The gaming community has seen a lot of bad adaptations over the years: Far Cry, Hitman, Lara Croft, the list of mediocre (or just plain bad) movies goes on.
A few good adaptations in recent years—such as Super Mario Bros, Sonic, Amazon's Fallout and Arcane—have lessened some of the skepticism that fans feel when an adaptation is announced, but the stigma surrounding half-baked video game movies hasn't completely disappeared.
This is why fans are skeptical of Justin Lin, who was recently announced as the director of the upcoming Helldivers adaptation. Lin has decades of experience in Hollywood, having directed several of the Fast & Furious movies (Tokyo Drift—Fast & Furious 6 as well as F9 and Fast X) and Star Trek: Beyond.
However, Lin isn't a gamer and has never played Helldivers. A paragraph from a piece by The Hollywood Reporter confirms this:
"Lin is not a gamer and has leaned into that strength when pitching his take on the material, said insiders. He aims to find the humanity in the characters and weave timely themes into the story, while building out a world and mythology. There are plenty of details waiting to be drawn in, something that is compelling...
