How 'Disco Elysium' Was Stolen From Its Creators

By Petr Navovy | Miscellaneous | May 11, 2023 |

By Petr Navovy | Miscellaneous | May 11, 2023 |

We don’t talk about video games all that much here at Pajiba. Occasionally, Dustin being the rotten saint that he is, indulges me, and graciously withdraws that iron fist of control he terrorises us all with, letting a piece or two on the topic slip through the authoritarian cracks.

Video games are not exactly traditional Pajiba fare. But then 2019’s Disco Elysium is not a traditional game by any means. A dark and twisted, beautifully designed role-playing game developed by an Estonian creative collective, it follows an alcoholic detective who wakes up one day with a vicious hangover—both physical and existential—only to find himself completely unable to remember who or where he is, but still having to get on with the business of solving the mystery of a murdered man hanging from a tree. As forces material and mystical make their influence known, the secrets of the post-industrial seaside town still convulsing from the aftermath of a deadly siege that he finds himself in begin to reveal themselves.

The set-up of Disco Elysium would be enough to tempt many players in—indeed it was for me—but it was the execution of the game that really took things over the top, featuring phenomenal writing, satisfying gameplay, deeply atmospheric music, and a stridently unforgiving anti-capitalist message and ethos. It’s painfully ironic, then, that the real-life story of Disco Elysium since its release has been one plagued by cartoonishly corrupt capitalist chicanery. Creators and writers Robert Kurvitz, Aleksander Rostov, and Helen Hindepere (featured in the header image but strangely omitted from the video below) were swindled out of the company set up around their game in a truly despicable example of the worst of the predatory parts of their industry. Here, take a quarter of an hour to enrage yourself: