"I would love to make Dead Space, I'll tell you that right now," said John Carpenter last week, adding the celebrated director, expert moustache cultivator and avid gamer to the the swelling ranks of reputable film-makers (ie those whose names aren't spelled "Paul WS Anderson" or "Uwe Boll") who recognise games as another viable well of narrative inspiration – equal in richness, if not yet in popular reputation, to any other artform.

And it's difficult to envisage a director better suited or more qualified to interpret the dank corridors and squelchy, shambling horrors of the USG Ishimura. The Thing, The Fog and Halloween clearly influenced Visceral's icky franchise, and Carpenter's ideas feeding back into a mythology they helped create gives a pleasing sense of symmetry. His skill with suspense and body horror would serve a cinematic Dead Space better than any other director we can think of.

While, for now, Carpenter's Dead Space dwells solely in the realm of the hypothetical, we hope someone with a spare hundred million dollars or so takes a punt on it. It's a perfect fit. It also got us wondering which other film-makers would be best suited to gaming adaptations. We've got a few suggestions:



The Elder Scrolls: Skyrim – Guillermo del Toro

The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim: heavy on the dragons

Skyrim's tale of dragons and political power struggles doesn't seem like such a hard sell post-Game Of Thrones and Lord of the Rings, and while any of the Elder Scrolls games would be an ideal jumping-off point, Skyrim has dragons. And everybody loves dragons. Guillermo del Toro originally signed up to direct The Hobbit (before inner-studio politicking relieved him of the chance) so you'd think he's got a superb dragon-heavy fantasy bubbling away in him somewhere. A liberal sprinkling of sensibilities from the darker end of his oeuvre (like Pan's Labyrinth and the Devil's Backbone) could produce a dense, dark and thrilling epic.

Far Cry – Duncan Jones

Far Cry 3: journey to the heart of darkness

Let's forget for a moment that Uwe Boll has already made a Far Cry film – one so meritless it does you actual physical harm – and consider the potential of Far Cry 3's narrative. A group of teens captured on a Pacific island is held at the whim of an unhinged drug lord; Jason, the protagonist, abandoning his humanity, turns to murder and witchcraft in order to save them. It's a journey to the heart of darkness. With Moon, Duncan Jones explored the ramifications of one man's descent into ostensible madness. A similarly handled treatment of Jason, together with the adroit deployment of visual flair Jones once again exhibited in Source Code, would lend enough weight to Jason's journey to propose the same awkward insights into morality that the game almost did.

Slender – Jaume Balagueró and Paco Plaza

Slender: pervasive, suffocating sense of dread

When used deftly, particularly in horror, "found footage" can be incredibly effective. Slender, Parsec's free-to-play chiller, has you wandering alone in the woods as you're stalked by the faceless, sharp-suited Slender Man. You're not armed – all you have is a torch – so if you see him, you run, or you die. Your brief glimpses of him become more and more frequent as he moves in. He toys with you. He waits. It's bowel-looseningly terrifying: no gore, just a pervasive, suffocating sense of dread – one which Jaume Balagueró and Paco Plaza's REC, particularly in its unbearably tense later scenes, oozed. Fleshing out the backstory a tad, a found-footage Slender might be a bit Blair Witchy, but in the capable hands of the REC helmers it could be utterly petrifying.

Spec Ops: The Line – Kathryn Bigelow

Spec Ops: The Line: treatise on wartime morality

Spec Ops: The Line was one of last year's most interesting releases - a character study and treatise on wartime morality packaged as a gung-ho military shooter; more Apocalypse Now than Rambo III. In it, Dubai lies beneath the sands following a biblical sand storm, and your group is one of many fighting for survival in the wastes. The Line asks you to examine what each kill means, portraying its characters as affected by each life they take. Kathryn Bigelow's similar work on The Hurt Locker and Zero Dark Thirty might make her a bit of a route-one choice, but it's hard to think of anyone better.

