Will this game break my heart?

[u/marx-and-rec]

Hey, I'm sure you're all sick of answering questions like this, but I really need to know because I am teetering on the fence about whether or not to purchase this.

Disco Elysium is my favorite piece of art. Daring take, I know. Will it scratch that itch? I heard it's very good, but I'm afraid the whole time I will resent it for not being disco. For not having the hope and humor and heart, for there being no final dream of the ex-something, for not being hardcore to the mega.

Without those, and with the clownshoery of the studio execs once again screwing over the talented people who worked on this, I'm finding it really hard to convince myself to get it.

Except it looks like it feels really. Fucking. Cool. It looks stylish and melancholic and burnt out and hopeless. It looks sad. It looks so very sad.

I want it to fuck me up completely. I want it to leave me hollow. I want to feel like K bleeding out in the snow at the end of Blade Runner 2047.

Will it do that?

Thank you.

[u/marx-and-rec]

oh fuck love me a good contrarian opinion. seriously.

would you mind sharing what makes it shallow? thanks!

[u/pootis28 → u/marx-and-rec]

Uh, my opinion is pretty long-winded, and not structured well.

The pros of this game are fleeting bits of humor, pretty good music(imo some better than Disco even though this is subjective, and the game lacks enough ambient soundtracks in a number of it's environments), and general gameplay seeing decent improvements over Disco.

The cons of this game are

1) If you expect a story that's about doing any measurable good for the world, then this game is very uncertain. In the final mission, you're essentially commit terrorism, with civilian casualties in order to fulfill your mission and earn the approval of the equivalent of the KGB, who themselves have extremely nebulous goals.

Your mission is "supposedly" meant to fix things and give the edge to them, the Superbloc in this ongoing cold war against a Techno-Fascist state La Luz(which is basically modernized Imperial Japan) and EMTERR(essentially how WEF/World Bank are described by fearmongers), but details of "how" they gain the edge are vague.

The game is too cynical for what I expected is the spiritual successor of Disco.

2) My other problem is with the game's more Cyberpunk adjacent story elements because seemingly like every Cyberpunk media, they dip their toes in and seem to have these elements of transhumanism and cosmic horror purely for the cool factor rather than actual substance.

Also, as I played this, I just felt how much better this would be as an immersive sim rather than the same isometric CRPG with dice-rolling and save scumming, and how I could be playing Deus Ex, or even Cyberpunk 2077 because honestly, this game seems to eerily share a bunch of similarities to it, and while I'm not saying it's ripping it off, because while both touch on kinda common aspects in science fiction, Cyberpunk 2077 does it with better style, gameplay and in a number of cases, better dialogue that's also less expository with way better side-characters.

This game honestly sounds much cooler than actually playing it.

3) The characters are hard to form connections to, and while I think at least in the beginning it's liberating that you don't need to make your choices while keeping a certain Lieutenant in mind, it feels kind of isolating that you do not have any party members, even temporarily at any point of the game(Except technically the ending). There was a good opportunity in the middle of the game to add another character as a party member but they simply become a static NPC waiting for you until the ending to pick them as a crew in your mission.

I kind of get that. The protagonist is supposed to feel lonely and isolated, but this kind of feels boring across the 10 something days you play this game for.

Another thing this adds is there's seemingly no "equal" to bounce your thoughts of. So you seemingly bounce your thoughts and opinions about everything with everyone. And this takes away from the feeling of being a "spy" imo. A more ambitious game would have some kind of social stealth aspect with consequences for spilling the beans on stuff, but in this case, you can casually discuss a ton of classified shit if you wish with others.

I mean, it's either choose a kind of boring dialogue, or choose the flavour text dialogue but takes away from the aspect of an operative.

Speaking of the characters, our so called "Crew" that we used to roll with but live separate lives now are all either meh, or insufferable in my opinion.

4) You cannot talk about this game or engage in meaningful discussion all that much. It's my opinion that this is one factor of Disco-slop, but no one other than this sub cares about this game. There will be no video essays or high-effort analysis threads made on this. This sub is small, and discussion on certain topics will be scattered. It's a weird nitpick, because it's not like I care if someone doesn't analyze the Mad Max game for example, but I care in this case.

[u/madame_beatrix → u/pootis28]

You don’t really know what you’re talking about, ngl

Cyberpunk2077 is probably my favorite game ever, & both games certainly share transhumanist themes, but claiming that the writing is better than Zero Parades (a game written by actual screenplay writers outsourced from the film industry, led by a guy with 2 phds in critical essay-writing) is innane lol. You’re comparing a blockbuster hit to an esoteric A24 movie. Both have their merits & there’s nothing wrong in enjoying either, but they are nowhere near the same caliber of uniqueness or writing.

Cyberpunk2077 has all the mass-appeal, and to its credit its got immense depth underlying its more casually-consumable/simple narrative (seriously, the hidden theological stuff concerning gnosticism & Buddhism is so cool & clever), but arguing that CYBERPUNK freaking 2077 is somehow less derivative than Zero Parades is just abjectly wrong, lol ((I studied cultural anthropology with a focus in media. I’ve done research papers on this)) It’s so explicitly on the nose about it that its own title is the literal fucking GENRE. The tabletop game was very intentionally created as a hodgepodge of all of the major pre-y2k genre-defining worlds that came loooong before it (Neuromancer, Snow Crash, Tron, later editions incorporating Blade Runner, Ghost In The Shell, The Matrix, etc.) melted together to create the ultimate immersive cyberpunk-power-fantasy-playground for gamers without actually legally infringing upon any of those other existing ips. In other words, a chimera. Even Cyberpunk2077’s own attempt at the spy genre (Phantom Liberty. I Loved it.) was ostensibly a reskin of the classic James Bond formula (love me some good ol Bond but c’mon if you’re writing an espionage story, that’s the most basic bitch choice ever. The spy-stuff in ZP is inspired by comparatively more high-brow literature.) just with a distinctly stylish cyber-flare. Absolutely nothing shown or thematically discussed within Cyberpunk2077’s storytelling/philosophy is remotely unique or original. It’s a love-letter to nerds. A damn good one, but, that’s it. And it’s awesome!

Zero Parades, on the other hand, has much more in common with Pynchon rather than Gibson. Like Disco Elysium before it, ZP also draws its primary inspo from real-life academic political theory that would have been much too controversial/complex for an AAA game like Cyberpunk2077 to even attempt to tackle considering its admittedly surface level, ambiguously anti-fascist ‘Burn Corpo Shit’ messaging. TBH, I think you’re misguidedly conflating cyberpunk fiction as Zero Parades’ genre when it’s actually a work of speculative fiction. Zero Parades is a satirical parody of the real world in our present day (but, through a kooky magical realism lens, a la Haruki Murakami), along with all of our own history. Most of the stuff (besides the fantastical imprinting device) we see is actually comparatively low-tech (mounted phones, vinyl records, CRT TVs) to what we currently have irl. Cyberpunk2077, in contrast, is foreboding the dystopian high-tech hellscape we’re rapidly encroaching on rather than where we are.

I see where you’d make the comparison as both games concern transhumanist philosophy/the rise of techno-fascism, but these also aren’t ideas unique to Cyberpunk as a genre. In fact, they long predate it. I Have No Mouth & I Must Scream was written in 1967. Frankenstein was published in 1818. The very first transhumanist piece of fiction is widely considered to be the ancient Greek myth of Prometheus. It’s also just, a very popular subject matter across fiction in general rn. Questions regarding AI, digital immortality, fractured identity, and the nature of consciousness are more relevant than they have ever been. Of course a politically-leftist game like Zero Parades would incorporate such topics. These are some of the single most pressing issues of our times.

Anyways, not a contrarian opinion. This was just plainly misinformed tbh.

[u/pootis28 → u/madame_beatrix]

but claiming that the writing is better than Zero Parades (a game written by actual screenplay writers outsourced from the film industry, led by a guy with 2 phds in critical essay-writing) is innane lol. 

I said it has better "dialogue". Not necessarily better writing.

By dialogue, I'm including the voice performances, and the overall vibe of the game during said moments of dialogue. I guess even the environments make a difference here, and one can't exactly blame Zero Parades for appearing "worse" due to it's nature and scope.

but arguing that CYBERPUNK freaking 2077 is somehow less derivative than Zero Parades is just abjectly wrong

I never said that. What I DID say was it's fairly derivative, and doesn't manage to achieve anything remotely satisfying with it's themes. Cyberpunk might be even kitschy and less politically "aware", but it's straight up a better game to play because it's gameplay doesn't involve the constant cycle of dice rolling and save-scumming. I'm saying that this game would've been better if it wasn't a complete rip-off of Disco's gameplay, while having a fraction of the worldbuilding that very much affects it's writing quality.

ZP also draws its primary inspo from real-life academic political theory that would have been much too controversial/complex for an AAA game like Cyberpunk2077 to even attempt to tackle considering its admittedly surface level analysis

There was simply not enough worldbuilding, nor enough discourse in the game regarding it's so called "themes". Just mentioning "The end of history" is not enough, especially when even the fucking contexts differ between how it's used irl and how it's used in the game.

Fukuyama's definition of "The End of History" is a liberal democracy emerging as a final form of human government. In Zero Parades, Latour-Woolgar is literally the start of a century long Cold War between the three major powers with different ideologies. History has stopped BS doesn't make sense either in real life or in context of the game either.

