Chapter 918: Creating a Nostalgic Effect

Scarlett Johansson was also curious and immediately asked, "What's the reason?"

Duke thought for a moment and said, "Most modern video games have fairly simple plots, so when adapting them into movies, studios usually need to make certain changes to the story."

He shrugged. "However, from the players' perspective, they hope that a movie adapted from a game can recreate it to the greatest extent possible, respecting the original games."

"But the plot and settings of a game aren't necessarily suitable for a movie," Sofia Coppola said knowingly. "Games and movies are completely different mediums."

"Exactly." Duke nodded slightly. "And that's where the conflict arises. Mainstream moviegoers want a video game adaptation's plot to deliver more cinematic thrills. If you stick too closely to what the players demand, the movie will be restricted by the game's narrative settings, severely dragging down its quality as a film. But if you cater too much to the moviegoers, the gamers won't buy it."

Hearing this, Scarlett chimed in, "That sounds like a very difficult conflict to resolve."

Under these circumstances, a movie adapted from a video game needed to satisfy both mainstream moviegoers and the gamers. For film studios, striking this balance was incredibly difficult to manage.

Duke then brought up the adaptation of Resident Evil as an example. Relatively speaking, the film could be considered a success. Even if it hadn't made a massive amount of money, the studio had definitely turned a profit.

"The reason I bring up Resident Evil," Duke explained, "is mainly because the movie completely strayed from the game's core path. It ignored the feelings of the gamers entirely and went down its own self-indulgent route."

It was no exaggeration to say that deviating from the game's original setting was a crucial reason why the Resident Evil movie was relatively successful.

In the Resident Evil movie, the plot had nothing to do with the games. Because of this, gamers constantly ridiculed it. Making a completely unrelated movie under the game's title earned it the mockery of players, who called it a textbook example of a "bait and switch."

Thinking about it, even if a video game adaptation gained popularity by throwing out that balance, it would face the wrath of countless gamers. And if it didn't achieve massive success on top of that, wouldn't it just be destroying its own IP?

If a gaming IP could never earn the players' forgiveness, would they pay for it the next time around? The answer, of course, was no.

"Can video game adaptations ever escape the curse of failure?" As a fellow director, Sofia Coppola couldn't help but ask. "And how should they escape it?"

When bringing a game to the big screen, how could the adaptation be improved? Most importantly, Duke still believed the story should do everything possible to balance the needs of both the gamers and the mainstream moviegoers.

Since altering the plot was inevitable in adapting a game, studios could actually have film producers and game developers collaborate closely during the production process. A movie made this way would likely turn out much better.

Furthermore, during the filming and production of these adaptations, studios needed to find more competent actors.

By competent, he mostly meant that too many actors in video game movies had never even played the games. As a result, their performances—such as their expressions and movements—differed drastically from the original characters.

In a sense, the upcoming movies adapted from World of Warcraft and Assassin's Creed might represent a highly historic battle for video game adaptations.

World of Warcraft and Assassin's Creed were diamond-tier IPs with incredibly massive fanbases, and both featured rich storylines. This greatly reduced the pressure of adapting their narratives for the screen.

Without a doubt, this laid a solid foundation for their commercial success, and the constant delays for both projects were surely just to polish the films further.

However, in Duke's eyes, while these two movies might change the landscape of video game adaptations, they wouldn't become explosive mega-blockbusters even if they succeeded.

After attending George Lucas's wedding, Duke returned to the post-production of Star Wars: The Force Awakens. He specifically instructed Tina Fey to confidentially order a custom ring from Tiffany, so that it would be ready to use once he finished the hectic production and release of the film.

Because the dizzying visual effects in the Star Wars Prequel trilogy had caused dissatisfaction among many hardcore fans, Duke utilized a massive amount of practical shooting. During post-production, CG technology was often used to remove elements from the frame rather than add them.

However, this didn't mean that post-production visual effects shots were completely absent. From fleshing out environments to creating brand-new characters, almost no step could do without the magic of CGI. During the production phase, 128 shots were completed entirely through post-production effects, and the number of scenes exceeded at least 1,350. These included Kylo Ren's ship taking off from the Jakku desert toward the Star Destroyer, and the TIE Fighters returning to the Star Destroyer after a battle.

