There was once a time when you couldn’t go to your local game store without seeing a plethora of ads for the slew of upcoming movie tie-in games, which coincided with the release of the major blockbuster of the week. From box office champions like Batman Begins or the Harry Potter series, to smaller, since-forgotten films like Jumper or Aliens in the Attic (seriously, am I the only one who remembers Aliens in the Attic?!), movie tie-in games were undeniably rampant in the 2000s. For nearly ten years, movie tie-in games have been an essential piece of both the movie and gaming industries, and it was a strange time of symbiosis between the two mediums.
For some, this was simply a time when executives saw an opportunity to make more money off of their most beloved properties and hit summer flicks— which is certainly true to some extent— but for me (and perhaps many others), this was a magical era which fused my two favorite mediums of entertainment. It didn’t matter that most movie tie-in games played worse than a tuba filled with mayonnaise; the addition of tie-in games enhanced both the movie-watching and gaming experiences of the 2000s and early 2010s in a way no other trend has managed to capture since. So why don’t we see tie-in games anymore?
Most Movie Tie-In Games Were Bad… But Not All of Them
As previously stated, movie tie-in games rightfully have a rather sour reputation. Many tie-in games were nothing more than cheap shovelware with some licensed characters thrown in, oftentimes going through generic platforming and shooting scenarios with very little effort put into their creation. Games based on DreamWorks‘ Bee Movie, the 2004 Halle Berry-starring Catwoman movie, and even Bad Boys II were just a few examples of games that were cheaply cobbled together for no other reason than to make a quick buck off a hot blockbuster film. There’s admittedly a charm to these subpar offerings when looking back with rose-tinted glasses; there’s just something oddly majestic about a time when you could go watch Bad Boys II in the cinema before driving over to GameStop to grab the tie-in game on PS2 and continue the party at home.
However, while there is an endless list of drivel to come out of this long-lasting trend, there were some legitimate gems in there as well. While games based on hit animated films were hit-and-miss, Kung Fu Panda‘s tie-in game was a genuinely fun beat ’em up adventure game with enjoyably clunky combat and a vibe and atmosphere that aptly captured the spirit of the movie. Something similar can be said for the game based on Peter Jackson‘s King Kong, which is still the best game featuring the Eighth Wonder of the World. There were also several great games based on specific films in the Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter franchises, namely The Return of the King and The Chamber of Secrets, both of which did a solid job in immersing players in their respective worlds despite not having the technical capabilities or the meaty budgets of modern games.
Even superhero games occasionally fared well at this time, with the 2005 Batman Begins tie-in game being a genuinely enjoyable game for the Caped Crusader, and a good holdover for fans until Rocksteady’s iconic Batman: Arkham series kicked off with Arkham Asylum four years later. The early Marvel Cinematic Universe movies also had their own tie-in games, which were rather hit-and-miss in their own right; while The Incredible Hulk and Thor tie-in games were utterly abysmal and lazy, Captain America: The First Avenger‘s tie-in game, titled Captain America: Super Soldier, was perhaps the best superhero movie tie-in game ever released, featuring a really fun (albeit slower and clunkier) version of the Batman: Arkham combat model, and a really tight, fun campaign full of great set pieces which did a lot to build out Cap’s career as a WWII super soldier. The video game tie-in for X-Men Origins: Wolverine is also widely considered to be far better than the movie was. And who could forget the absolutely phenomenal Spider-Man 2 tie-in game, which still stands as one of Spidey’s best outings in the gaming space, paving the way for Insomniac’s terrific PS4/PS5 Spider-Man games.
Some of Pixar‘s best films even received some fairly decent game adaptations themselves. WALL-E and Ratatouille, while not the greatest games ever, were quite respectable for what they were, giving young movie fans such as myself a means to enjoy these worlds and characters in a different way. And while the open world was very barren, I have a lot of fond memories of the first Cars video game, as well as the more action-packed Cars 2 game. So, while there were countless abominations created during this period of gaming, there are plenty that are truly worth seeking out and giving a go if you have the right mindset going into them. Few are going to blow your socks off, but there’s a lot of nostalgic bliss to the existence of movie tie-in games, for better or worse, and these are just a few examples of the genre’s bright spots.
The Cost of Game Production Played a Major Role in the Downfall of Movie Tie-In Games
Perhaps the most damning factor in the eventual decline in movie tie-in games around the early to mid 2010s was the cost of game production. Back in the early 2000s, AAA games were made on much smaller budgets with significantly smaller dev teams guiding the projects along, with much faster turnaround rates than we see in the gaming industry nowadays. Whereas back then, a movie tie-in game would take roughly a year to complete, giving the teams ample time to get their games out the door at the same time as the films they were adapting, eventually, games became more costly and time-consuming endeavors, with many developers pushing the needle forward with more creatively and graphically ambitious AAA titles like Rockstar’s immensely successful Grand Theft Auto V, Rocksteady’s Batman: Arkham Knight, and Naughty Dog‘s now-iconic The Last of Us, just to name a couple. Thus, there was little incentive to continue with the movie tie-in trend, as many developers wouldn’t even be able to get a polished game out in time for the release of the latest mega-hit franchise film, and the trend quickly faded from the marketplace entirely.
Another aspect of the decline in movie tie-in games was the early 2010s boom of mobile games. Mobile gaming became a huge market in itself around this time, with many movie tie-in games such as adaptations of 2013’s Iron Man 3 and Thor: The Dark World being relegated to mindless shovelware intended for mobile devices rather than the beefy console titles of the past. Between the increasingly pricey production costs within the gaming industry and the sizable mobile games market, movie tie-in games for home consoles quickly became a thing of the past, with very few games popping up in the years since.
The Movie Tie-In Game Lives On in AAA Gaming
While the proper movie tie-in game may be extinct in the AAA gaming space, that doesn’t mean we aren’t still receiving some incredible IP-driven AAA titles to this day. Games such as the smash-hit Hogwarts Legacy, Ubisoft‘s Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora, and the recent survival MMO, Dune: Awakening, have taken from these dazzling cinematic worlds and made them fully inhabitable fans with these immersive, endlessly imaginative games that continue to move the needle in a way that old-school tie-in games never could have when considering their inextricable ties to their movie counterparts. Those games, as charming as they were in many ways, didn’t have the technological leaps and ever-evolving marketplace of today’s gaming landscape, and it’s a joy to see all these fan-favorite universes get the proper care and love that they deserve with shiny new graphics and a stronger focus on robust gameplay.
This isn’t even taking into account the many multiplayer titles which let fans play as their favorite characters, with popular games like Marvel Rivals and (especially) Fortnite allowing gamers to step into the shoes of their favorite heroes and villains alike any time they wish. AAA gaming is in a much different position than it was twenty years ago, and it will continue to expand in many new and exciting ways in the coming years. Some may be bummed by the lack of movie tie-in games in the modern age, but these worlds and characters will forever live on in gaming despite this, continuing to inspire generations to come.
