As part of their partnership with Atari, Dynamite Publishing has announced that they’re launching a new line of comics based on Atari’s library of game titles. Kicking off the first new Atari comic series since the 1980s is Swordquest by Chad Bowers, Chris Sims and Scott Kowalchuk.
Swordquest, based on the series of games released in 1982-83, tells the story of Peter Case, a boy on a quest… the quest to win the prizes from Atari’s Swordquest challenge! He was counting down the days to the release of the final game, AirWorld, only to be shattered when the news surfaced that it would never be released. Now Peter is an adult… and things aren’t going well. The bad news is he has to move back in with his mother. The good news is she still has all of his old Atari stuff. With nothing else to look forward to, his obsession with Swordquest is reignited, in a more daring — and fantastic — way!
Swordquest was unique in that it was a four part games series that offered a contest with prizes up to $150,000 and each game included a comic that provided the clues needed to win. The comics were produced by DC Comics, written by Roy Thomas and Gerry Conway and drawn by George Perez and Dick Giordano. The fist two parts, Earthworld and Fireworld came out in wide release, but the third part, Waterworld, was in limited release. Airworld was never released at all. The first two prizes were award, but not the last two or the grand prize. Interesting that this is where the first comic chooses to focus.
Swordquest #0 will be solicited in the March 2017 Previews catalog and slated for release in May.
