Despite numerous criticisms and lots of empty seats, Hollywood seems determined to try and nail a decent movie based on a video game. Most of these films are so bad that the Street Fighter movie actually turned out to be one of the better ones, especially considering serial game-license butcherer Uwe Boll and his unwatchable crap-o-rama.

It’s not all bad though. The first Tomb Raider was a decent effort and Silent Hill did the original games proud, by using elements of the games’ history and special effects, showing the town changing over to the hell version with atmospheric sirens marking the imminent change in suitably chilling fashion.

The noir-like Max Payne is the latest effort starring Mark Wahlberg, famous for his past roles in Boogie Nights, the remake of The Italian Job and The Departed.

He plays the titular character, a hard boiled cop seeking revenge against the people that murdered his wife and child.

Walhberg said: “It was great making Max Payne because I could get out there and do what the bad side of me would do, if something like that would, God forbid, ever happen to my family.”

The main selling point of the game at the time in 2001 was the ‘bullet time’ concept which evolved around the same time as the bullet-dodging sequence in the first Matrix movie. However, the decision to do a movie seems a little late in the day.

Fans that can remember the game may be wondering if the film will measure up.

Wahlberg adds “I read the script before I even knew it was based on a game, and then I looked at the game and I liked it. The film does the game a lot of justice but I had never played a game like it.

The games I grew up playing were like Pac-Man that had no story whatsoever, whereas this has a very elaborate story. So it is definitely going to satisfy the die hard game fans and hopefully will also bring in film audiences; maybe they will become fans of the game as well.”

It’s another angry cop role for Wahlberg who admits he’s so good at the role because he’s had his run-ins with them in the past: “I’ve been arrested so many times, there is a very fine line between cop and criminal.

“I think the cops are also the ones who have really hard lives.”

So what other game adaptations can we look forward to? The epic, Arabian adventure of Prince of Persia, starring er… Jake Gyllenhaal as the free-running, sword swinging Prince could be a catastrophic disaster.

On the other hand the upcoming Kane & Lynch film with the rumoured pairing of Bruce Willis and Billy Bob Thornton could be a great movie. Metal Gear Solid, Halo and Chun-Li (Street Fighter) are all getting the silver screen treatment too. It doesn’t look like Hollywood is quite ready to give up on games just yet.

Max Payne opens 14^th November