Amidst all the death throes of Disco Elysium as the suits who now own the IP try to cynically milk it for all it's worth, this is certainly one of the more interesting ones. Hot on the heels of announcing their successor to Disco Elysium, studio ZA/UM (which bears no resemblance to the group of creatives who gave us one of the best RPGs ever made in 2019) followed up with another surprising reveal: a mobile port of the original.
Taking Disco Elysium on the go wouldn't be all that bad in and of itself – it is already on the Switch, after all – but as revealed by Studio head Denis Havel in a discussion with IGN, it's more of a re-imagining. Hearing alarm bells yet?
"We intend to captivate the TikTok user with quick hits of compelling story, art, and audio, ultimately creating an all new, deeply engaging form of entertainment," Havel said.
[…]
Here's the official blurb:
This is a total re-imagination of the award-winning, gripping psychological RPG Disco Elysium and designed to completely cater to the habits of today's mobile users. This story-rich adventure has been optimized for short play sessions, allowing players to dive in anytime, anyplace on their mobile devices.
Narrative Lead Chris Priestman said Disco Elysium's mobile version is "what audiobooks wish they were," and is designed to be played in short bursts.
Nothing like cutting down a dense, wordy, narrative-driven RPG spanning 40 hours into TikTok-sized chunks – am I right, 18-24 market?! Naturally, the Disco Elysium fanbase is not having it. The game's official subreddit is abound with memes about season passes, gacha pulls and Cuno Coins(tm) – maybe there'll even be an option to have Subway Surfers gameplay automatically pop up on one side of the screen to take your mind off all those big words. As far as cynical last-ditch efforts to wring more money out of Disco Elysium's sterling reputation go, it's certainly a bold choice… but with existing fans disavowing it and its new target market likely not taking to its long-winded, unabashedly political approach, it's hard to imagine who exactly Disco Elysium Mobile is for.
Previously:
• Competing Disco Elysium successors announced
• Disco Elysium and the death of art
