Books Inspired By My Favorite Video Games

Today’s post is inspired by Let’s Talk Bookish hosted by Rukky and Dani. It is also inspired by the challenge prompt Page to Screen for Wyrd and Wonder (but I obviously flipped it).

I love to read. I love to play video games. Today, I get to combine both! We all know there are plenty of movies and tv shows based on books. There are video games based on books (The Witcher). But did you know there are also novels based on video games? There’s actually a surprising amount of books based on video games out there. I could write an exhaustive list on them, but Wikipedia already did it for me, so instead I’m sharing book series that I want to read that are inspired by 5 of my favorite video games! 

[How I structured this: The titles of each book is a link to either Goodreads or a fandom wiki, below that I give 3 descriptions I associate with the video games, then I give some of my own commentary, then some art from the video games. I wanted to clarify this since I haven’t read any of these books, so I don’t know how similar or good they will be compared to the video games I love]

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DISHONORED
THE CORRODED MAN | THE RETURN OF DAUD | THE VEILED TERROR

Industrial with a dash of plague | Stealthy killer with cool magic tricks | A paranormal element

Dishonored is such a good video game series. This is the perfect game if you love story, love magic, and aren’t that great at video games. You can be stealthy or go in guns blazing, it’s up to you. Plus, the steampunk setting is amazing. Anyways, back to the books. I actually had no idea there were books based on this game so when I saw it on the list, I was so excited. Even better, there are three books! The first book bridges the gap between Dishonored and Dishonored 2; book 2 takes place during Dishonored 2; book 3 takes place after the events of Dishonored: Death of the Outsider. So, it seems like its not exactly a series you can read without having playing the games – but you should play the games if you’re even remotely interested! Trust me.

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BIOSHOCK
RAPTURE | MIND IN REVOLT 

Retrofuturistic world | Totalitarian dystopia | Freaky bad guys

I have to admit, I have not played the original Bioshock games, but I have played Bioshock: Infinite and boy is it good. I absolutely love the retrofuturistic setting of a city in the sky in 1912 (the setting for the first 2 games is an underwater city in the 1960’s). Infinite was super fun and is another game that I think even those who aren’t too good at games can play (let’s be honest, most of the games I play will be good for those that are bad [meaning you can mostly spray bullets and kill things, or sneak around and avoid things, without dying]). The 2 books are set at different times. Rapture is a prequel to the first game, Bioshock. Mind in Revolt is a prequel to Bioshock: Infinite.

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BORDERLANDS
THE FALLEN | UNCONQUERED | GUNSIGHT

Unique art | Big gunz | Cute robots

Borderlands is an iconic game – and one that I love but have never finished. This game is actually quite hard for me to play by myself 😆 I die a lot and end up getting sidetracked (I am a completionist when it comes to video games). But the post-apocalyptic world is so me I love it. The Fallen is a prequel focused on Rolands backstory; The Unconquered focuses on more of the characters from the game (I couldn’t find a definitive answer for when this book takes place); the last book, Gunsight, takes place between Claptrap’s New Robot Revolution and Borderlands 2. 

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ASSASSIN’S CREED
GOODREADS

Time-travel | Stealthy killer | Evil corporations

AC was one of the first games I played that wasn’t Mario. I love it. I haven’t played all of them (because, man, there are a lot of games) but my favorite so far has been Black Flag (helloooooo pirates!). Anyways, as I said there are a lot of games (12 main games, and 12 spinoffs)…well, there are even more novels and the breakdown isn’t as straightforward. So, I’ll try my best…

PUBLISHED

• • • • • The main series – so far 11 books with more on the way
        • The official movie novelization
        • AC: Fragments – French YA trilogy, only first one is released so far
        • Valhalla: Geirmund’s Saga
        • The Last Descendants – a YA trilogy
        • A large selection of comics (it’s a lot, so I don’t want to list them here)

UPCOMING

• • • • • Mr. Men and Little Miss – children’s book
        • The Ming Storm – the first in a trilogy set in Japan
        • The Imperial Jade Seal – an upcoming series of 10 books focusing on Chinese history (I’m not sure if this will be released in English)
        • Untitled Valhalla trilogy
        • Untitled trilogy from Aconyte Books

I tried my best to summarize the novels, but if you want a more comprehensive list, here’s a great source.

*Image from AC: Black Flag

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ELDER SCROLLS
THE INFERNAL CITY | LORD OF SOULS

High fantasy | A huge world | Freedom

Disclaimer: I have only played Skyrim. Which I have never completed because as I said earlier, I am a completionist. If any of you have ever played Skyrim, then you know that it is so easy and nearly impossible to actually complete everything in it. Now, it’s been so long since I picked up this game, I’ll probably have to start over (oops). Anyways, because of that, I’m not super familiar with the backstory of Elder Scrolls so I don’t know where these books fit in, but those covers are pretty and give me Lord of the Rings vibes. Either way, I love the world, its vast with so many options so I hope these books really take advantage of that (they don’t have great reviews though, eek).

Those are some of my favorite video games with books based on them! Have you played any of these? Do any of them intrigue you? What do you think of books based on a visual media (tv show, movie, game)?