Game of the Year 2024 – Best Video Game Adaptation
It definitely feels like Hollywood and TV companies have figured out video games in the last few years. No, they don’t always get it right, but between huge, blockbusting animated films for Sonic and Mario, and TV and streaming series like Castlevania, The Last of Us and the following selection of shows, we’re a world away from the bad times of Doom, Prince of Persia and Mario… the live action one.
The Last of Us changed gaming in 2013 with its unparalleled story telling and, a decade later, HBO’s The Last of Us rewrote the script on how to make a TV adaptation of a video game. The team behind Amazon’s Fallout TV show were clearly taking notes, as it does exactly what The Last of Us did, taking the world of the game for your setting but make sure to focus on the characters. We follow a trio of protagonists, all of which were created for the show but are based on archetypes found in the games, with their stories crossing over at various points as the mystery of a vault is gradually revealed.
The show also has a strong emotional centre which unexpectedly comes from Walton Goggins’s character, the Ghoul. The radioactive gunslinger is the star of the show, his tragic story from television star to reviled outcast is spread across the episodes and neatly dovetails in the story of Lucy, played by Yellowjackets’ Ella Purnell. Rounding out the trio is Aaron Moten who manages to bring to life the weakest of the three, Maximus, a squire of the Brotherhood of Steel who steals a set of Power Armour after Knight Titus exits stage left, killed by a bear.
Everything you love from the franchise is on screen, even down to the smallest detail like the door handles being the same as in the game, it is extraordinarily faithful to the games but is careful to keep the fan service to background details. The show doesn’t shy away from some spectacularly gory sequences which like the game are mostly played for laughs but there are some very real moments of danger, the psychotic Snip Snip, a
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