Searching for Disco Elysium

Memory’s images, once they are fixed in words, are erased. | Directly support me and watch exclusive videos by joining Nebula at go.nebula.tv/jacob-geller
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Timestamps:
00:00-15:40 No Spoilers
15:41-18:43 Spoilers
18:44-23:55 No Spoilers
Additional Voices by
Laura Crone: / down_w_lcc
Ilario Parascandolo: / ilario.spara
Toggle HUD mod by Cem Aslan: www.nexusmods.com/discoelysiu...
Skill Portrait Screen by Tiemaster_n: / skills_wallpaper
Character Portrait Wallpaper by Underfloored: imgur.com/gallery/PpvPm7T
Games Shown: Disco Elysium, Microsoft Flight Simulator, The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim
Music Used (Chronologically): Instrument of Surrender, Ecstatic Vibrations Totally Transcendent, Martinaise Terminal B, Miss Oranje Disco Dancer, Tiger King, Polyhedrons, Precinct 41 Major Crime Unit, The Cryptozoologists, Krennell Downwell Somatosensor (Disco Elysium), Second Confluence (Journey), The Insulindean Miracle (Disco Elysium), Atonement (Journey), Another Voyage (Chrono Cross), The Smallest Church in Saint-Saëns (Disco Elysium)
Thumbnail by: / hotcyder
Description Credit: Invisible Cities, Italo Calvino
Video Supplied by Getty Images

[@JacobGeller]

To ask questions ("who's the best character and why is it Cuno?") and get them answered in a full-length director's commentary on this video, jump on my patreon at: www.patreon.com/JacobGeller

[@ryandaniels7617]

no

[@zedc6072]

Cuno should be fired out of a canon and into the sun

[@LillianRyanUhl]

Cuno is an amazing character

[@zedc6072]

@@LillianRyanUhl I want to punt him off a table a-la garfield

[@SJKlapecki]

Cuno is legitimately one of the better characters in Disco Elysium to me. He represents the cycle of brokenness in Revachol, where drug abuse and poverty begets drug abuse and poverty, where a kid can be forced to take on a harsh, cruel exterior in order to fit in, because they feel they have nothing else going for them. He's an annoying, angry, little prick, but I feel horrid for him and want to help him because at the end of the day, he's a kid trapped in a cycle that started long before Harry ever came to Martainaise. Either that, or "FUCK DOES CUNO CARE???" is stuck in your head and you want to punt him. YMMV on interpretations.

[@RPBiohazard]

Dumping all your points into Shivers is the most Jacob Geller thing imaginable.

[@hankwicklund2182]

Shivers and inland empire are pure Rust Cohle. I love them.

[@DCGloto]

@@hankwicklund2182 Aluminum and ash

[@baylego]

@@hankwicklund2182 inland empire is a bore, it feels like a reading a depressed teen's diary that doesn't really understand what it's trying to say

[@duplicate8297]

@@baylego I think the idea behind it is just that it is the part of your brain that hasn't forgotten anything, and is supposed to be an insight to the reaction that 'past-Harry' would've had. Also, it speaks with vagueries that do come true later, but have to be kept subtle enough that it wont spoil anything. So it is depressed and vague but that's kind of the point. It has a point, speaking from more experience, but is crushed with grief and heartbreak so it is non-functioning. Also, if you got the necktie to talk to you, the skill becomes more entertaining and explains more.

[@nmeister007]

@@duplicate8297 I always read Inland Empire as being Harry's sense of imagination and curiosity. Spoilers below The Necktie and IE even tell you that the only reason you give personality to inanimate objects is because you're able to imagine them as something more than just a postbox or a tree or a blue door. It's why, even if you seem to find a clear-cut solution to an issue, IE will pipe up with a crpytic and vague interjection that then becomes incredibly accurate later down the line (Like the blue door "feeling important" and turning out to be the way to make Ruby's involvement in the murder credible, or "Love killed him, but Communism did him in" perfectly describing the Deserter and their motive for both still remaining on the Island and what drove them to deliver the shot that would start off the investigation). It's the part of Harry that isn't content with the mundane or the logical; the world of the Insulindae is fantastical, so why can't the solution to the case or a question or anything be similarly fantastic?

[@razbuten]

I'll be back for those last 8 minutes in a couple months. update: I came back for those last 8 minutes. good game. good video.

[@R0BB23]

This is where having a terrible memory works in my favor, since I know it will be months at best before I will be able to play it.

[@jackthespiller1263]

Same here

[@MrBsehratmaannking]

Hey razbuten

[@setrisd9191]

I feel so incredibly validated that my favorite content creator likes the things that I like

[@greyfox4838]

@@R0BB23 me too, I watch the spoilers of whatever video, if it still doesn't interest me enough to play, no harm done, if it does, I'll probably forget the details of the spoilers anyways by the time I start playing the game

[@funguy398]

I took 1 damage from Light bulb and 1 damage from running into a wheelchair Lady and died not even leaving motel. Best game ever.

[@norasyikinali6283]

I died in the lobby, accidentally stumbled onto the wheelchair woman there. I cackled when that happened.

[@Shiny_Gliscor]

I died from a heartattack cuz I failed to grab my tie from the ceiling fan. XD

[@Marewig]

Same here. That's exactly my first playthrough. It got my attention from that point on.