Dishonored – Nicholas Winding Refn

Dishonored: could be a violent, uncompromising revenge movie

One of the surprise hits of last year brought us the skewed-reality setting of Dunwall, a swarming den of skullduggery, murder and intrigue. Corvo, framed for a crime he didn't commit, becomes an assassin of singular purpose – ruthless, yes, but necessarily so. With Drive, Nicholas Winding Refn trod similar ground, showing the hero committing savage acts of brutality for the greater good. Valhalla Rising and Bronson marked him out as no slouch when it came to design and visuals, too – in Refn's hands, Disonored would be a violent, uncompromising revenge mystery in a nihilistic yet beautiful Dunwall. That sounds rather good.

Tomb Raider – Danny Boyle

Tomb Raider: could become a darker tale of survival

It's certainly time for a new cinematic spin on the character of Lara Croft, sending the silliness of Angelina Jolie's efforts to the metaphorical step of shame where they can have a good think about what they've done. This year's Tomb Raider showed Lara's metamorphosis from frightened, defenceless youngster to double-hard grave-burglarising kicker of bottom. It was, in places, incredibly dark, asking questions about what it takes to kill, even if it only partially succeeded in answering them. Doing what you must to survive is a theme Danny Boyle's explored, from 127 Hours' self-amputation to 28 Days Later's less generous appraisal of the depths to which humanity will plunge. His kinetic visuals would not only give stylistic sheen, but also help convey the primal fear, instinctive violence and inner turmoil of Lara's journey, as they did with Aron Ralston's. Boyle wouldn't touch it in a million years though.

Uncharted – Shane Black

Uncharted 3: Drake's Deception: reluctant, bickering heroism

Silver Linings Playbook director David O Russell wrote a treatment for an Uncharted movie, with the intent of casting Marky Mark Wahlberg as Nathan Drake. "Creative differences" – that ancient chestnut – caused him to abandon the idea. Shane Black, currently riding the wave of success with Iron Man 3, would presumably write as well as direct, bringing the confident understanding of spectacle which runs through his recent work. Most importantly, he'd understand that the key to Uncharted is Nathan Drake's reluctant, bickering heroism. Black's work on Lethal Weapon, The Last Boy Scout and Iron Man make him the ideal choice.

Mass Effect – Christopher Nolan

Mass Effect 3: deserves Christopher Nolan's touch

There have been grumblings of a Mass Effect film since 2010, but little actual movement beyond that. It certainly won't be a cheap film to produce, but Ridley Scott's Prometheus, if a meandering mess, proved expensive, mildly portentous sci-fi can make money. Christopher Nolan would be the safest choice for Mass Effect: his Batman films were intricately plotted dramas sold as blockbusters; intelligence perfectly balanced with bombast. If he could repeat this trick, Nolan could deliver the thrills the Mass Effect universe demands without scrimping on the multifaceted plot. Interstellar, his next film, is a sci-fi epic. Let's hope he gets a taste for them.

Bioshock – Tim Burton

BioShock Infinite 3: could get the Time Burton tretment

Gore Verbinski (of dubious Caribbean Pirates fame) tried to get a Bioshock film off the ground in 2008, with budgetary concerns forcing him to abandon the project. This might, in hindsight, have been for the best. Tim Burton doing a better job than Verbinski could is by no means guaranteed, but he's mentioned here because the prospect of his visual eye falling on Rapture, throwing a gothic veil across the doomed underwater art deco dystopia, is tantalising. Burton does have something of style over substance about him, but if he could rein in his predilection for kitsch oddballity and bring the harder, nastier edge of Sleepy Hollow or Batman's grimmer moments, he could do ample justice to Andrew Ryan's legacy.

Halo – Neill Blomkamp

Halo 3: packed with aliens and explosions

Neill Blomkamp was actually in line to direct a Halo movie, but even the producing might of Peter Jackson couldn't get that particular ball rolling. Irritating, because Blomkamp (whose Halo disappointment led to him directing District 9) was an excellent choice, and proof is in the pudding of Bloomkamp's short Halo film. If you like (a) aliens, (b) explosions and (c) combinations therein, Blomkamp's Halo would have been right up your strasse.

Let us know your suggestions in the comments.