Borderlands follows the familiar path of many popular video game franchises that have been adapted into edge of your seat, nail biting action films. There are various approaches to these video game to movie adaptations depending on how much they embody the distinctly video game elements of their source material. Is the film then a filmed video game or a movie based on a video game? Does one pay homage to the other or does each narratively format function autonomously? How much should the film appeal to gamers compared to film viewers who’ve never played the game before? All these are valid considerations.

Borderlands cowriter/ director Eli Roth set out to make a movie than a video game, but its gaming roots are apparent. Here are some of the main aspects of video game formats that make their way into the movie:

1) Format

Borderlands, the video game, is built as an action, first person, role playing, looter shooter game. That’s a lot to remember. Let’s break these terms down and explain how they relate to traditional film narrative structure:

2) Genre

Action clearly relates to the genre, and unsurprisingly, contains a lot of combat sequences. The movie has expanded on it by infusing it with more adventure, comedy, and dramatic character elements. Hybrid films genres are a movie staple while gamers generally go for a single defining genre.

3) Backstory

Borderlands has a simple premise of late-stage capitalism gone rogue. It defines the tone and expectations of the game.

A handful of megacorporations control the universe and set out to colonize Pandora to extract its perceived mineral wealth. The Eridians are extinct and the indigenous monsters are too dangerous to successfully colonize the planet.

References to these elements are made in both the game and the movie to create a context and basis for the story to proceed.

Lilith (Cate Blanchett), Roland (Kevin Hart), Tiny Tina (Ariana Greenblatt), Krieg (Florian Munteanu) & Tannis (Jamie Lee Curtis) Photo by Katalin Vermes

4) Quest

A video game is broken down into quests or series of tasks that must be completed in order to complete a level. Then, players can advance to a more perilous and difficult one. A level might be considered to be similar to a scene or sequence in a movie although it’s more compartmentalized in a video game.

Watching a film is a passive experience because audiences don’t directly influence the story outcome. There is no joystick controller.

In screenwriting terms, the progressive quest/ level difficulty might be perceived as the relationship between a character, a goal, and increasingly difficult obstacles and stakes that they face.

This is more visceral in a video game and is frequently based on a literal life or death situation. It can take on a somewhat more metaphorical meaning in film where the stakes can be physical, emotional, and spiritual.

A character’s goal is typically stated at the start of a film and remains reasonably constant. Although the concept of quests and levels are terms exclusive to games, there is sufficient conceptual overlap between them and film to identify a single story goal.

5) Open World

An open world is a gaming term that refers to locales that can shift between universes and timelines as players move between levels. In many games, players can choose their world to play in. Not so in a movie version.

There is a well-defined world in both game and film here. The planet is a wasteland called Pandora and Borderlands lies in its dreaded outer reaches where most of the film’s action is set. The game is more expansive in its locales.

6) First Person

In film parlance this is analogous to a main character or a protagonist. They have a goal, they have obstacles, and they either achieve their goal or they don’t. The story is told from their point of view. Lilith is dangerous because she’s bored. She’s vowed never to return to her home planet of Pandora (until she does) and she doesn’t have much to live for.

In both the case of game and film, Borderlands follows bounty hunter Lilith (Cate Blanchett) who was born on Pandora and has a shady and mysterious past. Her goal is to find thirteen year old Tiny Tina (Ariana Greenblatt) somewhere in Pandora, the outer planet wasteland where Lilith was born and vowed never to return.

7) Role Play

These are the character-building moments and refer to how characters interact with each other in games. Let’s be clear. Video games typically do not contain layered characters and they generally function as archetypes. Friend or foe. The film adaptation grants the space to add limited texture and nuance to certain characters, but not too much so it maintains its “gamey” feel.

Borderlands contains a palette of colorful and vibrant stock characters. Lilith is a jaded, scarred hunter who uses violence to mask her emotional pain. She was abandoned by her mother and raised by archeologist Tannis (Jamie Lee Curtis) who often let Lilith fend for herself while she pursued her true passion of exploring the universe and its treasures.

Lilith initially meets Atlas (Edgar Ramirez), the cruel and most powerful corporate overlord of the universe in a bar. Her interaction with him is transactional. He pays her. She goes on a mission to a place she despises. There is very little character development here. Lilith doesn’t hate Pandora any less, but she acknowledges that it’s her home and worthy of saving. That’s as close to an arc as we see.

Tiny Tina (Ariana Greenblatt), the precocious, teenaged demolitionist refuses to return to Atlas. She’s everything a rebellious teenager should be. She pushes Lilith’s buttons, tests her patience, and triggers her childhood traumas. This is definitely more film territory thematically as their mother-daughter dynamic is explored.

Tina is surrounded by a motley crew of misfits who function as stock characters. They’re a ragtag team of misfits ― Roland (Kevin Hart), once a highly respected corporate soldier, but is now desperate for redemption and switches sides, Krieg (Florian Munteanu), Tina’s muscle bound bodyguard  and Claptrap (Jack Black), a persistently irritating, wise-cracking robot who commutes on one wheel and the others often leave him behind. Ask him how he removes bullets after a relentless shooting spree.

This team is often seen in found family films. Characters are often grouped according to skills and experience and what they bring to the overall mission.

The aim of video games is to keep the action moving more than developing chapters.

8) Looter Shooter

This is also a game trope that lends itself to shoot ’em up films like Shoot ‘Em Up. Characters complete one level and progressively gather (or lose) more powerful and sophisticated weaponry. This extends into equipment, powers and other elements to benefit them.

Games often rely on hidden vaults and treasures that two or more parties seek. Secrets and clues are unlocked by solving puzzles or good ol’ armory.

Looting is when characters pick up tools and use weapons or treasure dumped or lost by their opponents. They are often known as “loot drops.”

These components are liberally peppered into the film adaptation of Borderlands.