There's been so many I couldn't recall them all.
Waiting for "Elite Dangerous - The Movie"
- Thread starter Born Free
- Start date
I don't particularly have an issue with Engineers in this context though - given one of Clarke's most famous quotations supports "wizards and engineers are the same thing" and the Foundationers deliberately turn themselves into a theocracy to hide the fact they are using engineering to control the destiny of society, this is pretty well established.
Lucas and Kasdan are quite happy that Star Wars is a Western in space. But then the best fights are the wuxia, not the pew pew... now ED x Bushido Blade, that is a game I would buy.
This is a beautiful and colourful summary of what I was thrashing around trying to express, thank you.
Also I believe Edward McHonda is in talks about a merger with Bob de Nissan.
Absolutely.
I don't have an issue with any of it - it can be fun as an "overthinking it" joke to point out the physical or social implications of the technology shown in Elite Dangerous, but I'm not playing the game because of its commitment to a realistic setting, I'm playing it because it has exactly the right sort of silly and unrealistic setting to let me fly a spaceship.
(And similarly, if I want detailed explorations of how particular futuretech might influence society, I'm not going to go looking for it in Elite Dangerous fiction)
Ah yes:
- jedi / superheroes saving the world / galaxy
- soldiers in (insert war)
- knights, royalty in medieval, ancient times
- surviving scary zombies / vampires / werewolves, alien creature
- police vs crime
- family drama, comedy
- youth with magical powers
- mythological stories from (insert culture)
- fairy tales
Yet these movies continue to be made and people go watch it. The actual storyline should be more creative than your example.ED has a more plausible futuristic setting than Star Wars, Star Trek which are far more unrealistic.
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Yes but be fair that is a low plausibility bar to get over even if one of those examples isn't set in our future.
God damn it ... now I can't stop thinking about whether it would be possible to recreate this, scene for scene, in Elite Dangerous!
Watching the Andor series right now got me thinking. Do we have a lot of elaborate large universes with a long history?
Star Wars, Star Trek and Elite ... and I can't think of any more.
Elite! Take the movie, it's ready to go. Make a TV series about the world of Elite and game sales will increase a million times over!
Star Wars, Star Trek and Elite ... and I can't think of any more.
Elite! Take the movie, it's ready to go. Make a TV series about the world of Elite and game sales will increase a million times over!
Fade in to Adam Sandler in a sidewinder. It's an hour and half of him trying to dock for the first time only to get blown up by the station. Roll credits.
Battlestar, B5, Firefly, Stargate, Dark Matter, Farscape, Killjoys, Foundation, Andromeda. Frontier should concentrate on making games, I mean really concentrate on making games.
I meant popular, i.e. both movies and games.
Other than BattleStar, I don't remember any games from that list.
Films of games aren’t the best, unless you’re talking about IP massaging, eg making more people aware of your IP than your core player bases / expand sales etc . The film industry is generally a lottery, so any such move by FD ought to focus upon looking at the mitigation of any potential financial loss, and recouping earnings over extended time, eg their best bet would be low budget equities to cult classic, equities to guaranteed slow burn income - forever.
Personally I don’t believe it would work, as thematically at some point the characters would need to at least get out if their chairs, then your in a heap of issues with suspension of disbelief, but primarily when people buy the game and go, oh this ain’t Star Wars this is Euro Truck Simulator…so you’re going to need to play down the whole ‘blockbuster’ ethos and go low-fi arty.
So for me (yes I did film studies) FD would need to look for a very basic plot, simple heroes journey type stuff but proper low-fi, but play heavily upon the irony and zillion references in game to popular culture; especially not trying hard to look like Star Wars, but really focus on a central “spam in a can” theme, so the various interplays and themes etc ought to play out environmentally, with the heroe/s role is navigate that mess, the plot effectively is meaningless and is just a big advert, the heroes would not directly be involved nor win, it just would be about surviving and growing.
Hand in hand FD would really need to opt to invest in at least gasgiant and interiors game development, and look to roll out a new DLC to tie in with the film, that would counteract the continuing Eurotruck comparisons and allow the film director some space to get really creative.
