A Blade Runner tabletop roleplaying game, slated to be released in 2022, will take place between the original Blade Runner and Blade Runner 2049 films. Based on the novel Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? by Philip K. Dick, both neo-noir science fiction movies take place in an alternate dystopian future where rogue replicants–androids nearly identical to humans–are killed by officers called blade runners.
Because of the alluring story and Ridley Scott’s original movie staring Harrison Ford, the Blade Runner franchise remains extremely popular. The most recent film, Blade Runner 2049, was released in 2017. The franchise has expanded with novels, short films, comics, anime, and video games. 1985’s Blade Runner video game is based on the soundtrack from the original movie, and the 1997 Blade Runner point-and-click adventure video game is currently in the process of being restored. Now, a different type of game based on the franchise is being released: a tabletop roleplaying game.
Announced via a trailer on Free League Publishing’s Youtube channel, Blade Runner RPG will be set between the events of the first Blade Runner movie and Blade Runner 2049. Set in Los Angeles in the year 2037 following the debut of Wallace Corporation’s new Nexus-9 Replicants on Earth, the game will give players the option of playing as either human or Replicant Blade Runners. Working on the LAPD’s Rep-Detect Unit, players will be given tools to solve cases that go beyond retiring replicants. The game promises to showcase key themes in the Blade Runner franchise, including sci-fi action, existential character drama, and moral conflict, as well as the dystopian setting that helped inspire games like the controversial Cyberpunk 2077. Blade Runner RPG is categorized as an investigative tabletop RPG with rules based on Year Zero Engine, but specifically tailored and further developed for Blade Runner.
Watch the announcement trailer for the Blade Runner tabletop role-playing game on YouTube here.
Free League Publishing is already well-known for publishing other roleplaying games, including Mutant: Year Zero, Crusader Kings–The Board Game, Forbidden Lands, and Alien: The Roleplaying Game. As Free League Publishing’s Alien: The Roleplaying Game is based on Ridley Scott’s 1979 movie, it’s not surprising that the tabletop game publisher would make a game based on Blade Runner, another one of Scott’s movies. If the RPG is anything like Alien: The Roleplaying Game, fans will be in for a treat. It’s a good time to be a fan of tabletop RPGs, because Blade Runner isn’t the only franchise getting such an adaptation; it was recently announced that Valiant Comics will be launching a tabletop RPG soon.
Because it is set between Blade Runner and Blade Runner 2049, fans are prompted to wonder how the new RPG will fit into the Blade Runner universe. This is especially the case with the anticipation of Blade Runner: Black Lotus, an anime from Adult Swim and Crunchyroll that is set to premiere this fall. Blade Runner: Black Lotus will also take place between the two movies, in the year 2032. With both Black Lotus and the new tabletop game, fans of the Blade Runner franchise will have a lot to look forward to in the upcoming months.
Blade Runner RPG will be released in 2022.
