The box office bomb that is Borderlands isn't scaring producers away from the whole video game movie adaptation trend right now in Hollywood. In fact, The Hollywood Reporter has just revealed that there's a new live-action movie adaptation of the Sega video game Eternal Champions.
Industry veteran Derek Connolly, whose perhaps best known for his work on the Jurassic World movies, has reportedly been tapped to write the Eternal Champions movie for Skydance. Toru Nakahara, who oversees the Sonic the Hedgehog movies, will act as one of the film's producers. David Ellison, Dana Goldberg and Don Granger will also produce for Skydance.
While video game adaptations have found success in recent years both on the big screen and through streaming, an adaptation of Eternal Champions feels like a bit of a head-scratcher. For starters, it's a fairly old game, having been released for the Sega Genesis back in 1993.
Following the massive success of Street Fighter II (1991) and Mortal Kombat (1992), Sega tried to capitalize on the industry's fighting game trend. The game did try to set itself apart, however, by putting more of an emphasis on the story and incorporating characters inspired by different time periods.
Plot details for the movie haven't been revealed, but the game's story revolves around a god-like Eternal Champion who tries to restore balance to the world with a martial arts tournament featuring warriors drawn from various periods in history. The game synopsis reads:
Unjust deaths were dealt upon nine of history’s greatest and most influential warriors, and the future now stands at the brink of chaos. The Eternal Champion has summoned the souls of the nine and placed them in competition. The winner will be rewarded a second chance to prevent their own death, and in doing so restore balance to a desperate world.
Some of the characters featured in the game include Larcen Tyler, a former cat-burglar from 1920s Chicago; Midnight, a vampire-like mutant hiding in Vietnam, Slash, a prehistoric hunter from 50,000 B.C.; R.A.X., an American cyber-kickboxer from 2345 A.D.; and Shadow Yamato, a ninja assassin from modern-day (1993 A.D.) Japan. As you can see, there's no shortage of intriguing characters who can be brought to life on the big screen, although we don't know just how closely the movie will follow the game (see Borderlands, for example).
While the game saw strong sales and positive reception upon release — enough to warrant a sequel, a remake, and two spin-offs — Eternal Champions hardly has the brand recognition of fellow fighting games like Street Fighter and Mortal Kombat. Of course, I'm sure it helps that these franchises have seen consistent releases through the years. In comparison, Eternal Champions was added to the Wii's Virtual Console in 2007 and then included in the Sega Genesis Mini in 2019.