Disco Elysium – The Final Cut

Genre: Graphic Adventure

Players: 1

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Review:

Disco Elysium is a Graphic Adventure that made a huge impact when it first released on PC in 2019, earning multiple Game of the Year awards from various publications. Two years later, the game has received a “Final Cut” version that adds extra side-quests and fully-voiced characters, with this version of the game given to PC players as a free update, as well as being ported to mobile devices, PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and Nintendo Switch in 2021.

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Hard-Boiled Rotten Eggs

Disco Elysium takes place in an alternate and largely contemporary world called Elysium, and specifically in a city called Revachol, where political and socioeconomic problems have led to a depressing squalor and defeatism, particularly in the district of Martinaise where your character awakens, evidently having drunken himself into an amnesiac stupor the night before. Players must decide how to best go about investigating the shambles of the protagonist’s past life as a detective, which is tied up in his last case, a murder investigation on the grounds of the shabby hostel he awakens in.

One of the great joys of Disco Elysium is exploring this game’s fascinating world and its deep and nuanced characters, both those in your head and those you meet while walking on the streets tracking down those responsible for the game’snoir-style central murder plot. Seemingly everywhere you turn you’ll be in for excellent writing, great world-building, and outstanding characterization.

When it comes to that writing, Disco Elysium is extremely lofty in its language and simultaneously vulgar in its topic matter. The game begins with your character’s inner voices arguing over whether or not he should even wake up, with the prevailing view being that he’s such a miserable wreck of a man that he’d be better off surrendering to oblivion. The discussions these internal dialogues have are often complex and philosophical, and yet your protagonist may very well not comprehend any of it (depending on how you opt to play him). These inner voices are all characters in and of themselves, with players getting a feel for your character’s “Ancient Reptilian Brain” and “Limbic System” well before you meet any of the game’s human cast. Each of these facets of your character receive a different voice too, though all are impeccably carried out by the same voice actor, Lenval Brown.

The game’s cast of human characters are all quite excellent here too, with one of the most prominent ones being Lieutenant Kim Kitsuragi, a detective from the local district assigned to work with you. Kitsuragi’s depiction in this game is incredibly nuanced – he’s a straight-laced by-the-book type, but clearly weary of the less than ideal society he finds himself in, and he is simultaneously judgmental of the wreck of a human being your character is, while at the same time surprisingly gentle and understanding of your many, many, many flaws as a human being.

The game’s excellent writing and superb voice acting is joined by some very nice hand-painted backgrounds traversed by 3D characters. These backgrounds feature an incredible amount of detail, making the game’s areas absolutely gorgeous to look at, even if what they depict is urban squalor or a bloated corpse. I should also make mention of the character portraits, both for human characters and the different facets of your mind, which are beautifully abstract works of art in their own right. These visuals are backed by a soundtrack that’s largely atmospheric, but which works well for befitting the tone of the game’s story.

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Reaching New Levels of Alcoholism

When it comes to gameplay, Disco Elysium is a Graphic Adventure that many have called an RPG, largely due to the important role that your character’s RPG-like skill setup plays in your ability to accomplish tasks, as well as the isometric perspective and detailed environments being very reminiscent of PC RPG classics like Planescape: Torment. However, mechanics normally used for determine combat skills in RPGs are used here to determine pretty much every skill and facet of your character’s psyche, including their logic and problem-solving skills, their artistic sensibilities, persuasiveness, and even their tolerance for drugs. Players will earn experience in the game by solving mysteries and completing other tasks, and every level that is gained enables players a point to upgrade one of these skills.

Often during the game, players will have these skills checked, with an action your character attempts having its success tied to one of these skills. White checks can be attempted again after failing them if you improve the pertinent stat or otherwise change the circumstances of the situation in your favor. Red checks, meanwhile, can only be attempted once, so you will want to make sure the skill needed for that check is reasonably high before attempting it. Fail, and you’ll have to find some other way to reach the goals you’re striving for.

