

In this definition of "video game", I am purposely excluding visual novels. By
"video game", I generally mean anything you can play on a console (e.g. Chrono
Trigger, Final Fantasy, Kingdom Hearts, Fire Emblem, etc...).

So most anime that airs each season is adapted from some form of source
material, like a manga, a light novel, or a visual novel. Why aren't video
games adapted as often? Sure, there are a few out there ([Valkyria
Chronicles](http://myanimelist.net/anime/5507/Senjou_no_Valkyria:_Gallian_Chronicles),
[MapleStory](http://myanimelist.net/anime/2719/MapleStory), [Devil May
Cry](http://myanimelist.net/anime/1726/Devil_May_Cry), and of course Pokemon,
to name a few), but overall, anime adapted from games tend to be much less
frequent than those adapted from LNs or VNs.

Why is this? Why don't bigger title games (like the aforementioned Chrono
Trigger or one of the many Final Fantasy games) get full-length anime
adaptations? (I'm also not counting those [small
OVAs](http://myanimelist.net/anime/1751/Jikuu_Bouken_Nuumamonjaa) or [side
story series](http://myanimelist.net/anime/1157/Final_Fantasy:_Unlimited) that
have nothing to do with the actual in-game story either).


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Why don't more video games get full anime adaptations?


Data about anime adapted from video games does not always separate out genres
as you would like (you seem to be primarily interested in RPGs, but data about
anime adaptions may generally group RPGs along with other games such as
children's games, dating sims, visual novels, etc.), but according to page 8
of _Anime and the Visual Novel: Narrative Structure, Design and Play at the
Crossroads of Animation and Computer Games_ by Dani Cavallaro (Jefferson, NC:
McFarland, 2010) and [_Manga, Anime and Video Games: Between Adaptation,
Transmedia Extension and Reverse
Remediation_](http://www.tft.ucla.edu/mediascape/Fall2014_MangaGames.html) by
Stefan Werning,

> manga and anime based on digital games appeared much later [than video
> games]; for example, series like _Fate Stay/Night_ (2006) have been
> developed as adaptations of existing visual novels. . . . _Sword Art Online_
> (2009-2014), _Accel World_ (2012) and _Btooom!_ (2012) is constructed around
> a fictional video game. This phenomenon can be partially explained in the
> context of films referencing (digital) games as plot elements or even as
> narrative structures. . . . **adaptations** of popular game franchises such
> as _Super Mario Bros._ (Rocky Morton & Annabel Jankel, 1993) or _Street
> Fighter_ (Steven E. de Souza, 1994, Figure 2) **were first produced for an
> international audience** [in other words, not produced for Japanese
> demographics].

And according to Mélanie Bourdaa's "‘Following the Pattern’: The Creation of
an Encyclopedic Universe with Transmedia Storytelling," ( _Adaptation_ 6, no.
2, 2013: pages 206 and 211) and Werning,

> Even though many of the anime series represent adaptations of light novels,
> the games usually do not cover the “canonic” stories from the novels but
> rather pick up loose ends and elaborate on the characters, often in unusual
> ways, thereby adding to the **“multiplicity” of the franchise**.

Wikipedia's [List of anime based on video
games](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_anime_based_on_video_games)
evidences that the number of anime adapted from video games has been
dramatically increasing within the past decade. By "full-length" anime
adaptations, if you mean a TV anime of any length, including the current trend
of series that are 10 to 12 episodes in total, the number of these has been
**greatly increasing as compared to the situation in the 90s or the 80s**. It
is not an overstatement to predict that the percentage of all anime produced
which are video game adaptions is likely to rise in the next decade.

See senshin's answer to [Are anime that are not based on manga
common?](https://anime.stackexchange.com/questions/8237/are-anime-that-are-
not-based-on-manga-common/8240#8240): during the 2000s, anime adapted from
video games have maintained a sizable chunk of all TV anime produced and has
increased in percentage since 2006. **You can see in the graph that video
games have gotten adapted into anime more often than visual novels have**. See
also [Why does anime air in 4 seasons per year of ~13
episodes?](https://anime.stackexchange.com/a/22479/8134) and [What are the
reasons for producing short-form
anime?](https://anime.stackexchange.com/questions/17239/what-are-the-reasons-
for-producing-short-form-anime)


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Logically speaking, it's a game - therefore, its role is to make people play
it. Say you made an anime based on it, that may result in people playing the
game, but it would also result in paying weekly for the animators to work on
it (even though they already made plenty of money from the game itself). Also,
there's no point making one, as it would potentially give spoilers, as seen in
titles such as Final Fantasy and Kingdom Hearts, which both have in depth
stories. Remember, making a game is more complex and harder than animating.


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