Due to the tremendous success enjoyed by films like The Super Mario Bros. Movie and the Sonic the Hedgehog series, more video game adaptations are predictably on their way to the big screen. That’s great news, but some classic video games – including some that still don’t have a movie version – should have received such treatment years ago.

There’s been a positive trend as of late when it comes to video games getting their own films. There was a time when these efforts were expected to fail, but various films in the last decade or so have helped generate a much-needed turnaround.

As a result, fans have gotten to experience worthwhile adaptations of Uncharted, Mortal Kombat, Super Mario Bros., and Sonic the Hedgehog, while also having several more to look forward to as well. Meanwhile, the likes of Halo, The Last of Us, and Fallout have found life on the small screen.

Thanks to these positive changes, overdue movies are finally getting made, and perhaps with any luck, more will follow in the near future.

Just Cause

A video game franchise with four installments, Just Cause focuses on Rico Rodriguez, a mercenary who makes a living overthrowing dictators and their governments, usually operating as a one-man army. Given the Just Cause franchise’s propensity for explosions, tons of gunplay and car chases, it feels tailor-made for a movie that’s a throwback to the days of 1990s action movies, mixed in with some Mission Impossible-style.

Rico Rodriguez is the perfect candidate to become a new action hero ala Ethan Hunt or Jason Bourne, and had the movie gotten rolling years ago, Anthony Banderas – whose likeness inspired the character’s design – could have had a reasonable chance at playing him in a movie. It’s taken a long time, but at least a Just Cause movie is finally happening.

The Legend Of Zelda

Like Just Cause, The Legend of Zelda has a live-action film in development. It’s a welcome move, but one that’s been anticipated for years. After all, The Legend of Zelda series has been running strong since the 1980s, and has arguably been a good option for a movie for the last two decades, especially since The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time reinvigorated the lore and pushed it to new levels of popularity.

All the various concepts, monsters, races, and regions in The Legend of Zelda games lend any movie with all sorts of storytelling and world-building potential. If it hadn’t taken the success of The Super Mario Bros. movie to create some progress on a Zelda film, we could be in knee-deep in an epic fantasy movie franchise right now.

Final Fantasy

Another video game series that would work well as a fantasy movie franchise is Final Fantasy. Built as an anthology that’s constantly creating new casts of characters with their own adventures, the Final Fantasy series is ripe with opportunities for a live-action movie – and it’s been that way for years.

Final Fantasy has been pumping out games since 1987, and has thus far only received CGI-animated and anime film adaptations. Looking at all the games in the series, there’s no shortage of options it would have to pick from, and the list grows the longer the wait goes on.

Star Wars: Knights Of The Old Republic

One of the most appealing directions for the Star Wars franchise to take has been facing it for years, but has been consistently ignored. BioWare’s Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic created the blueprint for a fantastic Star Wars movie when it told the tale of an amnesiac Jedi who discovers that they’re secretly the elusive Sith Lord known as Darth Revan.

Finally, the 2003 game’s potential to work as a movie was officially acknowledged with a plan to bring the story to theaters. Unfortunately, there hasn’t been an update on it since 2019.

Donkey Kong Country

Thanks to the success of The Super Mario Bros. Movie, odds are better now than they were before in regards to the possibility of a Donkey Kong movie now that Universal has purchased the copyright to a film about the character. However, it shouldn’t have taken a big-screen adventure for Mario, Luigi, and Donkey Kong to make this a reality.

The framework for an animated Donkey Kong movie has existed since the 1990s; the Donkey Kong Country trilogy on the Super Nintendo built a vibrant world for DK to inhabit, along with a great, cartoonish villain in King K. Rool and a fun supporting cast in the Kong Family.

BioShock

Having started in the 2000s, the BioShock series has long felt like a worthy candidate for a film. The first-person shooter games could easily be translated into a dystopian horror thriller, complete with jump scares, frightening monsters rendered with spectacular visual effects, and some intriguing lore to serve as a backbone for the story.

It looks like Hollywood has begun to recognize the potential the franchise has as a live-action movie, as a BioShock film based on the first game is officially in development.

Live-Action Kingdom Hearts

An extremely successful series that draws a mix of characters from different franchises into a fantasy-themed adventure, the Kingdom Hearts video games sees an original character named Sora join forces with multiple Disney heroes. It’s not hard to imagine a Kingdom Hearts movie sucking a live-action take on Sora into a magic-filled story packed with CGI-generated interpretations of Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck, and Goofy.

There’s been rumors of such a project happening on Disney+, but thus far, the idea has yet to take shape.

Metal Gear Solid

Another obvious chance for a live-action adaptation of a video game is Metal Gear Solid. An espionage thriller that sends the iconic Solid Snake on a high-stakes mission is something that could have been made at anytime, as it wouldn’t have been reliant on special effects.

But even though there’s been work on a Metal Gear Solid movie off and on since 2006, there still isn’t one in sight. The strongest sign that it was finally going to happen was the casting of Oscar Isaac as Solid Snake, but that was five years ago.

Mᴀss Effect

Despite being a video game series, there was an extraordinary cinematic feel to the story of Commander Shepard and his allies in the first three installments of Mᴀss Effect as they worked to rally help in their quest to thwart the return of the ancient species known as the Reapers.

The sheer epicness of the saga demands a live-action movie adaptation, quite possibly with a trilogy of its own, even if that comes with risks, given that player choice was a big part of the franchise’s original appeal. That doesn’t appear to be happening, but at least a Mᴀss Effect show is slowly coming together for Amazon Prime Video.