Soul Calibur Movie

[Crimson King]

http://www.soulcaliburthemovie.com/

[Xero Kaiser]

*blinks*

....that's it? That sucked. Where's Nightmare?

[Crimson King]

Here's the plot from wikipedia:

Soul Calibur: The Movie (or Soul Calibur: Endgame) is a movie adaptation of Namco's Soul Calibur video game series.

Warren Zide's Anthem Pictures has acquired the rights to adapt the game to film. It has been stated that the game's story "revolves around two warriors who are chosen by Shaolin monks to recover and destroy a powerful sword that has fallen into the hands of an evil prince who plans to use it to open the gates of hell and destroy the world."


Seems like its only borrowing SC's name and not including any of the characters :/

[Legato]

Is it really that difficult to make a movie out of it. I mean really the plot and characters involved seem simple enough.


What is it with adapting video games into live action films. If Advent Children proved anything it showed that it doesn't hurt to adapt it into animated format. Or is hollywood too lazy to consider such a thing.

[StoneGold]

What is it with adapting video games into live action films. If Advent Children proved anything it showed that it doesn't hurt to adapt it into animated format. Or is hollywood too lazy to consider such a thing.

Yeah, but you're talking apples and oranges here. You're talking a direct to video format as opposed to wide release.

Although it is funny that you consider Hollywood lazy for not ripping off the story of a game. Granted, it's a questionable marketing decision, but so is basing a game off an IP like Soul Cal anyways. The story is minimal at best, and it's not like it was a total breakthru hit.

[Stranger With Candy]

Without the caracters from the game i doubt i will see the movie.

[blackdragon6]

The story is minimal at best, and it's not like it was a total breakthru hit.i dissagree but thats beside the point anyway.

[Nate Grey]

Without the caracters from the game i doubt i will see the movie.

How do you know they're not using characters from the game? The two monks from that synopsis could be called Kilik and Hwang. The prince could be called be Rafael or Cervantes. WE DON'T KNOW. We're assuming a lot here, probably cause of bad experience with previous game to movie adaptions. There'll NEVER be a straight, verbatim adaption of video games into movies cause the producers/directors already feel they're being unoriginal by using a pre-existing property in the first place, so of COURSE they're going to inject their own originality/ideas into it any chance they get. No one gets that. I'm not saying anyone should be happy about it, but its really common sense. This is no different. Even the first Mortal Kombat, which everyone generally loves, when did Liu Kang have a brother to be killed in the first place?

And I'm sorry, StoneGold is right. I've played all the games and love them, but the story IS minimal. Its a race to find a sword. Period. Some evil folks are looking for it, some good, some are chasing each other, but its still a race. From this synposis it sounds like that's still intact, they're just changing slightly who exactly is looking for it. We don't know if they'll create new characters or not, but common sense would say NO, it's just a matter of if we'll see the spirit of the characters we love onscreen or if it'll be a name only type of deal.

Really, if that's all we got, shouldn't we wait for more info? And since when is wiki to be trusted by itself, anyway?

[Black Atom]

The story and characters from those games are actually pretty well-developed, intertwining mythologies and hero archetypes from several cultures. There's plenty of material there for a movie.

Stories get changed because Hollywood wants to snag a property that looks similar enough to a currently popular film genre (Wuxia films in this case, I'm guessing, possibly with a mix of LOTR-type fantasy) and shoe-horn it in. It has nothing to do with producers wanting to inject their own creativity--they want to change it to fit an established tried-and-true formula.

[Nate Grey]

The story and characters from those games are actually pretty well-developed, intertwining mythologies and hero archetypes from several cultures. There's plenty of material there for a movie.

The characters all have well detailed profiles, yes, but the story is still a race. The sword itself (and its counterpart) has a great background, but that's not the same as a story.

Stories get changed because Hollywood wants to snag a property that looks similar enough to a currently popular film genre (Wuxia films in this case, I'm guessing, possibly with a mix of LOTR-type fantasy) and shoe-horn it in. It has nothing to do with producers wanting to inject their own creativity--they want to change it to fit an established tried-and-true formula.