Running parallel to the paper thin central plot, they ought to seed it with a hidden narrative (which is actually the primary theme) concerning Raxxla, but not being overly obvious about it, nor ever resolve it, the sort of device were that concept only floats to the surface on second or third repeat viewings. Leaving it hanging for the viewer, a lure for buying the game.
Ultimately it ought to be a dark arty low-fi, practical effects UK film, very 80s in vibe, but not too corny. Possibly a bit of cosmic horror…
Cast of total unknowns, cobbled from the RCA. Produced by a French studio (the French are great scI-fi), with Richard Stanley as director.
Everyone almost certainly dies except the core trio, one of whom is part of the Dark Wheel.. one other is the ship… the ship ought to be a crappy old Cobra and the real central star of the movie, all creaking beams, steam and broken parts.
Brian Eno does the soundtrack in a sort of David Lynch / Ridley Scott in some genius Dune / Bladerunner / Firefly mashup…
Source: https://youtu.be/DVx6bXoCnC0
Source: https://youtu.be/cDs2hPtvpNI
or maybe just do a full on camp Flash / Queen rip-off…
Source: https://youtu.be/Lt08j3mBW3Q
Personally I don’t believe it would work, as thematically at some point the characters would need to at least get out if their chairs, then your in a heap of issues with suspension of disbelief, but primarily when people buy the game and go, oh this ain’t Star Wars this is Euro Truck Simulator…so you’re going to need to play down the whole ‘blockbuster’ ethos and go low-fi arty.
So for me (yes I did film studies) FD would need to look for a very basic plot, simple heroes journey type stuff but proper low-fi, but play heavily upon the irony and zillion references in game to popular culture; especially not trying hard to look like Star Wars, but really focus on a central “spam in a can” theme, so the various interplays and themes etc ought to play out environmentally, with the heroe/s role is navigate that mess, the plot effectively is meaningless and is just a big advert, the heroes would not directly be involved nor win, it just would be about surviving and growing.
Hand in hand FD would really need to opt to invest in at least gasgiant and interiors game development, and look to roll out a new DLC to tie in with the film, that would counteract the continuing Eurotruck comparisons and allow the film director some space to get really creative.
Running parallel to the paper thin central plot, they ought to seed it with a hidden narrative (which is actually the primary theme) concerning Raxxla, but not being overly obvious about it, nor ever resolve it, the sort of device were that concept only floats to the surface on second or third repeat viewings. Leaving it hanging for the viewer, a lure for buying the game.
Ultimately it ought to be a dark arty low-fi, practical effects UK film, very 80s in vibe, but not too corny. Possibly a bit of cosmic horror…
Cast of total unknowns, cobbled from the RCA. Produced by a French studio (the French are great scI-fi), with Richard Stanley as director.
Everyone almost certainly dies except the core trio, one of whom is part of the Dark Wheel.. one other is the ship… the ship ought to be a crappy old Cobra and the real central star of the movie, all creaking beams, steam and broken parts.
Brian Eno does the soundtrack in a sort of David Lynch / Ridley Scott in some genius Dune / Bladerunner / Firefly mashup…
or maybe just do a full on camp Flash / Queen rip-off…
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It's just that I was watching Andor and I realized that the world of the Elite is as good as the world of Star Wars. And in the case of the Thargoids, it even surpasses it.
To your point Elites world as a setting for a movie would be good. The storyline and characters would need to be unique, just with the Elite as the backdrops. So it would depend on writing, directing, acting, etc etc etc as usual to be good or not.
Barring my qualms with the absolute insanity that is FDev's quintuple downing of trying to say "the game is literal to the ingame reality" for lore (credits, the respawn mechanisms, the valuation and interaction of the world), the real reason Elite will never have a film is because to everyone in the world it's just a video game.
It's not a cultural phenomena. Star Wars was a film first that spawned other things from it. Most media strictly based on video game IPs rarely do more than fellate what exists already in the games and only becomes accessible to the consumers of the games, or are so out of pocket (lol Halo) it's a literal actual disgrace to both the format it's being released in and the IP.
There's no brand recognition to elite. The ONLY way Elite as a film succeeds is this.
