The shows pushing your buttons now? They were all video games once

Just last month, for one hot second, the internet was in grief. It felt like we were reliving the horrors of the Red Wedding—the brutal episode that shook Game of Thrones fans back in 2013. This time, we were watching The Last of Us season two, episode two. As a show based on a video game and clicker zombies brought us to emotional ruin, some remained smug over television’s biggest open secret. Those PS4 gamers? They saw it coming.

What began as a 2013 PlayStation game about Joel, a smuggler, and Ellie, a teenage girl (starring Pedro Pascal and Bella Ramsey in the lead roles) navigating a post-fungal apocalypse, has quietly turned into one of the best dramas on television today. And it’s no exception. Some of the most emotionally devastating, gorgeously crafted, pop-culture-shaking shows started life as video games.

Not so long ago, plot-driven shows meant stories that were most likely derived or adapted from books or comic books. These days, some of the most gripping story lines are sieved from video games. The Last of Us, the Emmy-winning post-apocalyptic drama streaming on JioHotstar, may not be the first, but it is the most impactful video game to turn into a show.

Immersive for gamers, and original for TV audiences, the second season’s finale—a strong contender to the former’s IYKYK cycle—ends on a cliff-hanger that leads the viewers to now follow a new character’s timeline, mirroring the plot of The Last of Us Part II game. It’s a bold move for television, and one that not only stays loyal to the original but also demands emotional buy-in from newcomers. “Every other character is written as they should be and doing their part well, but when your protagonist Ellie is destroyed to shreds, it just ruins the entire show,” says 24-year-old Bengaluru-based Krithika Bhat.

What’s making streaming platforms, film studios and the entertainment industry at large to increasingly turn to PlayStation, Xbox and Nintendo for inspiration? For one, they are not the video games of your childhood. Once dismissed as noisy, shallow, button-mashing adventures, video games today have evolved into sprawling universes with layered characters, sharp dialogue, strong narratives, and entire emotional arcs built around found families, betrayals, and existential dread. So, the leap to television feels not only inevitable but also overdue.

In 2019, two years before Arcane debuted on Netflix, the successful television adaptation of role-playing game The Witcher had already made it amply clear to streaming giants that gamers and viewers were hooked to a new genre. Arcane continued to pave the path for video game adaptations.

Based on League of Legends (LoL), a 2009 multiplayer online game by Riot Games, the show turned expectations on their head. The lore had always been vague in-game, but Arcane expanded it with stunning animation, fully fleshed-out characters voiced by Ella Purnell (Jinx) and Hailee Steinfeld (Vi), and an emotional narrative intact. Players who had spent years on Discord dissecting champion backstories finally got the payoff they deserved. Everyone else? They got a visually electric, emotionally grounded fantasy saga. (ICYMI, season two’s soundtrack just picked up an American Music Award.)

“They had a tough task introducing the viewers to the expansive universe of LoL and managed it incredibly well. What I love is how it sometimes even has you rooting for the ‘villains’,” says 24-year-old gamer turned viewer Siddharth Maddula.

This current generation of video game adaptations has one thing in common: they know the assignment. They respect the game’s world-building and the emotional weight that fans like Maddula bring with them. Prime Video’s Fallout nailed this in April 2024 when, instead of rehashing the 1997 game’s storyline, it leaned into the franchise’s tone—equal parts bleak, unhinged, and satirical—and gave long-time players satisfying nods to mutated cockroaches and vault life while also delivering on the drama, thanks to Ella Purnell (Lucy MacLean) and The White Lotus star Walton Goggins (The Ghoul).

The Witcher, though technically based on Andrzej Sapkowski’s books, owes much of its fanbase to CD Projekt Red’s 2007 game. The first season had fantasy fans buzzing. Henry Cavill played Geralt with perfect parts brooding and gamer credibility, a rare combo. But things began to unravel in season two. Fans felt it had veered too far from the source, and Reddit threads haven’t been kind. Cavill’s exit confirmed many suspicions. Liam Hemsworth will step into the lead role in season four, set to air this year, and the fandom is cautiously curious.

Of course, not all adaptations get a place in the hall of fame. This year, A Minecraft Movie, aimed squarely at younger fans of the globally loved 2011 sandbox game, felt like a pixelated sugar rush with little plot to chew on, box-office success notwithstanding. Until Dawn, based on the 2015 horror game, split audiences straight down the middle. Some loved the eerie expansion into Glore Valley. “I was pretty impressed with what they did,” says 22-year-old gamer Shyam Poduval of the adaptation. “Instead of just trying to replay the game beat for beat, they went for a new story set in Glore Valley. It let them expand on the creepy world we already love and bring in all those chilling elements, like the Wendigo.” For him, even viewers who have never picked up a controller will like it as “a solid horror flick”. Others shared The New York Times’ opinion that it was nothing more than a Goosebumps reboot with a bigger budget.

Meanwhile, Halo, the Xbox titan with a built-in fanbase and rich lore, stumbled by sidelining its protagonist and overstuffing it with new plotlines. But some fans lapped it up nevertheless. “The action and animation were great, and it felt like a faithful representation of the game in many ways. But it did veer off the original storyline. Some new characters took the spotlight away from the main ones, which was a bit disappointing,” says Sydney-based Nikhil Kundu.

Besides video games, even the video game industry is piquing interest on television today. Mythic Quest, Apple TV+’s workplace comedy set in a game studio, feels almost like an inside joke for game creators.

This April, Devil May Cry, a fast-paced combat game, dropped an anime reboot on Netflix, with Indian-origin director Adi Shankar at its helm. Long-time fans of the 2001 game were quick to point out character changes that didn’t sit right, like a flirtier demon-hunting Dante and off-canon quirks. It still holds potential, but it’s proof that when lore runs deep, fan scrutiny runs deeper. “They completely changed the characters’ personalities; there’s no flirting in the lore. Dante and Lady aren’t supposed to be what they were portrayed as,” says Siddharth Padwad, an exasperated gamer.

Still, the momentum is real. And the golden age of video game dramas has just begun. Tron: Ares hits theatres this October, and the internet is already buzzing to see what Jared Leto will bring to the neon grid. The Tron films have long held a place in the digital dreams of fans who grew up on light bikes and cybernetic wars. This third instalment is poised to blend that nostalgia with a new-gen cinematic polish. Because that’s the thing: Hollywood with its big budgets and special effects is the perfect medium to turn a slick video game with a complex storyline into an action-packed spectacle.

But ultimately, the best adaptations don’t just mirror the game, they also build on it. They bring in the world, the emotion, and the stakes without losing the spirit. What used to be seen as lowbrow entertainment now has the power to make people cry on a Saturday night over a fictional apocalypse or a malfunctioning vault door.

These shows aren’t just made for gamers anymore; they’re for anyone who has ever gotten attached to an enigmatic character, likes a good plot twist, or is looking for a perfectly timed soundtrack drop. Basically, all catnip for prestige TV. In the end, the formula isn’t complicated. Respect the fanbase. Understand the lore. Maybe hire a couple of nerds in the writers’ room. And one more thing: bring in some zombies.