Disco Elysium considered Twitter its competition for players' attention

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Disco Elysium considered Twitter its competition for players' attentionLeave the memes at the door

Leave the memes at the door

In an interview withGameSpot, Kurvitz explains that contrary to the hand-wringing we’re all subject to about young ‘uns these days, people really do like reading. They read Twitter, text messages, chat apps, and Reddit among so many others. It’s just a matter of making the text “snappy” enough and displaying it well.

Kurvitz explains howDisco Elysium’s text is displayed in the bottom right corner of the screen where players may already be used to looking at their operating system’s dash, rather than in the center bottom the way that so many other RPGs display dialogue. He also believes that text is best read in a column, unlike the wide, short text boxes of something like the originalFallout.

Disco Elysium’s dialogue jumps up with each new line, at times without any input from the player. “We wanted to build a dialogue system as snappy and addictive as Twitter,” Kurvitz says. Even as a big fan of RPGs and an avid reader, I often find myself needing to take breaks from dense world-building of other settings likePillars of Eternity.

With Disco, I spent an uninterrupted eight hours on a Saturday reading without a thought for the clock. Others may have had different experiences, but for me ZA/UM nailed writing engrossing dialogue. In RPS’sDisco Elysium review, Alice Bee calls it a flawed masterpiece, but masterpiece nevertheless.

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Late in the video, Kurvitz says he’d like to do “whatBaldur’s Gate2 did for Baldur’s Gate 1,” which I suppose we might take to mean that ZA/UM are planning a directsequel to Disco Elysiumwhich they’ve already made mention of ideas for. For the studio’s next game, whatever it may be, Kurvitz says he’d like to have more combat, though still in the style of dialogue-based combat from Disco Elysium. He’d also like to do a sex scene, which, well we’ll just have to see how that goes, but I’d trust Kurvitz to write one with a blend of cringe and humor that makes it memorable at least.