Reverse Flow

In past blog posts I've mentioned how movies influence video games, both directly (in the form of movie-tie-in games) and indirectly (in terms of game visuals).  There are even some cases where the flow of influence has reversed course after a fashion with video game IPs being turned into movies.  Off the top of my head Mario Brothers, Wing Commander, Silent Hill, Mortal Kombat, Street Fighter, Resident Evil, Tomb Raider and soon Sonic the Hedgehog all serve as examples of this sort of thing.  There are also indirect examples of video game concepts or aesthetics influencing films indirectly such as in the case of "TRON", "Scott Pilgrim vs the World", and "Edge of Tomorrow" (also known as "Live Die Repeat").  Having said all that, what about table-top RPGs?  Obviously, they have been a major source of inspiration in direct adaptations of Dungeons and Dragons computer games.  The same can be said for Shadowrun, and even the first Battletech computer game ever made - Crescent Hawk's Inception.  JRPGs (such as the Final Fantasy franchise) and CRPGs (like the Ultima series) were also influenced indirectly; particularly when it comes to mechanics.  But what about the other direction?

GURPS (or Generic Universal RolePlay System) by Steve Jackson games was designed as a one-size-fits-all set of table-top game mechanics with a variety of different thematic books sold separately from the fundamental rules.  Among what became a vast collection of setting material, there was one particular supplement based on Myth...or more specifically Myth: The Fallen Lords.  I must confess, I owned this book and no other GURPS products which (as you can imagine) meant that it was quiet impossible for me to actually play the game.  Nevertheless, it stayed on my bookshelf for a long time simply because it stood out as a lone example of a real-time strategy game turned into a table-top RPG.  Since that time though there have been more similarly produced games.

RUNE the video game and "RUNE" the table-top RPG were developed simultaneously with both making their debut in 2001.  The new Alien table-top RPG is derived not only from the films, but certain setting materials and gameplay mechanics come from Alien: Isolation as well.  CD Projekt Red seems especially fond of this sort of thing.  "The Witcher" series of novels turned into a trilogy of video games, and now even has a table-top RPG.  Their upcoming title, Cyberpunk, started off as a table-top RPG, then became a first-person action RPG, and now is getting a new version of the core rule book based on the expanded lore developed for the video game.  Even the indie game Hyper Light Drifter has a table-top RPG in the works thanks to a successful kickstarter project (although the results of the crowdfunding endeavor are pending as of the publishing date of this blog post).

Board games have followed a similar trajectory with OGRE being the earliest example that I can recall of a video game (metaphorically) ripping the setting and mechanics straight out of the cardboard box.  Since then there have been a lot of similar cases including, but not limited to, "Axis and Allies", "Catan", "Clue", and "Space Hulk"...not to mention some of the usual suspects like chess, "Monopoly" and "Risk".  More recently there are a number of cases where the opposite holds true.  Dark Souls, Bioshock, Assassin's Creed, Tomb Raider, World of Warcraft, Halo, Doom, and Gears of War have all gotten the board game treatment (albeit with some tweaks to make them work with dice, tokens and figurines rather than controllers, consoles and TV displays).

Needless to say, if you are an avid board game or table-top RPG player there are a variety of avenues in which you might entice video-game-playing friends to try out your non-digital hobbies...or vise versa.