In other words, almost all shots involving Star Destroyers, TIE Fighters, and outer space were done in post-production. The characters of Supreme Leader Snoke, played by Andy Serkis, and the pirate Maz, played by Sienna Miller, were also created using visual effects.

For a film with such a massive fanbase, the creators bore immense risks, regardless of whether they chose tradition or innovation.

For example, the new Lightsaber design was quite controversial. Many fans sent emails to Duke and the other core creators, with some even claiming that "a design like this would end up killing the user." Duke repeatedly reiterated that the design was based on the operating principles of Lightsabers from previous works. The visual effects artists at the Industrial Light & Magic Company also constantly referenced the original Lightsaber settings during production, adjusting the overall look based on the environment and lighting in the film.

The sheer force of the Star Wars fans put the entire team under immense pressure. Whenever the crew released a character design, a poster, or concept art, countless fans would leave comments dissecting the material, analyzing it down to the smallest pixels. But this pressure was also channeled into motivation, ensuring that Duke and his team didn't dare slack off for even a moment.

Duke also demanded that the visual effects team's designs make absolutely everything look like a real world, rather than just fabricating an illusory galaxy.

Without affecting the final cut, Duke also appropriately sprinkled in elements during post-production that would create a nostalgic effect.

Planet Jakku, where the female lead Rey lived, was a desert world just like Planet Tatooine in Star Wars 1. It was far from the Empire's sphere of influence, and Rey lived there just as Anakin and Luke had.

Planet Jakku also held many relics from the Imperial era, such as the ruins of the massive triangular Star Destroyer and the four-legged All-Terrain Armored Walkers. The helmet Rey wore belonged to a Resistance fighter pilot, and her goggles were scavenged from an Imperial Stormtrooper helmet.

The Stormtrooper serial number for the male lead Finn, played by Daniel Wu, was "FN-2187." In the 1977 Star Wars, the cell block where Princess Leia was imprisoned by the Empire was also numbered "2187."

During one of Finn's filmed scenes, post-production technology was required to add Holographic Chess. Holographic Chess had first appeared in A New Hope. The same visual effects team that had created the sequence back then using stop-motion animation had now replicated the scene in The Force Awakens using the exact same technique.

The Floating Sphere that Obi-Wan had used to train Luke with a Lightsaber was also included in The Force Awakens by Duke. It still sat quietly aboard the Millennium Falcon, easily enough to make Star Wars fans instantly recall those classic scenes.

The Starkiller Base in this movie was the equivalent of the Death Star from the previous Star Wars films, though its destructive power was far greater, capable of draining all the energy from a star. Only Duke and a very select few knew that when George Lucas originally wrote the script for Star Wars, the name he had initially given Luke wasn't "Skywalker," but "Starkiller."

To cram these nostalgic elements into the film without compromising the quality of the final cut, Duke had racked his brains.

For instance, with the voices of Obi-Wan and Master Yoda, Duke simply arranged for them to appear during Rey's hallucination.

After the female lead, Rey, touched Luke's Lightsaber in the basement of the pirate Maz's castle, she would experience a vision, seeing the past, present, and future, and hearing the voices of Obi-Wan and Master Yoda.

For this specific scene, Duke had specially brought in Ewan McGregor and Frank Oz to record new lines for the film.

As for the line, "I have a bad feeling about this," it had appeared in every single Star Wars movie. Luke, Leia, C3PO, Anakin, and Obi-Wan had all said it, and The Force Awakens was naturally no exception.

The Resistance in The Force Awakens would also feature many familiar faces from the Star Wars universe. Nien Nunb had once flown the Millennium Falcon during the mission to destroy the second Death Star. Ackbar was a highly decorated admiral who had participated in the Clone Wars, the Battle of Endor, and many other conflicts.

Furthermore, while adding the voiceovers, Duke also included the famous Wilhelm Scream.

This wasn't entirely unique to Star Wars. The "Wilhelm Scream" was the distinct, melodramatic scream of a man. Back then, the sound designer for Star Wars used a pre-existing stock audio clip out of convenience, never expecting that sound engineers in countless other movies would later follow his example.

The entire post-production process lasted until mid-November. The moment all the post-production work was completed, Duke immediately released a public statement.