#disco elysium is a deeply political story set in an extremely allegorical world
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Mom they're gentrifying disco elysium
#lmao#like everyone in the notes im like. how do you apply disco elysium’s narrative power to a story about… nothing?#disco elysium is a deeply political story set in an extremely allegorical world#every choice in the story/characters/worldbuilding/etc ultimately contributes to the depth of it. that’s WHY it has an impact#martinaise is not a generic grimy setting. it’s the forgotten ugly child in the corner of revachol#exploited for its commercial value in a city whose entire purpose for the rest of the world is to be exploited for its commercial value#if u dig for two seconds into the information you get to learn about revachol’s relationship with the rest of the world#and martinaise’s relationship with revachol#do you KNOW how much insane symbolic meaning you get out of that???#and that’s just one thing. the actual beauty of this game is that almost everything has something like that#there are symbols and parallels everywhere. the kinds of things that wouldn’t work if you took the politics out of it#it’s not a mistake that harry is white. it’s not a mistake that he can say racist & fascist things#it’s not a mistake that addiction is such a huge part of his story#if you replaced him with anything else the story would not be the same. it’s SUPPOSED to be uncomfortable#this goes for all of the other characters too. Joyce is a rich white woman on purpose. Kim is an Asian man on purpose. etc etc#this interconnectedness and intentionality is what makes disco elysium have the narrative power it does#you couldn’t make such an expansive story without first building a world w consistent internal logic#and with believable conflicts and forces fighting each other#you can’t make a game with this many choices without accepting that some people will want to make heinous choices#and accepting that giving them those options is a statement of itself in the game#a game about a young witch investigating the disappearance of a pet — not even a person. not even HER pet — isn’t the same#where is the emotional hook? where is the conflict? how many choices can you reasonably make over the course of that story?#and in a small village there’s so much less room for worldbuilding. disco elysium takes place in a small part of town but it’s for a reason#it’s bc martinaise is a microcosm for revachol and revachol is important. you need to understand it to understand the world#a small village in the alps sounds… disconnected. it isn’t the center of the world. it isn’t even a PIECE of the center of the world#unfortunately in order to write something as narratively interesting and strong as disco elysium you also need to understand what makes it#uh. good?#and we all know that what makes it good is the ick of it all
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