The Kickstarter for the Blade Runner RPG blew past its $10,000 goal to become fully funded in just 3 minutes and has since unlocked over twenty stretch goals. Based on Philip K. Dick’s novel Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?, Blade Runner originally hit the big screen in 1982, and the franchise has since sparked novels, short films, comics, anime, and video games. Interest has even been especially reinvigorated in the past few years, with the release of Blade Runner 2049 and the current restoration of the 1997 Blade Runner point-and-click adventure game.
The Blade Runner tabletop RPG was originally slated for a 2022 release and was confirmed to be set sometime between the original Blade Runner and its sequel. Developed and published by Free League Publishing, the game will be set in the year 2037, directly following the release of Wallace Corporation’s Nexus-9 Replicants. Free League Publishing was behind a number of popular tabletop adaptations, including Mutant: Year Zero, Crusader Kings – The Board Game, and Alien: The Roleplaying Game which was based on another of Ridley Scott’s films. Free League Publishing is known for successfully adapting franchises into the tabletop format, so hopefully the studio’s Blade Runner RPG experience is no different.
According to its Kickstarter (via Game Rant), the Blade Runner RPG raised over $10,000 in just 3 minutes, fully funding the project in incredible time. Since the Kickstarter’s initial launch, nearly 10,000 backers have helped raise over $1,000,000 for the Blade Runner RPG, in which players will be able to roleplay in the “neon-noir streets of Los Angeles 2037.” The current pledges have unlocked 20 of the Kickstarter’s stretch goals, including the add-on of Chase Maneuver cards, an additional dice set inspired by the franchise, a newspaper handout, and NPC mugshot cards among many others. With 21 days left, the Kickstarter is still inching toward the four other stretch goals, which include Chase Obstacle cards, a digital artbook, a bonus character archetype, and a handout envelope.
Set 12 years before Bladerunner 2049, Blade Runner: The Roleplaying Game uses a ruleset based on the Year Zero Engine which was previously used in the ALIEN RPG, Tales From the Loop, and Forbidden Lands, but was customized for the dystopian future setting and Replicant-infested world of Blade Runner. Players will roleplay as a human of Replicant Blade Runner, attempting to solve an assortment of cases that, according to the Kickstarter, contain action, corporate intrigue, existential character drama, and moral conflict, akin to the two mainline films.
Kickstarter has been the stage for many fully crowdfunded tabletop games, including the Deep Rock Galactic Board Game and Marvel Zombies Board Game. Most board game adaptations of previously successful IPs have blown past their initial goal, like The Witcher: Old World Board Game which made $2.6 million on its first day. It seems the Kickstarter craze still hasn’t run dry, as proven by Blade Runner: The Roleplaying Game’s incredible day-one performance.