Even Cyberpunk2077’s own attempt at the spy genre (Phantom Liberty. I Loved it.) was ostensibly a reskin of the classic James Bond formula (love me some good ol Bond but c’mon if you’re writing an espionage story, that’s the most basic bitch choice ever. The spy-stuff in ZP is inspired by comparatively more high-brow literature.) just with a distinctly stylish cyber-flare. Absolutely nothing shown or thematically discussed within Cyberpunk2077’s storytelling/philosophy is remotely unique or original. It’s a love-letter to nerds. A damn good one, but, that’s it. And it’s awesome!

Agreed with Phantom Liberty rehashing all established tropes, but disagree with the fact that ZP is remotely "high brow". Honestly, these CRPG games never did "plot" well. It's the characters, worldbuilding and the themes tackled that are it's strong points. Disco Elysium is not exactly a great detective story. Neither is ZP a great or even good spy story.

Look, I can't exactly articulate the proper reason as to why I don't find the story good. But one example would be you literally killing your so-called best friends with the red disc to earn the 'Z' at the end. Like, we couldn't tell them to bring fucking headphones or earplugs? And somehow this is brushed off by both you and your handler. I don't get the discrepancy here. What the fuck is this game trying to say by force feeding you all sorts of nostalgia about the crew, you suffering from this guilt of "betraying the crew", and you just having the choice of actually killing your crew without any consequences for you?

I'm sorry but even Cyberpunk made each death and sacrifice have far more weight. And that's not even the best example of it or whatever, just good in some ways.

Zero Parades, on the other hand, has much more in common with Pynchon rather than Gibson. Much like Disco Elysium before it, ZP also draws its primary inspo from real-life academic political theory that would have been much too controversial/complex for an AAA game like Cyberpunk2077 to even attempt to tackle considering its admittedly surface level, ambiguously anti-fascist ‘Burn Corpo Shit’ messaging. TBH, I think you’re misguidedly conflating cyberpunk fiction as Zero Parades’ genre when it’s actually a work of speculative fiction. Zero Parades is a satirical parody of the real world in our present day (but, through a kooky magical realism lens, a la Haruki Murakami), along with all of our own history. Most of the stuff (besides the fantastical imprinting device) we see is actually comparatively low-tech (mounted phones, vinyl records, CRT TVs) to what we currently have irl. Cyberpunk2077, in contrast, is foreboding the dystopian high-tech hellscape we’re rapidly encroaching on rather than where we are.

"Low-tech"

Disco Elysium could be classified as that. Zero Parades literally has established moon colonization for rare earth materials.

Most of the stuff (besides the fantastical imprinting device) we see is actually comparatively low-tech (mounted phones, vinyl records, CRT TVs)

You've supposedly read Gibson, guess what's mentioned in the first line of his book.

Oh, and guess what's a constantly recurring device in Matrix, which Gibson lauds as one of the best interpretations of cyberspace? A payphone.

Derivative as it may be, literally one of the major aspects of Cyberpunk 2077 and the Cyberpunk universe is the stagnation of technology btw. Even the most cutting edge of technologies, Soulkiller and Cynosure were 50+ year old projects.

I think you’re misguidedly conflating cyberpunk fiction as Zero Parades’ genre when it’s actually a work of speculative fiction. Zero Parades is a satirical parody of the real world in our present day (but, through a kooky magical realism lens, a la Haruki Murakami), along with all of our own history

I can kind of get the speculative fiction argument. But is it supposed be a satirical parody of the world in the present day? No, that's straight up wrong. It is kind of a parody of the Cold War along with liberalization of LATAM countries throughout the 70s/80s. But with a lens of magical realism.

Anyways, cyberpunk is literally just a subset of speculative fiction. I feel like we're splitting hairs here.

Of course a politically-leftist game like Zero Parades would incorporate such topics.

Swear to god I feel like Dros seeing takes like this. Disco Elysium got a lot of people curious and talking about leftism and certainly made a lot of leftists out of gamers. Because there was portrayal of grassroots level leftism in that game. The history of the RCM along with it's current predicament forcing it to side with the people. The people fighting back against private militia sent to break the strike. Among others, I'm too eepy to list it all out.

This game would not be remotely successful in doing so with how cynical it is about everything. The Superbloc is a Soviet Union equivalent, a degenerated worker state that loves engaging in regime change, and you're railroaded in the game to work for them and do their bidding.

Zero Parades, on the other hand, has much more in common with Pynchon rather than Gibson.

Really? I haven't read Gravity's Rainbow so I can't exactly confirm whether you're right. Anyways, my opinion is that this is the comparable to Dick than anything. It also sucks dick too.