5 Attachment(s)
Fantasy Novels That Would Make Great Video Game Settings
Movies adaptations of books tend to be seen as inferior to their source material, but video games adaptations of fantasy book series like The Witcher or Metro 2033 have a better record staying true to the original work's detail and characterization. The following four stories of science-fiction and fantasy in particular would make for excellent video games, thanks to world-building, magic systems, and storylines which could easily be translated into rewarding gameplay.
Few will be surprised at the declaration that video game developers can be huge nerds. Many of the hit video games released in the past three decades were developed by well-read individuals whose favorite stories greatly inspired their works. The "Halos" of the Halo franchise, for instance, were heavily inspired by Larry Niven's Ringworld and the "Orbitals" seen in the Culture books of Iain M. Banks.
Additionally, many of the most influential video games were directly adapted from books. Dune II: The Building of A Dynasty, loosely adapted from Frank Herbert's Dune saga, single-handedly pioneered the real-time strategy genre, while The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt redefined the action RPG genre while continuing the story started by Polish fantasy writer Andrzej Sapkowski. These specific video game adaptations worked so well because their novels of origin had vividly drawn settings with characters that grew like video game protagonists should, and the following sci-fi/fantasy novels would make excellent video games precisely because their setting have rich details and the potential to empower characters:
The Stormlight Archive, By Brandon Sanderson
In an alien fantasy landscape of constant storms and coral reef-based life, a group of Knights Radiant swear oaths with ancient spirits in order to regain magic long lost and fight back the coming Desolation. Brandon Sanderson's detailed world-building in The Stormlight Archive would make a vibrant environment for players to explore, while the structured, detailed magic systems of his books would be very easy for developers to adapt to gameplay mechanics. This high fantasy series has already inspired portions of the upcoming PS5-based Godfall RPG along with a mod for Mount and Blade II: Bannerlord.
The Dresden Files, By Jim Butcher
Outside of games like Vampire the Masquerade: Bloodlines or the Secret World: Legends MMO, there are precious few titles set in the Urban Fantasy genre, where magic, monsters, and fairy tales co-exist with the skyscrapers and slums of a modern metropolis. The Dresden Files series, with its wise-cracking wizard private eye protagonist, could stand tall as a modern sandbox RPG in the urban fantasy genre, with wizards, vampires, faeries, werewolves, and cops driving around a virtual Chicago, solving crimes and burning down buildings by accident.
The Lensman Series, By E.E. "Doc" Smith
To modern eyes, the Lensman series is the most stereotypical space opera imaginable, with the silver-suited psychic space cops of the Galactic Patrol fighting the forces of evil. There's a reason for this: E.E. "Doc" Smith, while publishing serial chapters of the Lensman series during the Golden Age of Science Fiction, invented nearly every sci-fi concept under the sun, inspiring the melodrama of Star Wars and other modern sci-fi epics. The Lensman franchise would work particularly well as a retro take on 4X strategy games like Stellaris, with plenty of deadly warships, super-weapons and psychic power upgrades for the forces of Civilization to fight the good fight with.
The Green Bone Saga, By Fonda Lee
Think Grand Theft Auto or Sleeping Dogs, but with Jade-themed superpowers. That's the Green Bone Saga in a nutshell, a modern Asian fantasy series by Fonda Lee about the fictional island of Kekon, its supply of supernaturally potent Jade, and the crime syndicates who can wield this Jade to destroy their enemies. A video game based on the Green Bone Saga could juxtapose civilization-building and resource management with frantic car chases and supernatural martial arts battles, with the victors looting Jade beads from their defeated foes to grow in power.
There are many, many other books besides the Metro and Witcher series video game developers can draw inspiration from, and the ones mentioned above are but a few in the fantasy genre alone. Instead of remaking video game titles over and over, perhaps some developers should look into the past and consider remaking one of these fantasy novels instead.
