Disco Elysium

[The NZA]

 

been seeing really interesting things about this upcoming CRPG & how it looks to break the mold

 

The future of CRPGs beyond nostalgia | PC Gamer
How Disco Elysium makes detective games work | Rock Paper Shotgun
Disco Elysium breaks down the psyche of a detective
Development blog of Disco Elysium

 

 

 

resetera has an interesting breakdown

 

What Kurvitz is arguing for is a more innovative and broader approach defining the personality and characteristics of the main character in role-playing games towards, which is typically limited to only physical and combat-related traits. Disco Elysium aims to take several steps forward regarding this issue. When looking at the skill tree in the game, it is immediately apparent that the game does away with the traditional strength, dexterity, vitality attributes and pretty much completely redefines the playing field. The four attributes are intellect, psyche, fysique and motorics.
 

• Intellect is the attribute which determines how you use your mental faculties. Solve cases with the power of logic or rely upon an impressive library of trivia to draw your conclusions.
• Of all our four attributes, Psyche is the most schizophrenic. You will be a magnetic personality able to pick up on other people’s feelings, a powerhouse of imagination and charisma. But this will also make you a greater burden on yourself.
• Fysique is defined as the most esoteric and experimental skill set of them all and governs over the physical world inside the player character: the muscles, a craving for drugs, what your gut says and one's pain threshold.
• Motorics covers your peripheral nervous system, your five senses, and your vestibular system. It’s our take on the classic Dexterity and Perception stats, but not only. Motorics also has an added mental aspect – your street smarts, the ability to think on your feet and maintain a poker face in stressful situations. Above all, the Motorics skills make you cool.

And, unlike the other skill sets, they don’t come at a huge cost. Put too many points into Physique and it turns you into a violent animal – something like Marv from Sin City. Overdo Psyche and you’re Dale Cooper on MDMA. Too much Intellect turns you a Holmesian pedant. The twist with Motorics is – there is no such twist. Ultra high levels of the Motorics skills surprise you with expanded functionality. It’s the stabilizing element of your build, the binding agent.



Some examples of skills and how they influence your character as a detective.
 

• Inland Empire is your unfiltered emotions, dreams, and forebodings. Basically, Inland Empire has a lot of interesting (read: wrong) ideas about the world. It lets you know when there might be something mysterious or spooky going on. Why would you want to be just a regular old cop when you could be a para-natural detective, groping your way through invisible dimensions of reality? it asks you. (Inland Empire is, after all, the Lynchian skill.)
• Visual Calculus is your forensics skill. It represents your grasp of the laws of physics, motion particularly. Create models of past events in your mind’s eye, trace dotted lines across the room, read tire tracks to recreate an automobile accident. Even notice tactical opportunities in combat situations – then take advantage of them.
• Savoir Faire is all about style, subterfuge, flair. Even sexiness to a certain extent. It’s our combined Acrobatics and Sneaking skill, with an added zest of verbal flare every now and then. The full package for a slippery roguish detective. You’re basically a ninja-cop, or what our worldbuilding calls a Sambo artist. (Sambo, short for Samaran Boxing, is a communist martial art from Sapurmat Ulan.) You may also be… a bit of a douchebag, to be honest.
• Endurance is your metabolism and your circulatory system. It’s what keeps you alive. Endurance determines the amount of health points you have. Health is our primary resource pool, in addition to morale. Run out of health and you have a heart attack. Have too many heart attacks and you die. Endurance makes you a more robust person. The more robust a person you are, the more fun you can have. And by fun I mean drugs and silly things. So far so normal. Until you find out that Endurance is also your gut feeling. And what your gut feeling tells you is – immigrants are bad for the economy. There are varied multistage reasons why women get paid less. Yes. If you play a certain way you may find out this guy’s a fascist, much like the Rhetoric skill under tends to be a little socialist..