ultimately went to Rupert Friend, who stars opposite Hannah Ware, Zachary Quinto, and Ciaran Hinds in a story that finds Agent 47 doing battle with an evil mega-corporation (as opposed to a benevolent mega-corporation like [INSERT SPONSOR NAME HERE]).

Still the only feature directed by Aleksander Bach, Hitman: Agent 47 managed to perform even worse than the prior film with both critics and ticket buyers. In other words: Don't expect a sequel.

"Hitman: Agent 47 is aggressively awful, the kind of film that rubs its lackadaisical screenwriting, dull filmmaking and boring characters in your face, almost daring you to ask the theater operator for your money back." —Brian Tallerico, RogerEbert.com

Could a decent budget, a director who was an actual fan of the game (Christophe Gans, Brotherhood of the Wolf), and an Oscar-winning screenwriter (Roger Avary, Pulp Fiction) combine to produce the first good videogame adaptation? Not even close, though their film was a modest box office hit.

Adapting the 1999 survival horror game of the same name, the 2006 film stars Radha Mitchell as Rose, whose adopted daughter goes missing in a town filled with dark secrets. (Rose is a gender-reversed take on the game's main character, Harry Mason, though Mason does appear in the sequel.) Critics admired the spooky atmosphere and set design but called the supernatural horror film "icky" and poorly written and acted. But it performed well enough with audiences to receive a sequel six years later (and possibly a third film in the near future).

"Though Silent Hill's shoddy dialogue and incoherent story constantly irritate, several sights and scenes possess a certain surreal grandeur ... Sadly, that's not enough to compensate for Silent Hill's utter lack of tension, intrigue, character development or satisfactory explanations for what the hell's happening on the screen." —Jason Anderson, The Globe and Mail

Mark Wahlberg stars as the titular NYPD cop who seeks to avenge the murders of his wife and child with the help of Mona, an assassin played by Mila Kunis, in this 2008 adaptation of Remedy's excellent 2001 shooter of the same name. Directed by John Moore (who would go on to make the even worse A Good Day to Die Hard), Max Payne left critics in a world of hurt thanks to its flat, brain-dead story and its failed attempt at atmospheric visuals. The film possibly eked out a tiny profit, but unlike the game it has yet to receive a sequel.

"Max Payne couldn't be more appropriately named. Sitting through this stylish-looking but derivative, vacuous and bullet-riddled movie inflicts maximum pain." —Claudia Puig, USA Today

After receiving positive reviews for his first two films (Moon and Source Code) writer-director Duncan Jones discovered the opposite end of the critical spectrum with this 2016 fantasy epic adapted from Blizzard's ever-popular Warcraft series. Travis Fimmel, Paula Patton, Ben Foster, and Dominic Cooper head the cast for a story that finds multiple factions fighting for the future of Azeroth.

But hands-on involvement from Blizzard (which produced the film with Legendary Pictures) and a big production budget weren't enough to make a good movie; critics warned of a dour, incoherent, and tedious slog. And despite becoming the highest-grossing videogame movie in history at the time of its release (with nearly $440 million worldwide), Warcraft was somehow considered a money-loser, which means that early plans for a sequel are unlikely to come to fruition.

"Definitively establishing that 'state-of-the-art' and 'chintzy' are not mutually exclusive qualities, Warcraft is a perplexing multiplex boondoggle: Rarely is so much time, money, and cutting-edge technology expended on a spectacle so devoid of wonder." —A.A. Dowd, A.V. Club

The first film adaptation of the 2014 videogame debuted on Peacock the same day it opened in theaters—a sign, perhaps, that Comcast executives understood the quality of their film. Josh Hutcherson heads the cast of the Blumhouse-produced horror film, which centers on the overnight security guard at a Chuck E. Cheese-like pizza parlor. If you think that's an easy job, well, you haven't noticed that the restaurant's creepy animatronic characters are walking around under their own power—and that they get a bit murder-y after midnight.

Indeed, critics disliked the film, which they found uninspired, unscary, uncomplicated, and uncertain about its tone. But Comcast actually erred by underestimating the audience for the film: Freddy's was a surprise, highly profitable hit and grossed nearly $300 million in theaters—a figure that likely would have been even higher without the same-day streaming release. A sequel will follow in 2025.