It’s a system that works impeccably well, and your character being a terrible mess of a human being means that failed attempts at tasks are not necessarily a bad thing – they’re often both quite funny and well in character for your booze-soaked detective.

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Switch to Detective Mode?

Of course, much of what I’m saying here has been known for years now – like I said, this is a game that was highly acclaimed on PC. For many, the question here is whether the Nintendo Switch port is a good one. And to that, I say… it runs okay, but with some caveats.

In terms of performance, the game generally runs well, but I noticed some points where the game’s audio hitched, as well as a few places with a bit of slowdown. Nothing game-breaking, but still noticeable. However, what concerns me more is this game’s controls, which are frustrating and at times seemingly unresponsive, and it takes a lot of getting used to. Simply highlighting an object in the environment to interact with can feel like a chore. I also noticed some bugginess with the game’s interface, with some “mouse-over” pop-ups remaining on screen even after their parent menu was closed. And Nintendo Switch players also have to suffer through some pretty bad loading times throughout the game.

Things are somewhat better in handheld mode – the game’s text size (which can be adjusted in settings) is mostly legible in handheld mode, save for some of the flavor text in loading screens. Also, the ability to use the touchscreen to move and interact with the environment in the game helps to alleviate the awkward gamepad controls. Unfortunately, the immense visual detail of the game’s environments is largely lost on the Nintendo Switch’s small screen, making it hard to say that this is outright the best way to play the game.

Ultimately, if Nintendo Switch is your platform of choice, I can say that Disco Elysium is playable and works well enough on Nintendo’s handheld, but it is a compromised experience, and if possible I would say you’re better off playing the game on the PC, the platform the game was clearly meant for.

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Rock Star Cop, or Sorry Cop?

Make no mistake, Disco Elysium very much is the masterpiece that everyone has been celebrating it as. The writing, story, characters, and voice acting in particular are absolutely brilliant, the visual presentation is excellent, and the gameplay is inspired. Really, the one real flaw here is the port to Nintendo Switch itself. Again, this isn’t a terrible port, but those who play the game on the Nintendo Switch will have to content with frustrating control issues and long loading times, along with a slew of other more minor issues. It’s not enough that I would withhold my recommendation that you absolutely should play this game, but it is enough for me to strongly recommend that you play this game on the PC if possible.

tl;dr – Disco Elysium is a phenomenal Graphic Adventure with RPG elements that puts players in the role of an amnesiac cop on a bender after an apparent mental breakdown who’s trying to solve his case while he pieces together the shambles of his former life. This is an outstanding, must-play entry in the genre, but the Nintendo Switch version is somewhat compromised due to frustrating controls and long loading times, among other smaller issues. This is still a game I absolutely recommend you to play, and the Nintendo Switch version of the game is still a playable port… but if at all possible I would nevertheless strongly urge you to play the PC version instead.

Grade: A-

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This game has been nominated for one or more of eShopperReviews 2021 Game Awards:

Winner:

Best Voice Acting – While Disco Elysium may be two years old, the fully-voiced characters added in the Final Cut release of the game are new to 2021, and wow, what a difference it makes! All of the game’s excellent writing was already so full of personality, but it’s all taken to a whole new level with superb voice acting. Of special note are the multitude of different personalities bouncing around within the protagonist’s head, all with distinct personalities and voices, but all voiced by Lenval Brown. Jullian Champenois as Kim Kitsuragi is also well worth mention. But really, all of the voice acting in this game is phenomenal, which makes it all the more shocking that most of it was only just added in this year’s re-release of the game, as it all feels like it was meant to be here from the beginning. In any case, the voicework in Disco Elysium is perfect for the game, making this well deserving of my pick for the winner in this category.

Best Story – In Disco Elysium, every line of dialogue feels impeccably well-written, and the compelling story combines noir detective elements, science fiction, great characters, and some truly excellent world-building. I feel like each of the games on this list do some of these elements well, but Disco Elysium goes well beyond this to truly excel in all of these areas.

Runner-Up: Best New Character (Kim Kitsuragi), Best Graphic Adventure / Visual Novel

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