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There are plenty of opportunities in the game world to play around with these numbers. It’s a straightforward system, but where it shines is in its level of reaction it has with the game world. The game provides the odds of success before any check, though rolling two ones or two sixes will always result in a failure or success, meaning the result is never completely guaranteed. If the number meets the challenge level, the check is a success. The way checks are resolved is simple the game rolls two six-sided dice and adds the total to the player’s skill level. The checks are usually tested against one of the twenty-four stats on a scale that goes up to twenty. It’s here where skill checks present themselves, serving as the main obstacle for the majority of the game. While the game does offer smaller, more succinct points of interest, many of the game’s interactions will provide paragraphs of flowery detail. The game is played from a traditional isometric perspective and feels more like a point-and-click adventure game much of the time. The way Disco Elysium handles resolutions is one of its two shining features.

The sheer amount of information given is initially overwhelming, but it’s difficult to make a character that isn’t viable, as the way the game handles conflicts and their resolutions means that plenty of stats get an opportunity to shine, even the ones that don’t feel useful at first. Additionally, players get to choose one signature skill, which again increases its base and potential growth.

Twelve points are available to spend on each field, with each point raising both the base level of all the skills within that field as well as the potential increases to each skill through leveling up. Attributes are split among four fields - Intellect, Pysche, Physique, and Motorics - each with six distinct stats. While there is no option to create an avatar of the player’s choice, the player is given a large amount of freedom to fill out statistics as they see fit. The game begins, like many RPGs, with character creation. Hungover, in the throes of amnesia, and missing any clear identifiers of what happened the previous week, players must work to solve the crime while navigating the socio-political climate of Revachol. Lo and behold, the body is still where it was discovered and seemingly very little headway has been made into the investigation. After a struggle to make it downstairs, he is approached by a cop named Kim Kitsuragi who claims to be his partner, seeking to discover what happened to the dead man that the player character was sent to investigate a week ago. The player controls a man who wakes in a hotel after a major bender to discover he has completely lost his memory, as well as the ability to perform some basic motor functions.

Disco Elysium’s harsh and bleak tone, combined with its odd mix of grounded reality next to exaggerated characters, makes it a unique entry in the genre, but even ignoring all that it is one of the purest RPG experiences in years.ĭisco Elysium takes place in Revachol, an Eastern Bloc-inspired city that is still suffering from the effects of a revolution decades earlier. The game is filled with colorful characters, but many of them are varying degrees of unlikable, including yourself. The world may not be an expansive, globe-trotting ordeal, but the small game world is filled with detail and care. It offers very little in the way of traditional combat but plenty of struggle. Disco Elysium aims for something smaller and more intimate, but no less intriguing. Others still want a cast of colorful characters that they get to meet and grow with over an incredible journey. Others want an expansive world to explore, hoping for a secret dungeon in the mountain or a magic sword hidden in a crypt. Some wish for in-depth, systems-laden combat simulators, controlling the minutia of a party of character to lead them to victory. RPGs mean different things to different people.