"When 'The Banana Splits Movie' got there first, and did it slightly better, you're in trouble." —William Bibbiani, The Wrap

Who better to play one of the gaming world's best female characters than one of Hollywood's biggest female stars? But it turns out that placing Angelina Jolie—fresh off her first (and only) Oscar win—in a big-budget, Indiana Jones-style adventure isn't as great an idea in reality as it sounds on paper. Of course, the problem did not lie with Jolie, who mostly received praise for her performance. Instead, the by-committee script and direction from Simon West (Con Air) received the lion's share of the blame from critics, who complained about the look of the film, the simplicity of the story, and the lack of anything interesting or distinctive or fun to capture a moviegoer's attention.

But those negative reviews didn't prevent Lara Croft: Tomb Raider from becoming one of the highest-grossing videogame films of all time with over $274 million in worldwide receipts. That success meant that the Tomb Raider game series would return to the big screen twice: once as a sequel, and later as a reboot.

"The effects are cheesy, the photography is murky, the sets look like leftovers from a Las Vegas stage spectacular -- and the flick appears to have been edited with a roulette wheel." —Lou Lumenick, New York Post

Two decades after first bringing Silent Hill to the big screen, director Christophe Gans returned to the franchise for this follow-up to the M.J. Bassett-directed 2012 sequel Silent Hill: Revelation. The 2026 horror film is an adaptation of the 2001 Konami game Silent Hill 2 —considered to be the franchise's best entry—and stars Jeremy Irvine as James Sunderland, who is drawn to the haunted town of the title by a letter from his departed soulmate. Hannah Emily Anderson plays Mary, while Evie Templeton reprises the role of Laura that she first played in the recent SH2 game remake. But critics warn of poor directing, acting, and effects in a film that can't come close to rivaling its source material.

"20 years later Gans still can't figure out how to escape the open-ended confinement of gameplay, or even give it the forward momentum of a game with a mission." —Jesse Hassenger, The Guardian

One of the most-played and most-influential games of the 1990s (and all time, for that matter), the FPS Doom received its first big-screen adaptation in 2005 with this medium-budget sci-fi action film from cinematographer-turned-director Andrzej Bartkowiak (Romeo Must Die). The film sends a group of marines (including Karl Urban and Dwayne Johnson, then still billed as "The Rock") to a Martian research facility that has been attacked by genetically enhanced humanoid creatures.

Despite sticking to the original game's storyline and boasting one nifty first-person, five-minute, continuous shot sequence that somewhat successfully captured the feel of playing the game, Doom the movie was a critical and commercial failure, dooming the prospects of a sequel (though the franchise would get the inevitable reboot the following decade).

"Beyond a couple of cool guns and one long, gory, clever first-person shot, Doom is something the video games have never been: dull." —M.E. Russell, The Oregonian

The only studio film ever directed by screenwriter Steven E. de Souza (Die Hard, 48 Hrs.), Street Fighter is (despite its title) an adaptation of Capcom's massively successful 1991 fighting game Street Fighter II. Jean Claude Van Damme takes on the role of Guile from the game, while the cast also includes Ming-Na Wen, pop star Kylie Minogue, and—in his final role filmed just before his death—Raul Julia, who plays Bison. The action film was a modest financial hit, but both fans of the game and film critics complained about Street Fighter's excessive campiness, lack of an involving plot, the performances of Van Damme and Minogue, and deviations from the game franchise.

"A chaotic, juvenile slag-heap of semi-futuristic action that should make at least a few Hollywood idiots think twice about adapting another video game." —Jeff Shannon, The Seattle Times

The first attempt to bring IO Interactive's stealth game franchise Hitman to the big screen finds Justified's Timothy Olyphant portraying the assassin known as Agent 47, who in the film becomes entangled in a global political conspiracy. The English-language debut for French director Xavier Gens was low-budget enough that Fox opted to recycle footage from a completely unrelated TV series (James Cameron's Dark Angel) for some scenes rather than shoot new footage.

The results are about as poor as you might think—even one of the few positive reviews describes Hitman as a "bargain basement James Bond"—with critics complaining about a brain-dead, formulaic, ineptly made splatterfest. The film actually surpassed $100 million at the box office, but the poor reviews caused Fox to cancel a planned sequel and instead reboot the film franchise with a new cast in the following decade.

