The 12 worst video game movies of all time

Legendary/Universal Pictures

Take any popular and addictively playable game franchise and, chances are, there's a nearly unwatchable film adaptation. Movie studios regularly mine comic books for their built in audiences, merchandise tie-ins, and action-friendly storylines. They've routinely turned to games for the same opportunity. There's just one problem. Many of them are terrible. Uniformly terrible.

Players, critics, and audiences are all routinely disappointed by video game movies. With the latest addition to the genre, "Warcraft," in theaters this weekend, we've looked through the worst of the worst video game adaptations.

Was your favorite game dragged to the big screen for an unwelcome adaptation? Check out our list and see.

10. "Lara Croft: Tomb Raider" (2001)

Paramount

Rotten Tomatoes Score: 19%

Lara Croft is a gaming icon. A wealthy heiress fulfilling her daredevil dreams of exploring the world, both the game and film are generalized as starring a "female Indiana Jones." Really nothing in the movies work against that except for the gratuitous shots of Angelina Jolie breathless and gasping directly into the camera. The games were updated with a more feminist, humanizing perspective for Lara and a rebooted adaptation, presumably with the same perspective, was announced starring Oscar winner Alicia Vikander.  

From USA Today's review: "This film, directed by Simon West (Con Air), is like watching a novice (like me) fumble about while playing a video game. There are quick bursts of frantic activity followed by long, enervating lulls. The digital effects sometimes impress, such as the massive stone monkeys that come to life and a spinning gizmo made of huge rotating spheres. But the look of the movie is unduly muddy."

9. "Doom" (2005)

Universal Pictures

Rotten Tomatoes Score: 19%

The "Doom" series, just recently revitalized with its latest entry, is one of the most well-known horror-shooters and stars marines taking on hordes of violent, brain-dead monsters. The movie, starring The Rock, is such a monster. The explicit gore and violence tries to trick audiences into forgetting there isn't any discernible storyline. But neither fans of the games nor uninitiated movie audiences cared. The film tanked and, thankfully, The Rock's career escaped unscathed. 

From the Orlando Sentinel review: "The movie based on that best-selling body-count game is ugly, stupefyingly stupid and gross. It has a back story ripped off from a half-dozen sci-fi movies, a Z-list cast that exists only so we can see them impaled, decapitated and worse. It has zombies beheaded by bullets, gratuitous autopsies and the Rock. And that last bit is the saddest note of all."

 

8. "Super Mario Bros." (1993)

Buena Vista

Rotten Tomatoes: 15% 

Probably the most popular gaming characters of all time, the "Mario" games revolutionized the medium and gave Nintendo its esteemed position as the major innovators of the gaming world. The movie, however, was blasted as everything the games are not: generic, predictable, visually disappointing, and boring. 

From the Philly.com review: "So much like a theme-park ride that you wonder where the security bar is, Super Mario Bros. is a movie whose idea of a peak experience is to be on a derailed train as it falls off a trestle. Scenery rushes by, noise blares, characters pop up wearing new costumes that they couldn't possibly have had time to change into as they eluded their adversaries."

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