To make money, yes. Studios kinda like to see a return on their investment. As for WHY (their own ideas vs sticking to what's worked before), that's a matter of opinion, but the point I'm trying to make is that it doesn't make sense to make a mountain out of a mole hill. Wouldn't it make sense to wait till MORE info is ready? It could suck, it could be great, it could be inbetween, but all we have to go on for now is a paragraph from the official page and wiki, which should only be used as a starting point not the ONLY source for info.

[Kid Kamikaze10]

Soul Calibur is essentially a race, but some characters' storylines are a bit deeper than that. Like Siegfreid for instance.

[Black Atom]

The characters all have well detailed profiles, yes, but the story is still a race. The sword itself (and its counterpart) has a great background, but that's not the same as a story.

I'm not sure what qualifies to you as a story. Aside from having detailed backstories, the characters each play specific roles in a specific chain of events that occur throughout each game. Some characters are key to the story and some are not. Some succeed, some fail. Some live and some die. It's not really as "minimal" as you perceive it to be.


To make money, yes. Studios kinda like to see a return on their investment. As for WHY (their own ideas vs sticking to what's worked before), that's a matter of opinion, but the point I'm trying to make is that it doesn't make sense to make a mountain out of a mole hill. Wouldn't it make sense to wait till MORE info is ready? It could suck, it could be great, it could be inbetween, but all we have to go on for now is a paragraph from the official page and wiki, which should only be used as a starting point not the ONLY source for info.

Nope. When more info is ready, we will bash or praise it accordingly, until then we will most likely continue to bash what we do have. That can only be avoided by keeping the whole thing a secret until the day of its release.

[StoneGold]

Soul Calibur is essentially a race, but some characters' storylines are a bit deeper than that. Like Siegfreid for instance.

Yeah, but not in a way that really makes for a good movie. An individual character's storyline that is deep and interesting, yet doesn't make any sense in terms of the larger narrative structure of the movie, doesn't help any.

In fact, they can hinder the movie. Has there ever been a truly satisfying translation of the Street Fighter games to any kind of movie format? And yeah, the movie sucked, but so did the cartoons, unless you ignore the story for the pure fighting aspect.

Besides, how do you explain Spawn and Link in the movie?

[Kid Kamikaze10]

Yeah, but not in a way that really makes for a good movie. An individual character's storyline that is deep and interesting, yet doesn't make any sense in terms of the larger narrative structure of the movie, doesn't help any.

In fact, they can hinder the movie. Has there ever been a truly satisfying translation of the Street Fighter games to any kind of movie format? And yeah, the movie sucked, but so did the cartoons, unless you ignore the story for the pure fighting aspect.

Besides, how do you explain Spawn and Link in the movie?


I still think you're wrong about this (and believe you underestimate the story potential of video games), but I'm only gonna talk about the last comment.

Link, H. Mishima, and Spawn were guests in Soul Calibur II. They had nothing to do with the storyline, and therefore should not be in the movie.

[StoneGold]

I still think you're wrong about this (and believe you underestimate the story potential of video games), but I'm only gonna talk about the last comment.

Link, H. Mishima, and Spawn were guests in Soul Calibur II. They had nothing to do with the storyline, and therefore should not be in the movie.

The Link and Spawn thing was a joke. But what you are missing is that video games, especially fighting games, have a completly different narrative structure than movies. You know how in most fighting games, every character has a back story and an ending, often contradictory to each other and even more often having very little to do with the fighting aspect of the game itself? That doesn't work well as a movie. Now, you could trim down the backstories to most of the characters, focus on just one or two and run with it. Mortal Kombat did a semi-decent job of that. But in the end, you have to figure out a way to wrap the story around the fighting, and that usually doesn't work out very well. It's just a completly different kind of story structure.