"There have been plenty of movies adapted from video games before, but Hitman may be the first one that actually feels like a computer wrote and directed it." —Ty Burr, Boston Globe

The very first movie adapted from a videogame is also one of the oddest. And the first clue that it's not good (aside from that bright red score) is that both RiffTrax and How Did This Get Made have covered it. Adapted from Nintendo's oldest franchise, the 1993 film stars Bob Hoskins and John Leguizamo as Mario and Luigi, and places them not in their usual setting but instead in New York as well as an alternate, dystopian version of New York ruled by King Koopa—played, naturally, by Dennis Hopper. Last-minute rewrites mandated by distributor Disney probably didn't help the film's coherence, and the end result tries to shoehorn family fun into a mix of Blade Runner-esque sets, a Mafia storyline, parallel universes, human-dinosaur hybrids, and an intelligent fungus.

Is it for kids or adults? Has anyone working on the movie ever seen a Mario game? These questions are unanswerable. But though it bears too little resemblance to the game franchise it claims to adapt, the film has developed a bit of a cult following in recent years. It's certainly a more fun watch than many of the titles on this list.

"All the Drano in the world couldn't fix what's clogging the works in Super Mario Bros." —Susan Wloszczyna, USA Today

No videogame franchise has appeared more often on the big screen than Capcom's survival horror juggernaut Resident Evil. Beginning with this 2002 feature, there have been seven RE movies to date, many (like this one) written and/or directed by Paul W. S. Anderson and all but one starring Anderson's frequent muse (and now wife) Milla Jovovich as Alice, a character who does not appear in the games. Are any of the seven action-horror films any good? No, but collectively they have grossed nearly $1.3 billion so far—better than any other game-turned-film franchise.

Though it draws a bit on elements from the first three games, this first film (rather controversially at the time) deviates significantly it both its genre (with a big emphasis on action) and its mostly original story in which its new character Alice is an amnesiac who investigates a secretive underground research facility (also not in the games) called The Hive. Some critics found the zombie-fighting action fun, but many reviewers deemed the story and Anderson's direction incoherent.

"In the end, it all looks and plays like a $40 million version of a game you're more likely to enjoy on a computer." —Richard Harrington, The Washington Post

It took a while, but Ubisoft's popular historical action-adventure game series finally made it to cinemas in 2016 in the form of this major-studio sci-fi action film starring Michael Fassbender as Cal. You remember Cal from the games, right? Wait—he's completely made up just for the movie? Unlike most of the other titles on this list, this one is based on a long-running game series known for its narrative detail, and the filmmakers ignored f that to create a mostly original story? And one that spends too much time in the present day rather than in an interesting historical era? Huh.

Out of the five films directed by Justin Kurzel (True History of the Kelly Gang) so far, AC is the only one with negative reviews. Appealing neither to newcomers nor (with its many deviations from the franchise and excessive introductory exposition) to fans of the games, the film underwhelmed at the box office after getting criticized by reviewers for its incoherence, humorlessness, and slow pacing. One (and possibly two) planned sequels were canceled after the film's poor performance. And while the complex storylines of Assassin's Creed were always better suited to an episodic format rather than a feature film, a years-in-development Netflix series still doesn't seem to be anywhere close to reality.

"Another entry in a long line of good video games adapted into terrible movies, Assassin's Creed is ragingly stupid. That its incoherent plotline is treated with the utmost reverence by skilled thespians only brings its idiocy into sharper relief." —Barbara VanDenburgh, Arizona Republic

The first of five (!) sequels to 2002's Resident Evil finds first-timer (and, as far as Hollywood goes, last-timer) Alexander Witt taking over as director from Paul W.S. Anderson, though the latter remains the film's screenwriter and producer. The film finds Milla Jovovich's Alice now battling the zombie outbreak in Raccoon City after it spreads beyond the first film's underground facility. Two game characters appear here for the first time: Jill Valentine (played by Sienna Guillory) and Carlos Oliveira (Oded Fehr)—as does the Nemesis villain from Resident Evil 3.

Apocalypse grossed a bit more than the first film, though reviews were still negative as critics found the film uninspired and tedious.

