Adaptations Across Media

When a book has an upcoming adaption, it’s mostly met with both excitement and wariness from fans. Certain things simply do not translate well across differing platforms — live-action interpretations may not capture the whimsy and movies are likely to omit certain scenes to save for time. Most significantly, outside of dialogue, words are lost. However, I would argue that if a piece truly must have an adaptation, let it be in the form of a videogame. There are plenty of games that are narrative and text driven, like the acclaimed title, Disco Elysium — the RPG known for its writing. The words of an author can be saved, and it’s done so in an indulgent medium that allows fans to wholly immerse themselves in the fictious worlds they admire. Videogames have so much potential to make a great adaptation, especially due to the freedom modern technology allows. But direct adaptations come far and few, and are much less common now than

In the late 80’s to the mid 90’s, two literary works of which I admire were digitised in the form of a point-and-click adventure. Neuromancer and I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream. Now, admittedly, the former is not an exemplary adaptation. More accurately, the game is described as being loosely based on the novel. Certain main characters reappear and the setting is the same, but the storyline differs. Although in the text box — a hallmark of its age in videogame history — sentences taken from Neuromancer itself would spew, like the opening line “The sky above the port was the colour of television, tuned to a dead channel.”.

But Harlan Ellison’s I Have No Mouth but I Must Scream is the home to my favourite adapation. For one — Ellison himself worked on it very closely, as to not soil the literature of his creation. His approval for Cyberdreams to adapt his short into a game comes to a surprise to many, considering his disdain for the medium: he mentioned in an interview with Night Dive Studios, that he takes “silent pleasure” when he sees a kid with his nose in a videogame, running the risk of being hit by a van. Which checks out, considering the only game he has played was 1993’s Jurassic Park — and how he has made his views on the misuse of technology very clear. While I doubt videogames will directly lead to the inception of AM, he does think that technology has better use than to jerk thumbs. But he’s worked on various forms of art, so when the opportunity arose for him to sit alongside a videogame developer with his typewriter, he took it.

As opposed to the short story, the main cast of five were considerably more fleshed out as characters. During development, Ellison was questioned on why these people were saved — and in response, he gave them each elaborate backstories, enough to fill up an entire segment of a game. From Gorrister to Ted, players would assume control of them and complete personalised sequences of events about their shortcomings. He aimed to add depth to the pixelated characters on our screens, a quality that is “generally fairly superficial in videogames.” (I can assure you that this is miles less of a problem in this day and age — I wish he were alive for Disco Elysium, Fear and Hunger, and Silent Hill 2 — but this is a tangent saved for another day). Ellison’s contempt for gaming is made clear, but his critical attitude towards it did the adaptation justice. Mechanically, it may not be revolutionary; it is a point-and-click after all. Puzzles designs were horrid — perhaps not as convoluted as Grim Fandango — true to the fashion of 1990’s adventure games.

A notable gameplay element is the “spiritual barometer”, reminiscent of Fallout’s karma. Do good or do evil, and your playthrough will alter accordingly. Much like the end of the original I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream, the different outcomes of the videogame as miserable as the last. It’s simply impossible to fully win — his works are meant to provoke, and this game was “meant to frustrate the crap out of people who play it.”. Harlan Ellison is an author I look up to — he’d probably hate me for my love of videogames, but nevermind that. If you want to play this adaptation for yourself, head on over to Steam! The Neuromancer game is free on My Abandonware (a holy grail of a site), if you happen to be curious about that too.