Do you remember an old Far Side strip where someone was trying to read a comic strip out loud to someone? And it didn't work, because you have to explain the individual panels, and it totally destroys the flow of the gag? That's what happend 99% of the time when a video game story is translated into a movie. It just isn't meant for that genre.

[Black Atom]

Yeah, but not in a way that really makes for a good movie. An individual character's storyline that is deep and interesting, yet doesn't make any sense in terms of the larger narrative structure of the movie, doesn't help any.

Riiiight.
http://db.gamefaqs.com/console/gamecube/file/soul_calibur_ii_story.txt


In fact, they can hinder the movie. Has there ever been a truly satisfying translation of the Street Fighter games to any kind of movie format? And yeah, the movie sucked, but so did the cartoons, unless you ignore the story for the pure fighting aspect.

Apples and oranges. The storyline and characters in Soul Edge/Calibur were developed as the series went along, whereas Street Fighter was not. This was an advantage the Mortal Kombat games had over SF as well and why that movie turned out better.

[StoneGold]

Riiiight.
http://db.gamefaqs.com/console/gamecube/file/soul_calibur_ii_story.txt

.

I don't see how a referer link error is supposed to prove your point.


And honestly, if it needs a FAQ to explain itself, you've already lost the battle. KISS is the keyword here. Remember Mortal Kombat figured out how to reduce it to a Shaolin monk and his friends battle in a tournament to save the earth. Most of the extra stuff was stripped away.

Not to mention, don't most of the Soul games endings have downers? That's going to work on a popcorn flick. And if you think that Soul Cal had a chance of ever being anything more than a popcorn flick, you're delusional.

[Black Atom]

I don't see how a referer link error is supposed to prove your point.

And honestly, if it needs a FAQ to explain itself, you've already lost the battle. KISS is the keyword here. Remember Mortal Kombat figured out how to reduce it to a Shaolin monk and his friends battle in a tournament to save the earth. Most of the extra stuff was stripped away.

Not to mention, don't most of the Soul games endings have downers? That's going to work on a popcorn flick. And if you think that Soul Cal had a chance of ever being anything more than a popcorn flick, you're delusional.

First you were saying Soul Calibur's story was minimal, now you say there's too much. Either way, you seem to have some sort of opressive anti-video game adaptation agenda that doesn't really interest me. Despite points made by people who seem to know more than you about the subject, you seem resolved to stick to your half-informed (if not completely UNinformed) opinion on the topic. We can speculate whether or not the movie will be bad, but whether or not the game, itself, has a story isn't really debatable.

[StoneGold]

First you were saying Soul Calibur's story was minimal, now you say there's too much. Either way, you seem to have some sort of opressive anti-video game adaptation agenda that doesn't really interest me. Despite points made by people who seem to know more than you about the subject, you seem resolved to stick to your half-informed (if not completely UNinformed) opinion on the topic. We can speculate whether or not the movie will be bad, but whether or not the game, itself, has a story isn't really debatable.

Because the main story is minimal. Fight for a sword. It's all the backstory that has nothing to do with anything in the game really that there is too much of. And it would completely chunk up the narrative structure of a movie. For proof of this, see any anime based on a fighting game. They all suck. And what do I care about Rock's back story anyways (yeah, that's right, I said Rock, and I hated that they didn't feature him in the Soul Cal games, because I kicked ass with him in Soul Edge).

As for uninformed, I was paid to play and talk about video games all day today. And yesterday. And the day before. But not the day before that. Because it was Sunday, and I didn't go to work.

But I do like how anyone who doesn't have your opinion only has one that is either half informed or uninformed. Bet that makes you feel all superior-like to me, don't it?

Seriously though, can we have a discussion where we can discuss opinions without feeling the need to be insulting?

[Black Atom]

Because the main story is minimal. Fight for a sword. It's all the backstory that has nothing to do with anything in the game really that there is too much of. And it would completely chunk up the narrative structure of a movie. For proof of this, see any anime based on a fighting game. They all suck. And what do I care about Rock's back story anyways (yeah, that's right, I said Rock, and I hated that they didn't feature him in the Soul Cal games, because I kicked ass with him in Soul Edge).