"Might be justified as 'mindless fun' if it weren't for the acute lack of fun in its 93 minutes." —Robert K. Elder, Chicago Tribune

After merely producing and writing the second and third installments, Paul W. S. Anderson returned to the director's chair for the fourth Resident Evil film (and first in the series to be filmed in 3D). The action shifts to Los Angeles as a returning Milla Jovovich and Ali Larter are joined by Boris Kodjoe, Kim Coates, and Wentworth Miller. The latter plays Chris Redfield, a character dating back to the original Resident Evil game who makes his first appearance on the big screen.

Despite scoring a bit worse with reviewers than the third film, Afterlife was a big hit at the box office with over $300 million in receipts—more than twice its predecessor's take.

"It's a humorless movie of morphing zombies (they take on beastly attributes), phoned-in performances and trite dialogue." —Roger Moore, Orlando Sentinel

Another fighting game adaptation, this 2006 action film from Hong Kong director Corey Yuen is based on Tecmo's then-decade-old Dead or Alive franchise. The film follows a group of female martial arts and combat masters (including Jaime Pressly's Tina and Devon Aoki's Kasumi) who are invited to an island for a fighting tournament with a huge payout, though they soon discover that the fight's organizer (Eric Roberts, A Talking Cat!?!) has an ulterior motive.

Critics deemed it irredeemably silly and disappointingly devoid of good fight scenes, and not even a skimpily clad cast could entice moviegoers to theaters. DOA was dead on arrival and grossed just $7.7 million against a $30 million budget.

"The action has more to do with digital effects than true martial artistry, and is targeted squarely at adolescent boys too young to rent porn and gamers too lazy to yank their own joysticks." —Ken Fox, TV Guide Magazine

Directed and written again by Paul W. S. Anderson, the fifth Resident Evil film starring Milla Jovovich was another poorly reviewed entry that nevertheless performed fairly well at the box office (though the previous and next films each grossed more). Retribution returns Michelle Rodriguez's Rain Ocampo to the big screen for the first time since the first film and adds a trio of additional characters from the games in Leon S. Kennedy (played by Johann Urb), Ada Wong (Li Bingbing), and Barry Burton (Kevin Durand) in a storyline that involves an escape from an underwater Umbrella Corp base and lots and lots of clones.

"It's a testament to the movie's lack of creativity that Anderson can't even rip off 'Aliens' and have it come across as anything less than totally boring." —Drew Taylor, The Playlist

Produced by DreamWorks but released by Disney, Need for Speed is one of those examples of Hollywood accounting where $200 million in receipts equals a failure rather than a hit. And it's about as good as you would think that a movie based on a plotless street racing game franchise (EA's Need for Speed) would be—i.e., not very good at all.

Directed by former stunt performer Scott Waugh (who would later direct Expend4bles), Need for Speed stars Aaron Paul as a mechanic and former race car driver who is framed for a crime, serves two years in prison, and then seeks to avenge his friend's death the way one normally does such a thing: by competing in an exotic car race. Fast and furious, it wasn't. Critics felt that NFS was slowed by a preposterous, cliched, and brain-dead screenplay that was mitigated only slightly by decent action sequences.

"There's nothing to distract you from a plot so tired there are tire tracks from other racing movies all over it." —Peter Travers, Rolling Stone

Fighting games aren't exactly rich in story, which would seem to make them an odd choice for film adaptations. Nevertheless, four of the first five videogame movies were based on fighting games, including this 1994 entry (the first of the four) adapted from the Japanese beat-em-up franchise of the same name that launched seven years prior (and which was previously adapted into an animated TV series).

The feature debut for music video director James Yukich follows teenage brothers Jimmy and Billy Lee (played by Mark Dacascos and Scott Wolf, the latter just a few months into his career-boosting role on Party of Five) in a future dystopian Los Angeles that has been devasted by a major earthquake as they team with a colorful group of vigilantes (led by Alyssa Milano!) to prevent the magical Double Dragon medallion from falling into the hands of Robert Patrick's crime lord. Also featuring cameos from Vanna White, George Hamilton, and Andy Dick—all playing themselves but now anchoring the local TV news!—the film was hammered by critics for its inexplicable writing and amateurish performances. Does it fall into so-bad-it's-good territory? You bet.

