/games/ - Games

The player character seems to be a literal schizo like Harry. If the game's politics are terminally liberal, is it funny at least?

>>46241
Played a bit more and the meshing of real world political ideas and DnD high fantasy and schizo stat dialogue got me to chuckle quite a bit.
I think it's funny.

this entire idea seems cancer. Every year that rolls on I hate DND more and more.

>bourgeois revolutionary
I haven't touched up enough on my theory to remember what this term means, care to explain? and also how is it reflected in the game?

>>46246
>>bourgeois revolutionary
the bourgeois were revolutionary during feudal times

>>46249
Ah, okay.

So why the fuck would someone
Make a game about politics which are completely irrelevant to the modern day??

>>46252
Real reason is they didn't want to seem like a 1:1 copy of disco elysium and wanted a fun game. Funnier reasoning is that they are 200 autismo score marxist theoreticians making a bold choice to apply historical materialism in a medieval setting to stir up discussion in the right direction among communists, while also having a big dogwhistle effect on those uninitiated.

>>46253
>200 autismo score marxist theoreticians
<thinking you can "apply" "historical materialism"
at least you didnt say "use dialectics" lol

Really really hoping it's not r/DnDmemes in a Disco skin.

>>46240
Biggest Disco Elysium guy on YouTube/Xitter seems to be very positive about it, which is surprising because he has otherwise been very critical of other "Disco-like" projects.
I myself would love to play it ASAP but my PC is shit so I'll have to wait for the inevitable Switch port.

>>46240
Why did they copy the Disco Elysium UI exactly?

>>46274
its missing the aesthetics, but it's not shy about being a DE-clone. Theres a running bit where you go around calling yourself The Cleric, like how in DE you can go around saying you're The Law

>>46256
>heh you thought this thing but you are wrong
>no i won't elaborate, heh, just figure out what i mean
stop doing this. just communicate.

>>46246
>I haven't touched up enough on my theory to remember what this term means
cromwell. robespierre. that kinda thing
>>46249
>>46252
>>46253
>Real reason is they didn't want to seem like a 1:1 copy of disco elysium and wanted a fun game. Funnier reasoning is that they are 200 autismo score marxist theoreticians making a bold choice to apply historical materialism in a medieval setting to stir up discussion in the right direction among communists, while also having a big dogwhistle effect on those uninitiated.
clever. i like it.
that seems pretty based actually

>socialist path seems to be just social democracy, whereas the revolutionary path is as a bourgeois revolutionary
It's not like there weren't communist-adjacent movements in medieval times. I would respect it more if you could play as a radical yeoman, christcom Digger instead.

>>46272
>random Fan(tm) who made DE their whole personality has an opinion on this!!
yeah thats more like a reason to NOT listen to someone lol

>>46246
>I haven't touched up enough on my theory to remember what this term means, care to explain?
brush up on your history as well as your theory

Realistic socialist path in a medieval based setting would be like independent peasant communes not socialism as we understand it today.

>>46306
it is agrarian in nature, but the city is in the process of industrialization.
the cringe thing is that it's all based around a voot, and who you're going to voot for.
do you voot for the factory owners, the agriarian socialists, the pope, or do you write your own name in seems to be the options.

The creator is on rpgcodex

>>46300
yeah, I know about the revolutionaries of the 1700s, i forgot that the marxian term for em was bourgeois revolutionaries, is all.
>>46311
oh my god. can't they at least make it about slaying a dragon or something?
>>46311
at least this bits interesting.

>>46342
Did you reply to the wrong person?

I've started the game and there were definitely some good moments so far. The characters seem well done, the quests are accessible and combining them with the thought mechanic seems like a good decision overall. My biggest gripe so far is with the skills themselves. To explain this i need to back up a bit and elaborate on how you would build a specific character in Disco Elysium:

While skills have very diverse characterizations, their uses are mostly in line with their governing attributes. The exception to this i would call "crossover skills", like shivers, drama or composure. These serve a dual purpose: For example allowing a high int, low psyche build to still receive some context on people, and incentivizing a low int, high psyche players to invest in this skill.

The problem with Ebb Esoteric's skills is they seem even more diverse in application, while not allowing for the same degree of granularity. A talky character will need high cha, as well as decent end and wis to advance most conversations, with flirting being seemingly gated behind non-crappy str also. In my current playthrough this has forced me to use dex as a dump stat.

At the moment end also feels like the most undercooked skill. Actually it would be totally in character for volition to ecstatically support a declining political movement almost nobody talks about, but even that bit of characterization seems to be missing.

