Five Disney IPs that deserve the Terminator 2D No Fate Treatment…
Have you seen the extremely kick-ass trailer for Terminator 2D: No Fate? If not, do yourself a huge favor and check it out. It literally looks like some forgotten movie tie-in game from the 90s in the best way possible. It’s not a straight-up adaptation of the seminal Terminator 2: Judgement Day film, but it looks to evoke some of the most memorable parts of that movie in an extremely cool way.
Mining older IPs and specific films for not huge AAA games but smaller, cool releases like this seem like a mostly untapped goldmine. Disney of course has many IPs that would fit this mold spectacularly, so here’s five I’d really like to see get similar treatment.
#5. Aliens
So, the Alien franchise is arguably the most relevant it’s been in decades thanks to both a few solid game releases (Alien Isolation, which is getting a long-wished-for remake as well as Aliens: Fireteam Elite, Aliens: Dark Descent and Alien: Rogue Incursion) and Alien: Romulus as well as an upcoming TV series that’s highly anticipated. Things are good in the Alien franchise.
That’s why it might be a pretty ideal time to revisit one of the early successes of the film series with a new videogame adaptation that recalls the excellent arcade game by Konami based on Aliens that never got a home platform release. Just make a modern spiritual successor that follows the film’s events with some modern updates and you’ve got an easy winner in my humble opinion.
#4. Tron
I’ve said this on multiple occasions: not really a fan of Tron as a film/TV franchise. I don’t actually think any of the efforts in that arena are particularly good or memorable but I can acknowledge the first movie is still super influential in many ways. Tron as a game franchise I think has far more successes including in recent history with the really interesting Tron: Identity and the promising-looking Tron: Catalyst out later this year.
But while games in the Tron franchise have certainly captured aspects of the Tron universe quite well, there’s never been a worthy game adaptation that has done the original film that started it all. Such a game could look at what other game tie-ins have done well and adapt that into a late 80s/early 90s game aesthetic that also tells the story. I’m not saying it’s easy, but it’s certainly doable and if done correctly would be a hell of a game.
#3. Die Hard
There are a couple of pretty solid games based on the idea of Die Hard, but to date nothing that really captures the feel of the first great movie. This is kind of mind-blowing as the movie has a very videogame-esque setup and proceeds in a very videogame-esque manner.
So I don’t think it’s much of a stretch to make a late 80s/early 90s style action game where you take on a bunch of terrorists in various levels of an office building and it has fun scenes of some of the most memorable moments of the movie that launched Bruce Willis’ career and is a holiday favorite to this day.
#2. Who Framed Roger Rabbit
Who Framed Roger Rabbit has a couple of games based on it but none are good, in fact, they are downright abysmal. And granted, I don’t think this is the easiest movie to adapt into a videogame format, but I think it could be done. Pair up some investigation mechanics with eluding Weasels and maybe some driving sequences with Benny the cab, throw in some use of some cartoony items and I think it could easily be the 90s tie-in game Who Framed Roger Rabbit, one of the best movies ever made, deserves.
#1. Willow
This article actually started as being just about making a modern yet 8/16-bit style adaptation of Willow but then it was clear there was many more franchises to mine. Nevetheless, this was the originator and therefore easily my number one pick. Willow has a couple of not terrible adaptations but a modern version that follows the story and maybe even lets you play as multiple characters with different abilities would be amazing if done well.
Also frankly Willow was done a little dirty in recent history with the uneven but promising TV show unceremoniously ethered from Disney Plus so I’d like to see it get a well-deserved win with an awesome game adaptation.
That’s it for today, will definitely have another post sometime next week so see ya real soon!