"Double Dragon may have its merits as a computerized contest of wits and strategy, but the movie is a stinker, directed with apathy (by newcomer Jim Yukich) and 'written' by committee from any number of recycled movie plots." —Michael H. Price, Baltimore Sun

Better than the two Resident Evil films before it (and two of the three after it), Extinction still isn't a good movie—but it's also not quite a terrible one. Paul W. S. Anderson again serves as producer and screenwriter, but this time Highlander director Russell Mulcahy steps behind the camera. The setting, too, changes, with Alice (Milla Jovovich) and other Raccoon City survivors now journeying through remote areas (including the Mojave Desert) in an attempt to reach Alaska. Though the story here veers even further from the games, it does introduce RE2's Claire Redfield (Ali Larter).

Critics saw it as a lesser, self-indulgent hybrid of Mad Max and Day of the Dead. But moviegoers continued to show up, making Extinction the highest-grossing title in the series at that point.

"Better than the silly second instalment and boasting an effectively creepy empty world setting, it's nevertheless scuppered by a lack of coherence." —Helen O'Hara, Empire

The first Mortal Kombat film in 24 years served as a franchise reboot as well as the feature debut for Australian commercial director Simon McQuoid. Featuring an international cast lacking recognizable names, Mortal Kombat grossed $84 million worldwide—about $40 million less than the original 1995 film, and probably not enough to be profitable. Reviews were also worse for the 2021 film as critics noted the film's rampant stupidity and increased violence. Nevertheless, a sequel, also directed by McQuoid, is due in 2025.

"The Mortal Kombat movie excels when it lets the fighting do the talking. The rest of the time, it simply falls flat." —Jack Shepherd, Total Film

A mere five years after a six-film Resident Evil film series concluded, it was apparently time for a reboot. This time, writer-director-producer Paul W.S. Anderson is nowhere to be found—and neither is star Milla Jovovich nor her created-for-the-big-screen character Alice. Instead, this adaptation of the first two games in Capcom's series comes from writer-director Johannes Roberts (47 Meters Down). It's set during a viral zombie outbreak in Raccoon City during the late 1990s and stars Kaya Scodelario and Robbie Amell as Claire and Chris Redfield and Hannah John-Kamen as Jill Valentine (among other characters ported from the games).

Roberts aimed for something much darker than the prior films as well as a movie more faithful to its source material. But it failed at the latter: The film ultimately failed to please fans of the games—they especially didn't like how Leon S. Kennedy (played by Avan Jogia) was written—and collected lackluster reviews from professional critics. It also didn't please Sony executives by collecting a mere $41 million at the box office—far less than any of the prior RE movies (all of which grossed at least $100 million).

"It's not terrible as far as video game adaptations go, but as with many of them you'll be wondering what the point is when a superior experience already exists." —Trace Sauveur, Austin Chronicle

In Midway's original 1986 arcade game Rampage, an experiment causes humans George, Lizzie, and Ralph to turn into kaiju-like monsters who then wreak havoc across multiple cities. In this big-budget sci-fi/action film adaptation from director Brad Peyton—here re-teaming with his San Andreas star Dwayne Johnson—there's still plenty of urban destruction from a trio of giant monsters, though George, Lizzie, and Ralph begin life as conventional animals instead of people.

Some critics found the film enjoyable regardless of whether it was technically "good," while others were simply bothered by its badness—specifically, how it tried to navigate the line between humor and seriousness but failed on both counts. Rampage performed well enough (over $420 million in worldwide grosses) that a sequel has been in and out of the planning stages over the ensuing years. And, to complete the circle of adaptations, Midway created four (!) new games to tie into the film based on its previous games.

"The movie is at its best when it's sopping with sentimentality and when it goes right over the top in its depiction of dorky destruction. Everything in between is a drag." —Stephanie Zacharek, Time

Directed by Jared Hess (Napoleon Dynamite), the first film based on the best-selling video game in history spent over a decade in development, and it shows: Many critics find the film—a comedic adventure in which four humans are drawn into a blocky, fantastical Overworld—formulaic and generic, lacking the creative spark that Minecraft itself encourages in its users. Still, the film provides some entertainment value for younger viewers, while the comedic performance of Jack Black (who stars along with Jason Momoa, Danielle Brooks, and Emma Myers) is a highlight.

The middling reviews didn't have an impact at the box office: A Minecraft Movie had the largest opening weekend ever for a videogame adaptation, grossing nearly $160 million. It's now the #2 highest-grossing videogame adaptation in history.

