7 Best Open-World Games Based On Movie Franchises, Ranked

It’s not unusual for video games to pull inspiration from movies. In the past, there have been some strange movie tie-in games, but there have also been some pretty great movie tie-ins that have exceeded the movies that inspired them.

There’s a certain allure to movie-based video games as they finally give fans the chance to live within that world, perhaps none more than the open-world games based on the movies that came before. An open world can give players the time to explore the world in their own time, and the best are often packed with plenty of content for newcomers and fans to enjoy. Read on below to see what some of the best open-world video games based on movies are right now.

7 Mad Max

Metascore: 69

The Mad Max movies have inspired some truly great games, so it only felt right that the video game industry rewarded the character with a game of his own. Enter Avalanche Studios, who pieced together one of the best post-apocalyptic open worlds fit to entertain fans of the series and newcomers alike.

Mad Max is a game that embraces the utter lunacy and violence the movie series is known for. The game’s open-world wasteland is a great backdrop to the game’s story and the balance of up-close and personal combat, gunplay, and the weighty car combat all feel in line with the series’ best parts. It delivers everything a fan could want, but goes a good deal further thanks to the ruthless combat and creating an integral relationship with Max’s car, the Magnum Opus, in order to survive this relentless wasteland.

6 Disney•Pixar Cars

Metascore: 71

• Platforms: PC, Wii, Nintendo GameCube, Xbox, Xbox 360, PlayStation 2
• Released: June 6, 2006
• Developers: Beenox
• Genres: Racing, Adventure

Back in the early 2000s, movie tie-in games were fairly common. Another thing that was common about them was that they tended to be games that didn’t warrant the price of admission. So it was a pleasant surprise when gamers were delivered an open-world tie-in game that not only followed the movie’s story but was also a good deal of fun to play.

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Disney/Pixar Cars was undoubtedly a good racing game, but what made it great was the combination of solid driving mechanics and an open world that had plenty for players to do. Whilst it was a joy to cruise around the Hub world, there was a good variety of activities to tackle, whether that was tackling mini-games like tractor tipping, racing in Piston Cup circuit races, or even transforming into a monster truck version of Lightning McQueen for some monster truck races. There was always something going on in Radiator Springs.

5 Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora

Metascore: 72

When Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora was unveiled, it drew a lot of comparisons with another Ubisoft first-person open-world series, Fary Cry. Though the game does share several similarities with the shooter series, Massive Entertainment clearly understood the source material and crafted one of Ubisoft’s most immersive worlds for fans of Pandora to get lost in.

Thrusting players into the large blue feet of an escaped Na’vi, Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora sees players aligning with the other Na’vi clans to learn their ways, become stronger, and lead them against the occupying RDA forces still polluting and harming the planet. The game can be a bit slow to get going, but the game gives players access to their very own Ikran, Pandora really opens up. Soaring throughout Pandora grants fans a true look into the beauty of this sci-fi planet and, with the open world littered with just about everything, from plants, skill points, gear, and even sight puzzles, it’s hard not to get sidetracked by the sheer amount of content on offer. It may not feature the strongest of stories, but it has an impressive open world, and it’s a game that allows players to fully immerse themselves in James Cameron’s renowned sci-fi epic.

4 Middle-earth: Shadow of War

Metascore: 80

Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor was a breath of fresh air for games set in Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings universe. The first entry in this gaming duology featured a great dark open-world and introduced the beloved Nemesis system to players, but it was the game’s sequel that upped the ante in every way, delivering a sequel that went above and beyond what players could have hoped.

Middle-earth: Shadow of War didn’t just raise the bar, but obliterated it. The scale of battles was upped, a more diverse landscape was introduced and players got to fight against well-known series figures, including the Witch-King of Angmar. The game still retained some of the best flashy combat seen in open-world games to date. This time around, Monolith introduced fortress sieges that saw Ranger Talion assault fortresses with his amassed orc armies in large-scale battles before battling the fortresses’ overlord. These action-packed assaults created some truly memorable battlefield moments that begged to be tackled again and again.

3 Spider-Man 2 (2004)

Metascore: 83

A game that is held close to many gamers’ hearts, Treyarch’s movie-tie-in game for Sam Raimi’s spectacular Spider-Man 2 was a certified hit. The game went above and beyond what many gamers had hoped with Treyarch creating an open-world New York City for players to swing and thwip throughout.

As fun as it was just to traverse the city, the game packed a fairly robust campaign that closely followed the film’s plot but also added in a number of well-known Spider-Man villains to tussle with and plenty of spontaneous crimes to stop along their travels. The combat was simple, yet effective and the good amount of collectibles and side tasks to get distracted with meant the city felt like it was full of options for a budding Spider-Man to entertain themselves with.

2 Hogwarts Legacy

Metascore: 84

Ever since the first Harry Potter film was released all the way back in 2001, fans of the series had been dreaming of the day they would get to be a student of Hogwarts and practice the magical arts. Over the years, there have been a range of Harry Potter games, all varying in their quality. It wasn’t until 2023 that Avalanche Software brought many fans’ visions to life with the stellar Hogwarts Legacy.

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The game allowed players to live their wildest Harry Potter fantasies; being assigned their house, exploring the halls of Hogwarts, learning incantations and so much more. It’s a world packed to the brim with stuff to do. What makes it a great game is that it focuses on being a great magic-based RPG first and a Harry Potter game second. The combat is fluid and responsive, the exploration is a joy thanks to flight lessons, and there’s a good range of great quests to get involved in that weave gamers into the wider wizarding world.

1 Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic

Metascore: 94

Seeing Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic sitting at the top of the list is probably a surprise to no one. When a game that came out just over 20 years ago is still being talked about as one of, if not the best Star Wars game out there, it has to have done something right.

BioWare’s Sci-Fi epic RPG is a fantastic example of what makes the Star Wars universe so exciting. It has solid RPG combat, a spectacular story and hours upon hours of great content to get swept away in. The game lets fans live out their inner Star Wars fantasy by becoming a Jedi, visiting iconic planets such as Tatooine and Kashyyyk, but also putting them front and center in a compelling story that’s reactive to their actions and responses. It’s worth noting that Respawn has been coming close to the standards laid out by Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic with their current duology of Jedi games, but they just don’t quite hit the same level as this excellent open-world RPG.

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