The political dialog appears very tryhard in how closely it mirrors current-day, real-world issues. I can't believe how casually it injects capitalist realism into a late-medieval society, which should very much be suspicious of trade (see the physiocrats).

It's also a bit jarring how insecure the Cleric is in his masculinity. When there isn't even anything comparable to Harry's deep-seated wömen issues, because his interactions more closely follow a lovable scamp archetype, the regular talk about feeling emasculated (dawg can't even pick up a magazine) and shame about not being in a relationship come across as lowkey incel-ish.

>>46292
i am communicating that youre a retarded politically impotent pseud 👍 its still communication even if you dont like it lmao

>>46348
Uygga I wrote what you replied to not him, but you should maybe answer him when asked

I guess i should write down some more thoughts after finishing the game. If you liked Disco Elysium, you should definitely give this a try. Narratively it is full of memorable characters and layered situations. Thematically it's a muddle though. It may be at its best when it's in conversation with genre tropes, like the mysterious progenitor races, the non-human underclass or the benevolent ancestral deity.

I think adding largely superficial modern elements was their worst thematic decision overall. They establish enough parallels to the real world to make many things quite unambiguous like the freestriders being literal hegemonic imperialists, who you would only vote for as an unironic capitalist realist, or the nationalists canonically being bought by them and really diminish any nuance there was in these ideologies differing from their real-world counterparts. Only praxian magocracy and radical agrarianism seem specifically tailored to the setting.

I particularly like how densely connected the two top layers of the city are. The dungeon layout leaves something to be desired, since it's maybe 7 points of interests connected by a few intersecting corridors and one preemptive shortcut. The environment art itself i'd say serve its purpose, while not really being noteworthy.

The quest system didn't turn out to be as good as it looked initially. For one it doesn't record minor quests, which would have helped with keeping track of some minor details or cleared up when a time limited quest expired or the questgiver was already dead. Having traits be determined by your decision, which will most likely boil down to which clearly stated bonus is better for your character, also cheapens the outcome. You're not getting any flavor text beyond things that are otherwise tracked, which are class and political affiliation. In fact i my character started refering to himself as a wizard, then pivoted to a druid and chose the associated trait. Due to both being tracked, people mentioned both at different times and i ended up chosing some more wizard option, because they gave exp for some reason, despite in no other way contributing to the final character sheet.

Some of the balancing is also off (in a bad way), as i found out after acquiring the jester halfway through my playthrough. I kept making choices that gave me a useless advantage, which made me rethink those choices (in a bad way). It also completely obsoleted one and nerfed the rest of my traits (note the difference between simple advantage and proficiency in checks). Worst thing is, after knowing how to get it, the only thing stopping you from getting it on a repeat would be your own discipline.

Again i need to stress that the skills and their characterization don't work out. DE often had Harry actively converse with them, in contrast here it's almost always a succeed or fail check. DE has a sweet spot for skills, where you're not failing at low checks, but usually they're just chilling, unless you're engaged in something they care about, while in Ebb just as often as i had str yapping about manhood and the nation, i was failing or succeeding in unprompted rolls.

While my run might have been a little muchkin-ish, being slow (literally) was maybe the only negatively defining character trait my cleric had left in the end, with moderate additional input from my respectable int and wis. Though i admit there were some cool checks, like when you're high int enough to perfectly translate a random language being thrown at you. The trait selection screens had the most in depth characterization of the skills in the entire game, which was a bit lacking in the actual scenarios, even moreso for what the cleric thinks of them.

The keyword system is a nice nod to old CRPGs, but i have always been a fan of encyclopedia and having a choice takes away from the comedic timing of intelligence bringing up an unrelated spell. Initially i just thought they were text highlights, also figuring out far too late you could do behold checks on people, because the page looked so much like fluff.

i liked it a lot.
i am very curious about Ragn's family / his personal history.
lots of opportunities for more stories told in this world.
especially if this really is some high-level Marxist theory-work lmao.

>>46240
every disco elysium copycat is uniquely nauseating dogshit, as if the sole lesson they absorbed from playing it is "people love this, and i want to reenact what is desired without any human feeling or understanding"

theyre so used to being able to copy the mechanics of the thing of the moment they are hopelessly outgunned when the "mechanic" is "have actually good writing for once". just the king of comedy of game ripoffs

>>46311
>do you voot for the factory owners, the agriarian socialists, the pope, or do you write your own name in seems to be the options.
Oh my god it's literally New Vegas

>>46346
flirting requires strength, maybe it's written by a liberal?