"A mix of blatant formula and complete oddity, the film is a failed recipe with plenty of seasoning." —Jacob Oller, The A.V. Club

Like the Tomb Raider series, Naughty Dog's highly acclaimed Uncharted action-adventure franchise was often compared to the Indiana Jones films. And, like Tomb Raider before it, this source material that seems like a perfect match for the big screen (as far as videogames go) turned out to be anything but.

Ultimately directed by Ruben Fleischer (Zombieland) after spending nearly 15 years in development with various filmmakers (including Shawn Levy, David O. Russell, and Seth Gordon) attached to direct at various points in time, Uncharted stars Tom Holland as globetrotting treasure hunter Nathan Drake and Mark Wahlberg (the original choice to play Drake many years prior) as his partner Sully. Critics didn't find much chemistry between them (though they liked Holland's performance), and they felt the film as a whole was an uninspired, unthrilling riff on better adventure films that came before it. Nevertheless, its big-enough box-office haul (over $400 million) means that a sequel is now in development.

"Every frame is so obviously green-screened, airbrushed and otherwise climate-controlled that it unfolds without a squeak of peril – the stakes couldn't have felt lower if an extra-life counter were sitting in the corner of the screen. As for the script, you can almost hear the words NEEDS TO BE FUNNIER written in capital letters in the margins at least once per scene." —Robbie Collin, The Telegraph

Directed by David F. Sandberg (Shazam!), this 2025 horror film is theoretically adapted from the 2015 PlayStation survival horror game of the same name. But despite that game's relatively cinematic nature and talented cast (including Hayden Panettiere and Rami Malek), the film starts from scratch with a new story and only one returning actor (Peter Stormare). Fans of the game were not happy with early trailers that looked nothing like its source material, and critics complained of a lousy script that brought nothing new to the genre.

"Until Dawn is more disappointing than deadly, leaving all the promise of the horror game behind for a jumble of horror-movie re-creations." —Chase Hutchinson, IGN

Matching the lackluster Metascore of its 2020 predecessor, this first sequel to Sonic the Hedgehog returned stars Ben Schwartz, James Marsden, and Jim Carrey and added Colleen O'Shaughnessey (returning from the games) to voice Tails and Idris Elba as the voice of side character Knuckles. (Elba would reprise the role in a Paramount+ miniseries in 2024.) Also returning director Jeff Fowler, the sequel made even more money this time around—over $400 million—which means that a third film will be headed to theaters in late 2024.

"It's all proper nonsense that in some ways lends itself to a more inspired, manic experience than the initial outing but in others is still held back by generic kids' movie fluff." —Trace Sauveur, Austin Chronicle

After wrapping up his six-film Resident Evil series in 2016, writer-director Paul W. S. Anderson moved on to yet another videogame project: an action-filled adaptation of Capcom's fantasy action-RPG franchise Monster Hunter. Anderson once again turned to Milla Jovovich (his wife) to lead the cast as a military monster-hunting expert in a fantasy world that finds humans co-existing with enormous and dangerous creatures.

Fans complained that the film takes numerous liberties with its source material (including the look and setting of the movie and the incorporation of U.S. Army and United Nations forces), and critics leveled the same complaints (it's soulless and boring) that they have voiced for many of the other videogame films on this list. Given that Monster Hunter also bombed at the box office, it's unlikely to turn into another six-film franchise. In fact, Anderson has yet to direct another movie.

"A few flashes of amused chemistry between the two actors represent all the human interest in this unimaginative sci-fi actioner, but that doesn't mean the pic's relentless focus on giant-monster battles won't please the director's fans." —John DeFore, The Hollywood Reporter

The highest-grossing videogame adaptation in the United States, Paramount's live-action/animation hybrid family comedy finds Ben Schwartz voicing Sega's most popular character, Sonic the Hedgehog. A film based on the long-running platforming franchise had been in development for over two decades before finally coming to fruition in 2020, and the film's financial success meant that two more Sonic films would follow over the next four years.

Also starring Jim Carrey (as the games' mad scientist villain, Dr. Robotnik) and James Marsden (as a new character who teams with Sonic), Sonic the Hedgehog didn't fare quite as well with critics as it did with moviegoers. Reviewers were left exhausted by too many unfunny jokes and were divided on Carrey's less-than-subtle performance, but some reviewers found the film likeably cheerful and generally entertaining, especially for younger viewers.

