We’re by no means getting an official Disco Elysium sequel, however a few of its unique builders are at the very least engaged on the following neatest thing

Practically 5 years because the Recreation launched, Disco Elysium has one thing of a rotten legacy. One of the vital acclaimed video games of the fashionable period, the ground-breaking RPG was adored by critics and shoppers alike at launch, lauded for its deep RPG techniques, its exemplary writing, and for a way fully and completely well-conceived its bleak, depressing world was. I additionally actually, actually favored the music.

Tensions between improvement workers and the publishing arm of the corporate, and apparently rancid in-studio vibes, have result in many people pondering that we’ll by no means get one other Recreation like Disco Elysium ever once more. Or will we?

Although it’s lacking some key workers that made DE as memorable because it was, new indie developer Longdue has introduced that it’s engaged on one thing very Disco-like – and it even has a variety of workers that labored on the unique on its books (however not, notably, the three ‘principal’ leads: Robert Kurvitz, Aleksander Rostov, and Helen Hindpere).

The studio is already ‘a dozen robust’, per a press launch, ‘together with staff members that labored on the unique Disco Elysium and its unreleased sequel’. The staff can be drawing expertise from throughout the business, together with veterans from Bungie, Rockstar, and Courageous At Night time (who you’ll in all probability know from Sure, Your Grace).

“Longdue’s debut RPG explores the fragile interaction between the acutely aware and unconscious, the seen and unseen,” the press launch states. “Set in a world the place decisions ripple between the character’s psyche and setting, gamers will navigate a continually shifting panorama, formed by each inside and exterior forces.” I don’t find out about you, however that actually sounds somewhat Pale-like to me, no?

For those who cherished what The Thought Cupboard did within the unique Disco Elysium, you’re in all probability going to like the brand new ‘psychogeographic RPG’ mechanic that Longdue is engaged on, the place each choice reshapes each the world and the characters that inhabit it. On this expertise, the strains between the thoughts and the setting blur, colliding and reworking with every selection, main gamers by means of an ever-evolving narrative panorama. Color me intrigued.

The press launch actually says all the suitable issues to get my consideration. It notes that Longdue goals to create video games that “resonate emotionally and intellectually.” It assures us that the studio is right here to “construct a repute for constantly delivering high quality, with a concentrate on depth and narrative integrity”. That is, per the messaging, “only the start of Longdue’s journey to turn into a trusted title within the higher RPG canon”.

The studio is funded by by “non-public buyers from the tech world”, although, and we noticed how that every one went down with Studio ZA/UM. It seems that people who find themselves so rich that gentle bends round them have the ability to trigger numerous issues for creatives. Who’d have thought it, ey?

However, reservations apart, I’m enthusiastic about this. We simply don’t get quite a lot of video games which can be as narratively and mechanically wealthy as Disco Elysium as of late – the closest I can consider are in all probability Citizen Sleeper and Pentiment, however neither fairly scratches the identical itch. Disco Elysium, I’m not alone in pondering, was actually one thing particular.

However, good issues are by no means constructed to final, are they? In a story that would have been spun from one of many Recreation’s many side-stories, the collapse of the Disco Elysium thought post-release was messy, private, and achingly unhappy. Key figures in that first Recreation‘s improvement parted methods with developer Studio ZA/UM in 2021 (Kurvitz, Rostov, and Hindpere), and torpedoed a sequel as they exited.

Following that, earlier this 12 months, we realized that one other spin-off Recreation set in the identical universe has been cancelled. And rumours abound that we’ll by no means get a Disco Elysium sequel or spin-off from Studio ZA/UM, ever.

No matter Longdue is engaged on will probably be our greatest probability at getting one thing even remotely comparable, then. I’ll be preserving my eye on this one, and updating you every time there’s any information.