The Until Dawn Failed Video Game Adaptation: A Perfect Case of Wasted Potential

Let me tell you one thing right away: The Until Dawn video game adaptation has nothing to do with the game. Now let’s look into how the Until Dawn failed video game adaptation is a perfect case of wasted potential that David F. Sandberg and the production companies should have thought about before. 

I guess you know the film’s plot, right? No? Okay, Clover and her friends went on a hunt to find her lost sister, Melanie, one year after her disappearance. They enter an abandoned visitor center where a masked killer does not spare them. They are forced to experience their deaths on loop, but in different ways. Each time, the death is different, but they have to survive until dawn.

A horror hit that had everything—until it didn’t

Until Dawn is a 2015 PlayStation game, loved by the fans for its cinematic gameplay and narrative complexity. The characters who needed to be saved until dawn were already developed, making it a natural fit for a film adaptation.

It seems understandable that the filmmakers wanted to give it a different angle and did not want to copy-paste the game’s idea, which might have infuriated some of the fans. Even the monsters aren’t the same, and the characters don’t appear fully developed, as they were in the game.

When we compare to other game adaptations that worked seemingly well, Five Nights at Freddy’s video game adaptation (2023) and A Minecraft Movie (2025) did pretty well recently. Just look at their Rotten Tomatoes Popcornmeter scores. Both films have an 86 percent score at the moment, and reviews full of excitement as fans are happy that they embraced the spirit and tone of the game’s source material. 

The Until Dawn game is more of a dynamic, choice-driven player experience with intense cinematic visuals that give the players a deep-immersive adventure. The formulaic slasher seemed to strip the fans of their right to make choices that didn’t resonate well with the audience, supposedly. However, there are other factors as well. 

A game built for film… or so we thought

President of Sony’s film division, Ashley Brucks, stated that she respects the game’s source material, but the film is a whole new approach to the game. It was later confirmed by the actor Peter Stormare that no matter if you are a game fan for many years or a new movie watcher, it will be a whole new ride, per IGN. 

“The movie is going to be full of fresh characters and victims in a brand new story loaded with twists.” [Source]

The game was an interactive story with genre-savvy horror tropes, but the star-studded cast didn’t do much to elevate the game’s storyline. It seemed the fans despised it for not being true to the source materials. I’ll let you know why fans hated it in the next section. 

Despite having a great chance of retelling the story with a fresh perspective, the film failed to capitalize on this natural fit, which appeared as a shallow retelling of the story rather than a powerful reimagining. 

The deaths were new, each time the monsters were new, which, I understand, certainly needed a heavy brainstorming session. But the approach that the director adopted, who is a big fan of the game himself, by taking the essence of the game and reinventing it with creativity, did not work out well.

Although he tried to give homage to the game, the selected elements did not match with the new elements tastefully. The film is good if considered a normal ‘film’ only, but not a good video game adaptation.

The death of interactivity

The interactive storytelling was the game’s strength, which could have been adopted in the film. Obviously, when a film is to be released in cinemas, the interactive and choice-driven nature of the video game is not embedded in the film.

An eight-hour game compressed into a two-hour film explains it all, but other video game adaptations like A Minecraft Movie or the upcoming FNAF 2 are also films that don’t offer the Butterfly Effect. 

Giving the viewers a choice to select the outcomes, just like other game versions have tried, such as Netflix’s Minecraft: Story Mode are good example of the said fact. But with a theatrical release, the Butterfly Effect is not possible. I get that. 

But you know what, regardless of having some good death concepts and great jump scares, the story became predictable, and the characters fell flat. The story’s complexity was based on the player’s choice of the next step in the game. Hundreds of players are choosing hundreds of options for the next step, and the inner desire not to let their character die was an excellent adrenaline rush that the game provided in real time.

In contrast, the Until Dawn film did not thrive on these elements. Viewers did not feel tension in the choice and had no emotional weight connected with their character’s death.

