Fake Video Games in Movies and TV

[shopkins]

I started by posting this video of "Doubt" for the Sega Genesis from a MTV Movie Awards sketch.

http://kotaku.com/5302000/the-lonely...the-video-game

I thought it was pretty funny. The joke is that it doesn't translate, but honestly I think the idea of protecting your altar boy is an interesting gameplay mechanic. A variation on protecting another character worked very well in ICO. I love the status bar, too. I wonder if they actually mocked up a level for that and how they did it.

But, that got me thinking, I know I've seen fake video games, with actual gameplay in other movies before. They did a whole wrestling game for The Wrestler, for example. What other ones have you seen and how detailed did they look?

[BorrowedAccount]

In Grandma's Boy the plot focuses around a game that looks like a prototype of... Prototype. Very similar, other than you can't throw fire and electricity in Prototype.

[ryborg]

I started by posting this video of "Doubt" for the Sega Genesis from a MTV Movie Awards sketch.

That was pretty good, but they got the joke backwards. You can't make what looks like a fun beat-em-up and look bored, saying it doesn't translate well. It would have been funnier if the fake game was literally nothing but unskippable cut-scenes of dialog and no actual player control.

[Captain Wrong]

I don't know about fake games for movies, but I love the number of games in movies, real or fake, that sound like 2600 Pac-Man. I don't know who decided that was the default videogame noise, but it seemed like it was the electronic Wilhelm Scream for a while.

Sorry for the OT.

[Clownzilla]

I don't know about fake games for movies, but I love the number of games in movies, real or fake, that sound like 2600 Pac-Man. I don't know who decided that was the default videogame noise, but it seemed like it was the electronic Wilhelm Scream for a while.

Sorry for the OT.

I notice that in a LOT in sitcoms. The sounds are always some generic 80's video game "laser" sounds.

[Cryomancer]

I think the sound issue is something to do with public domain sounds / all studios owning the same sound library stuff and searching "video game noise" or something.

The game in Grandma's Boy was actually called Demonik, and was being made by Terminal Reality. It was cancelled.

[mrmark0673]

there is that fake NES wrestling game in "The Wrestler", and then their was Bonestorm on the Simpsons: http://gamevideos.1up.com/video/id/5888

Buy me Bonestorm or go to Hell!

[Daria]

I remember there was an episode of Roseanne where they get a Super Nintendo. You never see the game they're playing, and although the sound effects are obviously Super Mario World she quotes something about finding a sword to become queen of the monkey people.

The Simpsons also had a great arcade game with some granny beating up robbers.

[namzep]

Grosse Point Blank had a cab of Doom in the convience store scene. Always wanted to play it after that until I found out it was a fake and never actually existed.

[MrRoboto19XX]

In Hackers, before they get down to hacking the gibson they play what I believe is a prototype of wipeout.

They changed the game around a lot, but the proto looks totally elite.

[Melf]

I always love how people playing handhelds in movies and on TV are usually playing systems with no cartridge inserted.

[CelticJobber]

There's an episode of Full House where Uncle Jesse and Michelle play Super NES with a Super Advantage stick, but game footage is never shown. But from the sound effects its obviously not a real game, and they talk about it having "intergalactic wombats".

The Super NES starts at about 1:00 in
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=li6tGDuVPtk

[Haoie]

The Simpsons is full of fake games.

Everything from Devil's Advocate to My Dinner with Andre.

[SegaAges]

In Hackers, before they get down to hacking the gibson they play what I believe is a prototype of wipeout.

They changed the game around a lot, but the proto looks totally elite.

In hackers, it was wipeout. It would be awesome if any game did their high scores that way, but I am guessing that the part they show there is facied up just a little bit

[NayusDante]

House M.D. had a running gag of House playing Metroid, with replaced sound effects. First, it was Metroid Zero Mission, and rolling into a ball was accompanied by a "death" sound. Later, House got a DS, and played the Metroid Hunters demo. A few episodes later, Wilson chides House's obnoxious behavior with "why don't you go play your Game Boy, or whatever it is when you want to shove people away," or something to that effect. A few episodes later, House has a PSP and some genric ATV game with no music, just a revving sound.

There's a pretty good Star Fox lookalike in Walt Disney World's Carousel of Progress. In the future, games apparently still have point systems. Oh wait, they updated it to say "today." I'm going to cry if and when they tear that thing down.

There was a pretty good episode of Doug where Doug wins a game console for walking into a store. Again, I think the pack-in game was a Star Fox lookalike, and he spent weeks trying to finish it. The arcade in Doug had some good ones, like Bag the Nematoad, and Dinosaur Parking, both of which were featured prominently in different episodes. Nickelodeon used to be full of video game references, like the Space Invaders clone on Rugrats, when Mr. Finster wins all that money from Pat Sajak. Are You Afraid of the Dark had an episode based around a fictional pinball table.

In the movie Camp Nowhere, kids build a "Defcon" command post controlled with NES pads to make it look like they went to computer camp. Complete with some generic Scorched Earth kind of game.

In the movie Driving Me Crazy, the goofy foreigner who invents a vegetable-powered engine is amazed with SMB3, and later notices a PlayChoice 10 cabinet running it in a bar. "Look, Zuper Mario Brozers!"

There's an independent film (it's on YouTube now, as in ad-supported) called GameBox 1.0 which is ENTIRELY focused on fake video games. I dare you to sit through the entire thing.

And of course, the greatest fake video game is... Star Trek's Holodeck. How could I forget the adventures of Captain Proton?

[Compute]

The NES game in The Wrestler is clearly based on the first Wrestlemania game.

How about Tron? Lightcycles, discs, Space Paranoids, etc although these games would exist later. Along the 'trapped in a video game' theme we could also include the game Arcade from the movie Arcade. It was a virtual reality game. And let us not forget eXistenZ, probably my least favorite David Cronenberg film.

The movie 'Big' features a graphical text-based adventure game which may or may not exist.

Don't Be a Menace.. shows the protagonist playing SNES and references 'sega cartridges', and there is a scene showing a game based on the Rodney King beating.

This Is Spinal Tap shows a Missile Command-type game for the TRS80, although i suspect this game exists IRL.

Do we want to get into "there was a kid holding a controller for 2 seconds in movie x" type stuff? If so I'm sure there are a ton more.

PS: I remember that Full House ep..and that Roseanne ep. Rock on.

[NayusDante]

The movie Evolver (Sci-Fi Channel Original, I believe) involved a contest at an arcade for the high score in some VR game. The prize was an evil robot that tried to kill everyone (the prototype "home version" of the game).

Also, the movie Cloak and Dagger is entirely based around a fake video game. Wasn't there a prototype rumored to have come from that?

[Blitzwing256]

how to make a monster was based around a company trying to rush out a video game, the scenes of the game were a very crude doom clone, but if you look carefully at the screen some of the "demons" were actually pikachu's (good movie btw)

[ironpunch]

In South Park there is the Heroine Hero video game

[NESGamer24]

I remember in the movie Surf Ninjas the one kid is playing Surf Ninjas on Game Gear. Now I know they released a Surf Ninjas game but I dont believe it was the same as he was playing out the exact thing that was happening in the movie and he knew where the bad guys would be.