Pandemic, Mysterium and Legend of the Five Rings are being turned into comics
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The worlds of board games Pandemic and Mysterium, along with RPG and card game Legend of the Five Rings, are to be adapted into comic books.
The co-op smash hit, spooky deduction game and long-running franchise - which spans a tabletop RPG, ‘90s trading card game and recent living card game reboot - will receive comics based on their respective settings as part of a new licensing deal inked by Asmodee, the tabletop behemoth that owns the titles’ respective publishers Z-Man Games, Libellud and Fantasy Flight Games.
Behind the upcoming board game comics is Source Point Press, which previously released Gloomhaven: Fallen Lion, a one-shot comic book based on the fantasy dungeon-crawler.
The comics are described as delving into the worlds and narrative of each game, with a press release claiming that the adaptations will explore the “richness, drama, and mystery each of these game universes call their own”.
Released in 2008, Pandemic sees players work together to stop the spread of four diseases across the world by travelling between locations, combatting outbreaks and searching for cures. The co-op board game’s world and lore have been further explored in the campaign-based Pandemic Legacy trilogy, with instalments set before and after the original game’s global catastrophe.
The 2015 remake of 2013 release Tajemnicze Domostwo, Mysterium casts players as clairvoyants able to communicate with a ghost, played by another member of the group. Unable to speak, the ghost must provide visual clues - in the form of abstract illustration cards - to the group in order to successfully reveal the weapon, location and culprit involved in their untimely demise.
Set in the fictional world of Rokugan strongly inspired by feudal Japan, Legend of the Five Rings began life as a collectible card game released in 1995, which later spawned a spin-off tabletop RPG in 1997. After 20 years, the game was acquired by Fantasy Flight Games, which rebooted it as part of its living card game format. The studio subsequently released a new edition of the Legend of the Five Rings RPG and spin-off board game Battle for Rokugan. In early 2021, Fantasy Flight announced that Legend of the Five Rings: The Card Game was “complete”, teasing future board games set in the universe.
While Pandemic and Legend of the Five Rings have previously been explored in spin-off novels - including this year’s Pandemic: Patient Zero, the first in a planned series based on the co-op game - Source Point’s upcoming comics will mark the first time any of three franchises have been adapted into comic books.
All three comic books are set to arrive in 2022, with specific release dates yet to be announced.