Your claim that the backstories have nothing to do with the main narrative is what makes you sound uninformed, because it simply isn't true. Like any story, the narrative is driven by the characters involved.

Rock is unlockable in SC, also, I believe.

As for uninformed, I was paid to play and talk about video games all day today. And yesterday. And the day before. But not the day before that. Because it was Sunday, and I didn't go to work.

I didn't mean that you were generally uninformed.

But I do like how anyone who doesn't have your opinion only has one that is either half informed or uninformed. Bet that makes you feel all superior-like to me, don't it?

Seriously though, can we have a discussion where we can discuss opinions without feeling the need to be insulting?

Not at all. You're welcome to your opinion and I wasn't trying to insult you. But as I said before, whether or not Soul Calibur has a story isn't really a matter of opinion at all. If your opinion is that the story is not suitable for a film, then you're welcome to believe that also, but so far the rationale you've offered doesn't hold water.

[StoneGold]

Your claim that the backstories have nothing to do with the main narrative is what makes you sound uninformed, because it simply isn't true. Like any story, the narrative is driven by the characters involved.

Let me lay it out plain and simple. If I have to read the instruction manual to get the story out of a game, it doesn't have a story. It has an instruction manual with a bunch of words which may or may not have ever been looked at by the actual game developers. Case in point, in the American version of Soul Blade, the instruction manual writer named Rock Nathanial William. Except that was never in the Japanese manual, was never in the game, nothing.

Rock is unlockable in SC, also, I believe.
Yeah, but he's not a featured character, he's hidden. And they made him suck, took away his decent distance moves.

[Black Atom]

Let me lay it out plain and simple. If I have to read the instruction manual to get the story out of a game, it doesn't have a story. It has an instruction manual with a bunch of words which may or may not have ever been looked at by the actual game developers. Case in point, in the American version of Soul Blade, the instruction manual writer named Rock Nathanial William. Except that was never in the Japanese manual, was never in the game, nothing.

I'm not sure what the manuals say, to be honest, but there is an official story for Soul Calibur, some of which you can see in the character endings (although we know some happened and some did not). In fact, if you're bored enough to unlock all the hidden art in the Dreamcast version of the game, the story is actually mapped out in 100 or so pictures. The "world tour" mode also loosely follows it. An official story for the game does, in fact, exist.

Yeah, but he's not a featured character, he's hidden. And they made him suck, took away his decent distance moves.

Keeping the Redman down.

[Kid Kamikaze10]

I'm not sure what the manuals say, to be honest, but there is an official story for Soul Calibur, some of which you can see in the character endings (although we know some happened and some did not). In fact, if you're bored enough to unlock all the hidden art in the Dreamcast version of the game, the story is actually mapped out in 100 or so pictures. The "world tour" mode also loosely follows it. An official story for the game does, in fact, exist.


Not to mention, Soul Calibur 3, and if you want to bring it up, Tekken 4, did a great job developing the storyline of both games. They are legit, whether you like them or not.

[IamtheRock3]

Here's the plot from wikipedia:



Seems like its only borrowing SC's name and not including any of the characters :/

isnt that the plot of the game though

destroying the sword, or using it

always said the sword does SOMETHING bad

[IamtheRock3]

thing was most of the backstories didnt fit with the action of the game. A story, you shouldnt have to search through picture to find

least with Street Fighter and Mortal Kombat, it a tourment. So it a reason why there fight in best out of 3 round and having RING out movies. Or why it ok to come at best friend with a sword

Tekken some of it stuff make no sense or it made sense when your read source OUTSIDE the game. I mean one guy growing devil wings, other guy was fighting a Panda or something.

Things that had story, with begining, middle and end narative was the bonus games these have. Where your an army guy raiding castles. Gave a reason for the fighting


dont get me wrong, it a great game

but stories one has to make concession with fighting game most of all. So far the plot doesnt seem that far off. Dont get why people assume the charcter wont be in the movie.