A TV series based on the hit indie game Disco Elysium is in development, from the studio that brought us the Sonic The Hedgehog movie.
DJ2 Entertainment is attached to produce the series, though no network has snapped it up yet. With Studio ZA/UM's indie hit scooping up dozens of game of the year awards last year for its gritty detective story, we don't expect it to be long before someone's put in an offer.
The game is, itself, based on Robert Kurvitz’s 2013 novel A Sacred, Terrible Air, using the same universe to tell a story where a veteran detective with a mysterious past must solve a crime that threatens to set powerful political factions into civil war. He also has severe substance abuse issues and a number of voices talking inside his head as the inner monologue that the player controls.
DJ2 are going whole hog on TV adaptations of games lately, now that the Sonic movie didn't completely tank at cinemas (possibly thanks to that last minute redesign). They're also working on a live-action version of Sleeping Dogs (which, itself, was heavily inspired by Infernal Affairs (which in turn heavily inspired Martin Scorsese's The Departed)) starring Donnie Yen, a TV series of Life Is Strange, a feature film of We Happy Few, a TV series of Little Nightmares and a live-action film of indie game Echo, written by John Wick screenwriter Derek Kolstad. That's quite the portfolio.
This is just the latest in gaming TV crossovers to be announced this year, with Chernobyl's Craig Mazin attached to a HBO series of The Last of Us, and Cyberpunk: Edgerunners announced yesterday, an anime in collaboration with legendary Japanese animation house Studio Trigger.
Are you excited for a TV series of Disco Elysium? Do you think it can live up to the majesty of one of 2019's best games?