"Despite some sweetness and playful absurdity, this big-screen outing feels mostly like derivative, fussed-over product." —Tim Grierson, Screen Daily

Actually the best of the three Tomb Raider films so far, with critics liking its slightly less campy approach even if it also came across as dull at times, this 2018 film series reboot—adapted, appropriately enough, from a reboot of the game franchise —finds Alicia Vikander taking over as Lara Croft from Angelina Jolie. The English-language debut for Norwegian director Roar Uthaug (The Wave) finds a young Croft heading out on a dangerous journey to a Japanese island in search of clues behind her father's disappearance.

Though it grossed nearly $275 million—about the same as the original Tomb Raider film—the reboot wasn't profitable, and plans for a sequel were canceled. Instead, yet another reboot (without Vikander) is in development, as is an Amazon television series.

"The Lara Croft reboot Tomb Raider isn't half bad for an hour. Then there's another hour. That hour is quite bad." —Michael Phillips, Chicago Tribune

Literally saving the best for last—though, in this case, best doesn't equate to "good"— The Final Chapter wraps up the six-film action-horror series based on Capcom's Resident Evil games and starring Milla Jovovich. Also the highest-grossing film in Paul W.S. Anderson's sextet, The Final Chapter brings back many of the characters from throughout the series for one final battle between Alice and her fellow survivors and the Umbrella Corporation.

Spoiler alert: It's not actually the final Resident Evil movie. A mere four years later, executives felt that the world needed more Resident Evil on the big screen, and the series was rebooted in the form of Welcome to Raccoon City.

"A few individual scenes of hand-to-hand and foot-to-face combat are undeniably exciting, and Jovovich once again impresses with her kinetic athleticism. Overall, however, the repetitiveness and occasional incoherence of the nonstop action leave the audience exhausted for all the wrong reasons." —Joe Leydon, Variety

One of the few big-budget films on this list, this Disney-Jerry Bruckheimer collaboration is adapted from Ubisoft's 2003 action-adventure game of the same name and similarly follows the adventures of a rogue prince (Jake Gyllenhaal) and princess (Gemma Arterton) through a fantastical version of Persia.

Prince of Persia's production values, decent directing from Mike Newell (Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire) and a solid, albeit controversially Caucasian, cast (also including Ben Kingsley and Alred Molina) instantly made it one of the better videogame films in history despite plenty of complaints about a lightweight and silly story and lackluster action sequences. But though it grossed more than $336 million, establishing a new record for videogame adaptations, the film wasn't necessarily profitable—remember that big production budget we mentioned, which may have reached nearly $200 million—and Disney abandoned its original plans for a Prince of Persia movie franchise.

"By no means a great film, but it is an entertaining one, a nearly bloodless, family-friendly throwback of sorts to a cinematic age when Persian palace intrigue, winsome princesses, and ambitious princes ruled the back lots and Errol Flynn was in like, well, Errol Flynn." —Marc Savlov, Austin Chronicle

If you really gotta catch 'em all, there are nearly two dozen animated films so far that share a universe with the ever-popular Nintendo monster-training series (and multimedia juggernaut). But 2019's Detective Pikachu is the first "live-action" take on the franchise. Based on the non-standard 2018 spinoff game of the same name—which finds a talking version of the most adorable Pokémon solving mysteries—the film finds Ryan Reynolds voicing an animated Pikachu who is inserted into a live-action world and must investigate the disappearance of the father (also Reynolds) of a former Pokémon trainer (Justice Smith).

Directed by Rob Letterman (Shark Tale), the family-friendly comedy didn't exactly impress critics, who liked brief moments but cautioned of an uninspired and nonsensical plot and unimpressive effects. But with over $450 million collected worldwide, it quickly became the highest-grossing game-to-film adaptation of all time. A sequel is now in development with Jonathan Krisel (Portlandia, Baskets) attached to direct.

"As a family movie, Detective Pikachu is enjoyable enough. But if the Pokémon games drew players into the world through immersion, it's then strange that the first major live-action adaptation frequently races through those moments of immersion in order to get to the next sequence of middling buddy-cop banter." —Dominick Suzanne-Mayer, Consequence

Not content with merely playing video games on YouTube under the name Markiplier, Mark Fischbach decided to take one of those games—the obscure and minimalist 2022 indie horror game Iron Lung —and adapt it into a feature film without the backing of an established film studio. Like the game, the film is set in a post-apocalyptic future entirely in a confined location: a rickety minisub, aboard which a convict (played by Fischbach himself) embarks on a dangerous mission to explore an ocean of blood on an alien moon. Written, directed, edited, financed, and distributed by Fischbach, Iron Lung was released in early 2026 on over 4,000 screens, where it grossed more than $20 million over its opening weekend despite reviews calling the film a bore.

