Rainbow Six instantly comes to mind as it's based on a Tom Clancy novel. Metro 2033 is a novel series too. Suppose you could count Dynasty Warriors too since it's based on ROTK.
Anything else good?
The Warriors is based on The Warriors (1979) but it has a mode where you get to play some of the events leading into the plot and those hew a little closer to the 1965 novel by Sol Yurick.
The biggest ones that come to mind for me are The Witcher and anything Lord of the Rings or Harry Potter. I know the SMT series was originally based off the Digital Devil novels, but kind of developed its own identity pretty quickly.
There were some interesting names in this list from Wikipedia I found.
I always forget that Conan was a pulp novel series before it blew up via the movie.
apparently the world building done by the books is quite extensive
It's kind of racist, but if you're diving into 1920s pulp you should expect that.
It's turbo racist. A couple of years ago i was about to get all "nuh uh it's not racist" and decided i should go re-read some of it and was really upset to find out how vocal howard was. : (
Kinda tempted to go re-work the core stories to make Conan woke.
I mean there are a bunch of later stories from other authors so I wouldn't be surprised if they toned that down somewhat.
It's also a pretty fiercely guarded IP so you might want to think about creating your own less racist sword and sorcery setting
True dat. I kind of have half of one tucked away somewhere. A prominent feature is that fishing villages on one side of the central sea have an integrated culture of humans and intelligent, language capable squid. Everyone works the nets together and they hang out in the bay talking and shooting the shit after the work day is done.
good to know, thanks, only read some comic book adaptations a while ago by Roy Thomas
Howard wrote an short essay about the setting history which is more than 95% cases of worldbuild does.
I had the same thought when I saw Conan on the list too. I always thought it started in film and TV.
I actually read all of the Digital Devil Story novels. They're wack.
Wacky detectives Sam and Max were comic book characters before they were video game uhh... heroes.
Many many games based on lovecraft stories.
Many many games based on lovecraft stories.
Any of these good?
Forgive Me Father is just Shadow Over Innsmouth by way of Boomer Shooter.
Call of Cthulhu: Dark Corners of the Earth is a fun time, though it can be... Less than stable. Which, given that the development seemed like a Lovecraftian nightmare itself, isn't completely surprising.
It balances a feeling of powerlessness with moments to fight pretty well, in the beginning, but the back half kinda drops into a bit of a Power Fantasy.
Darkest Dungeon is loosely based on a load of them, but mostly "The Rats in the Walls".
Too many to count based on Journey to the West (Dragon Ball would count too, I guess)
It's a short story and not a novel, but I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream
Ubik, based on a Philip K. Dick novel
There's a bunch of games based on Dune, although the first one is based more on the David Lynch movie
A whole Discworld adventure game series
Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, a text adventure that's just about as wacky as the book
There's shockingly only one game based on Neuromancer from the 80s, it was made by Brian Fargo of Wasteland and later Fallout fame
It's a short story and not a novel, but I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream
This one's especially worth noting since the original author also wrote the game!
Disco Elysium is sorta kinda based off a book. Sacred and Terrible air is in the same universe and was released before disco.
I will say though Sacred and Terrible air is nothing like the game. It's very post modern and has strange prose. An interesting book though
It's very post modern and has strange prose.
You have my attention
The original metro 2033 is based on a Russian novel with all of its "both sides bad", Soviet nostalgia brainworms. The game is really good, despite being ideologically empty beyond "war bad".
Book was better, though, in my opinion. Artyom felt like an actual character, and the ending felt much more bitter, yet resigned.
Great game, but I'm glad I played it before I read through the book.
Stalker is loosely inspired by Roadside Picnic and the Stalker film
Oh shit how could I forget Stalker? I think it had it's own novel series too.
Fight Club featuring Fred Durst is based off the novel. Probably the most accurate video game adaptation.
I found a YouTube link in your comment. Here are links to the same video on alternative frontends that protect your privacy:
I believe there's been one or two games based on LoTR, there's also Dune and the Witcherino off the top of my head.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Video_games_based_on_novels
There was an adaptation of one of the Vampire Hunter D novels for the PlayStation. Reviews were pretty meh for it, but worth a spin if you can
it.S.T.A.L.K.E.R is loosely based off of Roadside Picnic! Great game series and novel.