Flat characters, flatter stakes

Certainly, when players start the Until Dawn game, they have time to build the characters with their own choices. In the movie, it wasn’t the case. Several characters enter the scene and start getting killed- there is no time left for the audience to care.

First-time viewers might enjoy the film just for the sake of the film. However, the fans weren’t happy. For example, one Reddit thread had a comment,

“They slapped Until Dawn as the name, and tried to make it seem like it had some correlation to the game…No characters, no similar story, I mean the monsters aren’t even the same. It’s just the scam of trying to pull in more of an audience by using the name of Until Dawn.” [Source]

The game characters, such as Sam, Josh, and Mike, were not able to form relationships, and viewers didn’t get a motivation. The characters felt less relatable, mishandled, and the story less impactful. It was just like a normal horror movie where characters are in for something unfortunate, and the end result is predictable- they are all going to die. But here, we were only sticking to our seats to see if any one of them really survived as it was promised that the film would have a new perspective.

Horror without heart that made Until Dawn failed video game adaptation

Clearly, the psychological horror was missing, which the game excels at. There, I said it! The suspense that was commandingly built in the game was not there in the film. Excess dependency on jump scares and overt supernatural elements does not justify the film’s narrative, which should have matched the game’s. 

There is a controversial difference in the lore. The game’s element of players having the right to choose their own fate is there, but for the fans, who have to deal with the frustration that the character should have chosen this option rather than that, it is quite exasperating.

In the game, players have to pause the game and think about the choices that will lead them to the best course of action. Meanwhile, the time ticking plays another level of psychological horror upon the players that their character is about to die, and they have to think fast. It was a slow-burning phenomenon with tight-pacing situations. 

Instead, the film settled for jump scares and predictable sequences, losing the real feel. It lacked the atmospheric brilliance and detailed world-building that prioritized the players. 

Moreover, the film shows that the flesh-eating Wendigos are formed after they have spent a lot of time at the lodge, and they are consumed by fear, anxiety, and several details they have to go through. Clover was diagnosed with that, too. On the other hand, the game portrayed Wendigos as eating the flesh of another human being and becoming one as they were possessed by a Wendigo spirit. 

It is a good thing that the film shows more monsters than the actual game, which stands true to the fact that the film is different from the game. Probably, for that reason, the Wendigo concept is different, too. The death tricks were new, the horrifying creatures were bold. But it is just do-or-die in the film.

How? The game gives the player a chance to move on to the next character if the first one didn’t survive. The players can play until they’re all dead. In the film, the players have one chance. They still have to die, as it is an on-screen Butterfly effect, where no controller is given to the audience to make their own choices. 

In the Glore Valley, the film’s characters identify that they are in a time loop and make a strategy for everyone to survive. They start gathering clues, but all of a sudden, the plan is nowhere to be seen in the film’s third act. Exploring and working together was where the tension kept growing, and everything came out to be a mess. 

Just for the sake of giving a new perspective to the film, the screenwriters of the game’s adaptation found a chance to give us fresh twists on their established loop. Suddenly, the characters realize they don’t remember what happened the previous time! Are you serious?

Conclusion: Another missed opportunity in a long line

The teen slasher Until Dawn video game adaptation was here to make an impression. Several kills were too generic, apart from a few. Although the film did well on the technical level, unlike A Minecraft Movie, which showed a plethora of green screen mistakes. 

Given David F. Sandberg’s experience in the genre, I was expecting a bit more. A massive kill montage becomes a missed opportunity. Sandberg’s previous films like Lights Out (2016) and Annabelle (2017) were the best examples of the director’s ability to helm this one with superiority with redefining game-to-film adaptations. 

The chilly and snowy Blackwood Mountain did not impress this time, apparently that Hollywood tends to create an appeal to a wider audience when making game-to-film adaptations. The magic does not work for the game fans who have an overwhelming desire for the film to stick to the game’s source materials, just like Sonic and The Last of Us did.