Disco Elysium — Coming Back After a 2 Year Break

I forgot how good this game is

Usually, when I uninstall games from my computer, I don’t reinstall them at any point in the future. That, of course, is the case with most cases, even though I don’t remember what games I reinstalled. I genuinely do not remember if there was ever a game that, at some point in time, I uninstalled and subsequently reinstalled sometime later… except for Disco Elysium.

The last time I played this awesome game, and it is very awesome despite its unorthodox RPG elements, was 2 years ago, and I more or less remember where I last was (which is ironic given that nowadays, I don’t remember anything). I also remember what killed it for me last time and made me stop at that moment, and that was the moment when I realised that the solutions in this game aren’t as creative as I expected them to be. But that was 2 years ago, and now I look at things differently, so I decided to revisit the game, and it seemed like a good choice seeing as how I want to play more of it but just don’t have the time (who has time nowadays?)

Disco Elysium has you play as a policeman suffering from amnesia, all the while investigating a murder that happened in the vicinity. The game’s world is rich with lore, if not somewhat complicated to understand given the esoteric terminology, but the game is particularly remarkable for its unconventional RPG setup and methodology, which is vastly different from most RPG games seeing as how in Disco Elysium, you invest points in skills that modify your dialogue with the many characters in the game, rather than give you stats for battle purposes, which is mostly nonexistent in Disco Elysium. My point is if you’re looking for an unconventional RPG and like reading a lot, then you might want to give Disco Elysium a chance. But what does it feel like coming back after two years?

The music is really atmospheric

So, there I was exactly as I was 2 years ago, an amnesiac cop standing on a balcony. I remember; this is the point that killed it for me last time. I quickly forgot about it and went on to play with what little time I had, but the more I played this game, the more I became curious about what I would discover next through the perspective of a hungover cop who can’t remember shit. I ventured into that one area I always wanted to 2 years ago when I also played the game enthusiastically but lost that passion somewhere along the line, and as I discovered this new area, I calmly walked from one point to the other, accompanied by music that is sad yet very fitting of the world’s depressive tone. Everything is gloomy, and you have to solve it all. And I tried…

The game is not without its flaws, though. There is a lot to read in this game, and reading is what you’ll be mainly doing throughout the game. The voice acting isn’t who-knows-what, but I’d say it’s passable. And worst of all is the glossary of terms that is present in the game, and there is too much to remember as every term unique to this game has a weird pronunciation to it. Words such as “Revachol” and “Oranje” and “kineema”. It’s clear that the developers went for period realism with the theme of this game, but I’ve reached parts in the game that may or may not imply that even in the game, people aren’t sure how to pronounce these words (“Revachol” has at least to different pronunciations). Sometimes, this just makes it hard to follow the story in the game, but frankly, these aren’t problems so much as they are nuisances because they don’t really do much to hinder the gameplay experience. So, I continued to play and complete as many missions as possible before calling it a day, and now here I am writing about that “comeback”, pondering when will the next time be that I get to play the cop again. It was fun while it lasted, though…

I might not be able to play it, let alone complete it, because I have no time and I need to move on. I just wanted you to know that it’s definitely a fun experience.

Are you having a disco in Elysium?

People keep saying that this game is really good despite its oddities, and they’re right. But have you played it yet? If so, do tell what you thought it, whether it was complicated are just right. If not, then don’t explain why and go try it out for yourself.

In Conclusion…

I probably don’t need to repeat myself by saying that Disco Elysium is a great game worthy of its commendations, even though I just did, but that’s beside the point. Anyways, you should try it out for yourself. They recently (relatively speaking) released a new version of the game that features a voice for the narrator and some other stuff, so you’d probably want to go with that one instead of the base version. Just saying…

But the lore is a bit complicated with its vast and rich lexicon of weird European-sounding words. I struggled to understand what the politics in the games were all about, nor did I understand what was up with the world that the cop inhabits. It’s clearly not present-day Europe. But what is the etymology of all those weird words? You know… it doesn’t really matter.

Anyways yeah, there’s a new version of this game and it’s better, so go check it out.