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Game News Disco Elysium: Introducing the Thought Cabinet

Infinitron

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Tags: Disco Elysium; Robert Kurvitz; ZA/UM

Six days after the long-awaited Disco Elysium release date announcement, Robert Kurvitz published a devblog update all about how colossal the game is going to be. Excellent hype material to be sure, but here on the Codex we're men of substance. You might remember that waaay back in May 2018, we were told to expect an update about the Thought Cabinet, Disco Elysium's unique mental inventory system. Well it's finally here, and they even made a video about it, which means it's definitely important enough to post about. Here's the video and an excerpt:



The time has come to talk about the Thought Cabinet, Disco Elysium’s illustrious “inventory for thoughts.” Let me start by presenting an image. A rather detailed image. Of all the icons of all the thoughts you can get in Disco Elysium, woven into a single tapestry. The Thought Cabinet art is made by Anton Vill, a concept artist known for, among other things, his work on the film Mad Max: Fury Road.

Each little composition on that image is one “Thought”. It’s impossible to get them all in one play-through, or even two. Each Thought comes into play face down. Only its name and some initial info are known to you. It takes in-game time to reveal its true identity by “internalizing” it. To truly uncover the mysteries of all these bad boys takes years of hard-core roleplaying. There are a total of 53 thoughts in the game. On average, a single character discovers and internalizes 16 of them in one playthrough.

And that, in a nutshell, is THC – how we’re abbreviating Thought Cabinet This mega-feature has gone through multiple iterations. It’s a unifying element that ties all the game’s systems together. Thoughts are like Fallout’s “traits” (back in the 14th century when Fallout had traits) crossed with Civ’s “world wonders”. They’re loot for your mind that you collect from the world by talking to people. They function as traits, perks, reputations and alignments.

You store Thoughts in your Thought Cabinet – your mind-lab, where you cook up new ideas and obsessions. Conduct research into futuristic armour, become a free market evangelist by thinking about indirect taxes, or just contemplate suicide. All with the power of your mind.

THC IS THE GAME’S REPUTATION SYSTEM.

In Disco Elysium there are tags you can acquire that make people think of you in a certain way. Say something stupid and they will remember it, help someone and they’ll remember that too. So far, so routine. But Disco Elysium also has an internal reputation system. Your skills – your faculties that talk to you in your head – develop notions about you too. Have you said three artsy things in the last hour? Been telling people you want your name to be Raphael? Trying to recall a lost memory, or your home address? Your skills can turn these into full blown Thoughts: “Actual Art Degree”, “Detective R.A. Costeau”, “The 15th Indotribe” and “Lonesome Long Way Home”. You can turn yourself into a deranged “Torque Dork”, constantly thinking about auto-mechanical trivia. Or torture yourself with the “White Mourning” – the shadow of someone you used to love. This adds a new layer of role playing options I like to call soul customization.

THC IS ALSO THE GAME’S PERK SYSTEM.

In addition to producing dialogue options and story events, thoughts have mechanical implications. Once processed, they can provide bonuses and – more often – diabolical side effects. Each is a riddle, posing a question for you to answer. The bonus (or penalty) is the Aesop at the end of that story. Thinking of love lost corrodes your soul, but it also gives you an expanded perspective: Your maximum zoom-out range is increased, letting you take in breath-taking vistas. Recalling that memory can lead to drugs being more powerful for you. When the Art Cop uses his Conceptualization skill they gain XP for every criticism. There’s even a thought that (temporarily) makes you fail all your skill checks, turning you into a walking disaster, which in turn, can lead to new thoughts.

Oh, the update also reveals that Disco Elysium will be launching with a $40 price tag. What do you think, Codex?
 

luj1

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Oh, the update also reveals that Disco Elysium will be launching with a $40 price tag. What do you think, Codex?

Funny how you question the price of Disco (and you did the same for Grimoire), yet you didn't find nothing wrong about PoE or its price. Attack incline and defend decline, you are a true cockroach
 
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Jinn

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God that Thought Cabinet artwork is so damn good.

So ready to finally play this.
 

MRY

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The price tag strikes me as utterly irrelevant. If the game delivers on what it is promising (truly unique gameplay in a truly unique setting, beautifully realized audio-visual-textually), $40 is a bargain. If the game doesn't deliver, the price tag is the least of the problem. I guess there could be some midpoint where it's a flawed but interesting game and paying more than $20 is annoying, but that seems unlikely here to me.
 

Prime Junta

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It is a bit of a weird price point but then everything about this is different. At $20-30 it would position itself as indie; at $60 it would be saying fuck you, I'm AAA. What other games are there at that price point?
 
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I sure hope that the russian price will be reasonable... Wait. Where the hell did this smilie go?
votlhqb.png
 

Tigranes

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The key point is how when you see thought cabinets work, you can see the game's approach to C&C and integrating story/setting and gameplay. The auto-mechanical trivia thought alone shows you that there's separate dialogue written that uses this thought, and then dialogue written throughout to give you opportunities to develop this thought, and that the kind of decisions you make about what to say determine not just NPCs' response in the world but a C&C on a whole distinct layer of what your thoughts think about you.

The amount of writing and planning involved in having dozens of these is mindboggling. We'll see how successful they've been.
 

Van-d-all

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Frankly, I'd give them $60 if they asked as I used to play AAA in early 2000 so the price doesn't scare me, and currently I'm buying almost only indie games so my expanses are minuscule in that department, but realistically $40 sounds fair to me. Secondly, it's one of two games I'm hyped about, except Colony Ship. And lastly, #SupportEuroJank.
 

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$40 is a lot but the game looks worth it. Hopefully it delivers on its promises. I paid about the same (not counting inflation) for PST back in 1999 and never regretted it.
 

flabbyjack

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So I despise detective TV dramas, but I'm really excited about Disco Elysium. I even had a daydream about opening up a Disco Elysium themed restaurant that played disco music.
 

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