You take a really good original story, and it just happens to be set in Elite. You don't try and shove all the fancy tech and words and memes and Ha-Ha Game Joke/References in it. You make it real, and approachable, and not have people go "oh it's based on a video game" On the contrary, you want people to see it without any presumptions and walk out realizing that it's part of something a bit bigger. I think think James Mangold generally executes this idea well, if you look at Logan. Obviously it's XMen but the way it was marketed stood out as a quite human story at its heart. I would argue the same for Ford V Ferrari. It captures a great period drama and while it takes a few gratiutous liberties in terms of car mechanics and details things, it's still a fun and visceral smorgasboard for the average car enthusiast.
As stated earlier, most media adaptions of games tend to go LOOK GUYS ITS THE GAME. LOOK AT THIS VIDEO GAME THING WE INCLUDED. There has to be real weight and gravitas to the film, focus it on a local level with approachable and relatable problems and show glimpses of the bigger picture at times, but never just drag the viewer to the "and now this is ELITE DANGEROUS!!" etc.
Basically you just have to make a good story that isn't overly enamored with its lore and setting.
It's not a cultural phenomena. Star Wars was a film first that spawned other things from it. Most media strictly based on video game IPs rarely do more than fellate what exists already in the games and only becomes accessible to the consumers of the games, or are so out of pocket (lol Halo) it's a literal actual disgrace to both the format it's being released in and the IP.
There's no brand recognition to elite. The ONLY way Elite as a film succeeds is this.
You take a really good original story, and it just happens to be set in Elite. You don't try and shove all the fancy tech and words and memes and Ha-Ha Game Joke/References in it. You make it real, and approachable, and not have people go "oh it's based on a video game" On the contrary, you want people to see it without any presumptions and walk out realizing that it's part of something a bit bigger. I think think James Mangold generally executes this idea well, if you look at Logan. Obviously it's XMen but the way it was marketed stood out as a quite human story at its heart. I would argue the same for Ford V Ferrari. It captures a great period drama and while it takes a few gratiutous liberties in terms of car mechanics and details things, it's still a fun and visceral smorgasboard for the average car enthusiast.
As stated earlier, most media adaptions of games tend to go LOOK GUYS ITS THE GAME. LOOK AT THIS VIDEO GAME THING WE INCLUDED. There has to be real weight and gravitas to the film, focus it on a local level with approachable and relatable problems and show glimpses of the bigger picture at times, but never just drag the viewer to the "and now this is ELITE DANGEROUS!!" etc.
Basically you just have to make a good story that isn't overly enamored with its lore and setting.
Arthouse film presents:
Hutton Orbital. Full length travel, no SCU, no dialogue, no interaction. You get a mug after watching.
Prequel to „Beagle Point.“ Into the void. Forever.
Hutton Orbital. Full length travel, no SCU, no dialogue, no interaction. You get a mug after watching.
Prequel to „Beagle Point.“ Into the void. Forever.
A good example could be Time Masters, stuff happens, but it’s not a typical hero’s journey..
Source: https://youtu.be/vGzhaupS_oU
Newer sci-fi movies use CGI which is not so expensive anymore. It also does not have to be made in the UK. Yes make it dark, but not low-fi or very low budget.
There's a couple of good fan-made videos of ED that showcase the setting, ships, environments, Thargoids, locations without explaining the lore.
Seconded. It should be a great scifi movie in its own right. Keep it true to the setting of the Elite universe. Add a good script, characters, actors, director and soundtrack composer. Give it a proper budget, but not high for the first film. For example Interstellar's (2014) budget was $165 million. This could also be an Amazon or Netflix series.
The story could be about a group of recruits who join the Pilots Federation, go on a mission to explore the galaxy and find the Thargoids. Perhaps include some leaders of Powerplay.
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TV Series, not a movie or even movies.
To truly give elite lore a decent exploration, you'd need a serial TV series similar to how Babylon 5 was. The plot structure can be like what @IstvaanDCIV suggested. But you'd need a long form series to really do it justice.
True, a series like Babylon 5, The Expanse, Firefly would be better. Start with 1 or 2 seasons (10-14 episodes per season). It should be on Amazon Prime, Netflix or maybe HBO Max though. Avoid Disney, because they've tarnished the Star Wars franchise.
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You should go watch Firefly immediate. You are not credible talking about space shows if you have not watched it.
Not to mention the rest.