Here’s something I didn’t know: The Mummy, the 1999 Brandon Fraser vehicle was based on a 1932 property of the same naeme. The property is being rebooted again by the original writer of Prometheus, the upcoming sci-fi film. With all this talk of rebeoots and 3D conversions, it’s hard to see any good in them.

It seems like games don’t do this quite as often, but instead just give the franchise another sequel. Remakes or more specifically, reimaginings, have the potential to be great. I really enjoyed The Mummy despite the fact that it was an action-adventure film and did not draw very much from the horror film it had been based on. This kind of genre-bending opens up new opportunities within the same space.

“More of the same, but bigger, better” has been the essential model for sequels in recent years. Halo’s core gameplay has changed very little in the history of its franchise yet it has remained extremely successful due to its ability to give people a more polished experience. Evil Dead 1 was essentially remade into its sequel. It was a strange experience, watching it for the first time and thinking “This seems awfully familiar…” yet the film lived up to the promise of the first movie, managing to become something completely different by its end, more bombastic and over-the-top than the first ever could have hoped for.

Adaptation can be a wonderful thing, since it gives people the opportunity to experience worlds in completely different lights. Halo attempted to make the leap into the RTS space with Halo Wars and though it was unsuccessful, it was an admirable attempt. I’d like to see more developers take risks like this, taking their existing franchises in new directions or starting from an old game and reimagining it in a new context.

[Via Slashfilm]