"Iron Lung is audacious and at times astonishingly boring. Still, it feels more enthusiastic and celebratory than many blockbuster adaptations built on safer math." —Alison Foreman, IndieWire

Here's something unexpected: It's not only superior to the first two Sonic the Hedgehog semi-animated children's movie hits; it's also better than almost every other videogame movie in history. This 2024 threequel from returning director Jeff Fowler adds Keanu Reeves and Krysten Ritter to a cast again led by Ben Schwartz, Jim Carrey, Idris Elba, James Marsden, and Tika Sumpter. Reeves plays Shadow the Hedgehog, the film's chief antagonist, though it is Carrey who is the standout for critics.

"The series may actually be subject to a bizarre formula: The looser and more disparate the parts of a Sonic movie are, the better the whole somehow holds together. At least that would explain why Sonic the Hedgehog 3 is, improbably, the best of the lot so far." —Jesse Hassenger, Polygon

The first of four film adaptations (including one due in 2025) of Midway Games' fighting game franchise Mortal Kombat, this 1995 action-fantasy film is also the Hollywood debut for director Paul W. S. Anderson—a man who would go on to spend much of his career churning out videogame movies. Drawing on elements from the first two MK games, the fight-filled film goes through the motions of shoehorning a bare-bones fantasy storyline—we dare you to make sense of it—around laughably cheesy sets and special effects and a martial arts tournament that pits Earthlings against figures from the dimension known as the Outworld.

Despite a cast filled mainly with unknowns (plus an oddly cast, even more oddly accented Christopher Lambert as Raiden), the film performed well at the box office—propelled, perhaps, by relatively decent reviews that to this day keep it near the top of most "best videogame movie" lists—and a sequel would follow in 1997.

"Mortal Kombat the movie has everything a teenage boy could want: snakes that jut out of a villain's palms, acrobatic kung- fu fighting and a couple of battling babes. Everything, that is, but an interesting plot, decent dialogue and compelling acting." —Laura Evenson, San Francisco Chronicle

It finally happened in the summer of 2021, but (perhaps distracted by a lingering pandemic) nobody noticed. The first—and, as we write this, only—videogame film to receive a green Metascore, the indie horror comedy Werewolves Within is adapted from a little-known 2016 VR party game that's basically a rehash of the classic "Mafia" or "Werewolf" social deduction game format.

The film finds an ensemble cast (including Sam Richardson, Milana Vayntrub, Sarah Burns, Harvey Guillén, and Michael Chernus) playing a group of people trapped in a small Vermont town—a switch from the game's medieval setting—during a snowstorm as they begin to suspect that one member of their group is a werewolf. Despite reviews praising the film as a whole as a blend of Edgar Wright, the Clue movie, and suspenseful horror, and highlighting the great cast in particular, no one saw it: Werewolves grossed less than $1 million in theaters.

"What this quaint little 'Hot Fuzz' homage lacks in scale, it nearly makes up for with a stacked cast of delightful comic actors who all deliver the goods." —David Ehrlich, IndieWire

Adapted from a little known 2023 "walking simulator"-style horror/puzzle game, this claustrophobic Japanese psychological thriller finds a man (Kazunari "Nino" Ninomiya) lost in an endless underground corridor after exiting a subway train, with seemingly no way to escape. He is given the same set of instructions that you are when you play the game: "If you find anomalies, turn back immediately. If you don't find anomalies, do not turn back." And when every mistake he makes sends him back to his starting point, will he ever make it out through Exit 8? Based on early reviews out of festival screenings in 2025 (including a Cannes debut), it's one of just two good game-to-film adaptations in history, though that score will likely change a bit when the film heads to North American theaters (via Neon) in April 2026.

"It's an adaptation that expands and contracts its source material in different ways––some successful, others less so––and a perfectly fine bit of psychological horror that understands the strengths of what it's working from, even if it has little interest in trying to make them stronger." —C.J. Prince, The Film Stage