Movie Adaptations of Video Games That I've Grown Up With

Video games and PC games are a great source of inspiration for movie adaptations, with Mortal Kombat II releasing on 8th May 2026, and a great adaptation of Street Fighter on the way to redeem the lukewarm to poor reception of the first movie attempt in 1994.

Here are a few movie adaptations of Video Games that I've grown up with:

Popular Movie Adaptations of Video Games

1. Mortal Kombat 1995

Everybody from the 90s has a personal history with Mortal Kombat, whether it's the arcade version of the game, the one available for PCs, or simply talking about either, as the characters were fascinating for the time. The plot was compelling even though it was simple, and as with every PVP fighting game, the backstory of the character, cutscenes in the video game, and the powers added a lot to the gameplay and storytelling.

What was and still is unique in this franchise is the finishing movie that ended with 'ity' - Fatality, Brutality, Animality, and so on. The sheer gore in the computer for the time was very satisfying. There was an upper cut that would send the other player into another floor entirely with the sheer force of the hit.

Animality involved the player turning into some type of animal and killing the opponent as that animal in an attack. I don't remember the difference between the other two ity's, but Fatalility is shorter and uses weapons to kill the person. Brutality is a lot longer and, as the name suggests, a lot more Brutal and takes more keystrokes and skill to perform.

A spoof of a finishing move was babality, where the opponent was turned into a baby, inevitably making the players laugh or at least crack a smile.

Christopher Lambert as Raiden does a fantastic job of the character with cheese built into the role, along with more than a bit of the self awareness about how over-the-top things were in the movie. But the movie adaptation was pretty awesome for any fans of the games. I was playing the MK3 version at the time.

Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa is a legend who just passed recently. He added that X factor to the character of Shang Tsung, who is a warrior deriving his strength from the souls of all the ones he has vanquished. The late Tagawa was such an iconic actor in movies such as Showdown in Little Tokyo and the latest Netflix adaptation of Lost in Space.

Bridgette Wilson plays Sonya, who also played Adam Sandler's love interest in Happy Madison. Her arch nemesis was Kano, who joined the bad guys on the side of Shang Tsung.

This movie was everything for us, Mortal Kombat 3 computer game fans, and brought the game to life vividly, giving us a real-life image to which we could compare.

2. Mortal Kombat 1997

Mortal Kombat Annihilation gave us, video game and PC game fans, more of what we wanted, and it was awesome.

There was the ultimate villain, Shao Khan, who was a pretty powerful character in the MK games and is the leader of the villains in this movie. You get to see Jaxx get his bionic steel arms, and Liu Kang unleash his inner spirit force in the form of a massive beast, shown with impressive CGI for the time, and it holds up well even in the current day.

There is an interesting twist in this instalment with Lord Raiden losing his powers, yet still leading the champions of Earth against the bad guys of Outworld in Mortal Kombat for the fate of our Earth.

You also get to see Sektor and Smoke portrayed well in this movie, which is a lot of fun to watch. ( Gen Zers stay away from this!! - we millenials love this movie. )

Sektor's powers in the MK3 PC Game were shooting missiles from its torso, the straightforward kind, and then there were also heat-seeking ones. Smoke had the power of slipping down the screen and appearing below the opponent while rising from the sub-surface level.

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The soundtrack that had the cry of "MORTAAL KOMBAAT!!" was pretty good, and I think it is still awesome. I honestly can't remember how they were shown in this movie.

Coming to Jaxx, in the game, he has the power to grab the opponent with one arm, hold them up, and bloodily smash the opponent's head with his other arm. In this movie, there is an interesting twist regarding how he takes on his opponent in the final battle and wins.

3. Street Fighter 1994

The only game that could go toe to toe with Mortal Kombat was Street Fighter, and it has a similar gaming heritage as the MK games

While I have only played the 8-bit version of Street Fighter 3 and the PC Game Street Fighter X Tekken (2012), this Capcom game is pretty awesome and is a worthy competitor to the Mortal Kombat Franchise in the game. I've also played the Street Fighter X Tekken PC Game (2012 ) which came out at around the same time as Mortal Kombat X ( 2015 )

Ming-Na Wen has had a significant role in Two and a Half Men as Charlie Harper's girlfriend more than once and in The Mandalorian as the bounty hunter Fennec Shand. Kylie Minogue is also one of the street fighters, which is just awesome.

While I have seen the entire movie at one go on TV when it came out, I don't remember much of it. I loved how campy and fun it was. IT was a financial success, making over $100 million from a $35 million budget. But critics obviously did not like it, and the fans gave it a massive thumbs down.

In case you missed it, the familiar face you see as Ryu was played by Byron Mann, who also starred in The Recruit as Xander Goi. Yeah, that's him.

The practical effects in the movie are great, the performances are over-the-top as expected, but this was what the 90s were all about, so I loved it.

4. Resident Evil 2002

Most people knew this movie by the videogame including me, and I thought it did a marvellous job of portraying the game as a consistent plot onscreen.

Milia Jojovich cemented her role as an action hero with this franchise, although her action chops were thoroughly tested in the movie The Fifth Element.

The plot of the movie closely follows that of the PC game, where the evil Umbrella Corporation, who are creating bioweapons such as the now infamous fictional T-Virus, has gotten loose in an underground lab and infected everyone in the lab, turning them into either zombies or monsters.

The lead character, Alice, wakes up in a mansion that serves as the secret entrance to the sub-terrenean Lab and accompanies a tactical team to the lab to secure the situation, leading to an action-packed adaptation of an amazing PC game that has endured over the years.

The action is well done and a fair amount of suspense for whoever has not played the game. One of the CGI scenes where high-intensity lasers kill a main character is pretty cool and holds up well even now.

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5. Tomb Raider 2001

While Angelina Jolie's Tomb Raider might have come off as a bit campy, it still is the definitive version of Tomb Raider on the big screen, at least for me. The latest reboot with Alicia Vikander as Lara Croft in 2018 ( which I watched in the theater ) wasn't that great, according to me, with the pacing being slow and inconsistent.

The aesthetic of the first adaptation more closely matched the look of the videogame and this counts for something in my opinion. The critics reviewed this as being cheesy, over-the-top action, which I think makes sense for a PC Game.

I haven't played the PC game when it came out, but I thought it was very cool and is a franchise that is alive and well to date, with the latest versions coming out in 2026 and 2027 consecutively.

6. Super Mario Bros. 1993

This is one of those freaky movies that I would have loved to watch, but the timings and dates it was on were never convenient. It is both its so bad it's good and just plain weirdly good as a movie.

Everyone who's anyone born in the 90s with even a remote interest in video games would have played the Mario video game in one way or another. I myself started with the 8-bit video game, and then tried the computer version, which was either an emulator or an actual PC Game.

This movie does not remind one of the game in any way other than getting the colors of the Mario Bros. characters right. Everything else is completely different in this movie, and now I finally understand the backlash behind the 2016 Ghostbusters movie, although it deviated from the existing lore and legacy of movies with great actors who did the movie first.

The Super Mario Bros., however, had a much bigger responsibility to translate the vision of the video game into one for the big screen, and it failed spectacularly in doing that. There are no game elements in the movie that are shown in the movie, and the main plot is shown quite differently.

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Wrapping Up

Most of these adaptations have a B-movie rating among casual viewers and critics but have achieved cult status among hardcore gaming fans. For most others, these movies will fall under the so bad it's good category. Watch these if you have the time, I certainly do from time to time!