[@kasane1337]

Pff, I took 1 damage from the light bulb and died. That's what I got for investing 1 point into Physique.

[@mrpmurphy]

I died from the light bulb in my shortest playthrough ever... my laughing fit latest longer even

[@sabinasabino141]

I have a weird experience playing this game, that’s because I can’t actually play it. I am poor, very poor by American standards, I was not born poor, however, and have had access to an excellent education - I am sort of an anomaly. I couldn’t afford this game, I earn minimum wage, but it had been so long since I bought something from myself, so I went ahead and bought it, 56 reais, I am Brazilian, by the way, from São Paulo. The problem is, my computer is slightly more than a decade old, a laptop, of all things. I installed it, and it ran, but just the beginning section, the game would crash and chug horribly if I left the Whirling Rags. I tried everything, but in the end I was left playing just that small sequence, over and over again, in the hopes that by some miraculous mean my hardware could last me just a couple of steps longer into the game. A new conversation, a new skill check, and since it chugged a lot I was left with my own thoughts. And everything kind of reminded me of home, yes, the game is set in what is essentially a frozen tundra, and I live in a sweltering tropical mega city, but still, maybe it was just those small conversations I kept having over and over with the same characters that gave off this feeling of familiarity, but their weary faces in a worn down bar and hotel, that unmistakable hopelessness, it really stinks of home. We are often stereotyped as a happy people, but our happiness is just we laughing off the pain, most of the time. Life is harsh around here, inequality and strife to the point of caricature, and our fascist in power doesn’t exactly lighten the mood. There is this feeling of empty nostalgia, not for anything in particular, because the past isn’t really worthy of it, but maybe for the times when things did not feel so apocalyptic. Two years ago now, I think, the sky blackened with ash, night fell at four o’clock in the afternoon, it was ash from the intentional burning of the Amazon, here, in São Paulo, as far from the Amazon as NYC to Denver. That day our collective heart broke, and we’ve been sort of undead ever since, settling in this kind of resigned routine. This reminds me so much of this game, or this game reminds me of all this stuff. Sorry for the rant, it’s been a hard day, your videos are lovely. Thank you.

[@godofgibberish85]

Just wanted to say that you write beautifully.

[@Enzaio]

Such a great comment. I really hope Spirit of Jazz's suggestion will help you to play the game in full.

[@lucassoaresmachado5112]

Teu texto é como um grito coletivo de uma geração. Nos negam acesso à cultura, ao lazer, à natureza, a um futuro e à vida. Eu moro no sul, mas aqui não é muito diferente. Falta alguma coisa. Essa nostalgia talvez seja, no fundo, a saudade da ignorância, de quando não sabíamos que era tudo tão duro. Eu espero que tu consiga ter a experiência de Disco Elysium. Para mim, foi algo muito importante, especialmente em 2020. Um abraço!

[@hp2893]

força família que agente é capaz de melhorar!

[@thegreatdream8427]

I'm American, but reading this comment made tears come to my eyes and I felt the urge to express arbitrary, random, unconditional love for you, a stranger. Make of that what you will.

[@phelanii4444]

After 23 years of living in the same small Eastern European city, where everyone knows everyone and everything you need is within an hours walk, I have moved to a big city in Germany. When I am in my family house, I refer to the small apartment in Germany as "back home". When I am in Germany, I refer to my birthtown as "back home". Home is not only where the heart is, it's where you are not.

[@valmontina]

Anymore

[@Mr_Case_Time]

Beautiful and bleak. I’d like to add, perhaps unrelatedly, perhaps not, that since I got married and had kids, they are where home is.

[@darthplagueis13]

@@valmontina Or yet.

[@gmacwizard8890]

Cherish it while you can it is likely you will live long enough to one day return and for there to be nothing left of the home you knew and you will be a stranger in familiar geography.

[@nanashi7779]

@@Mr_Case_Time That's also quite beautiful

[@tychoazrephet3794]

I...never realized the main menu is The Deserter's view of Revachol. That adds such an incredible depth to the imagery of this city, depth that was already fathoms upon fathoms. If it's the same view, the first view we the audience get of this city, how differently do we see it compared to him? Both views are voyeuristic, separated, removed and yet why are we filled with wonder while The Deserter is overwhelmed with fossilized disgust? This isn't our home, it isn't his home either, we're both foreigners to this strange city. Perhaps there's an inherent value to novelty, a value lost over decades, or perhaps it's easier to enjoy the view when you aren't carrying the weight of failing to change the world. We're all ghost's of our own pasts, but to us, Revachol isn't the corpse of a future we lost.

[@glumbortango7182]

If you haven't already, change you stats and give the game a second play through. There are so many changes between dialogue and character opportunities that it genuinely feels like a different experience; and then there's the stuff that glosses over the first time and glows like a neon sign later. It's good stuff

[@ingridww]

this reply is a bit late lol but i love this comment!! however i disagree with the idea that The Deserter is a foreigner to the city like us. i think its his history with the city that lets him feel disgust at it instead of the wonder the player opening the menu for the first time feels. kind of like the Italo Calvino quote used in the video regarding Phyllis: "Soon the city fades before your eyes... You follow zigzag lines from one street to another... All the rest of the city is invisible... Many are the cities like Phyllis, which elude the gaze of all, except the man who catches them by surprise." i think this applies to the way the player feels interacting with the beautiful but broken Revachol for the first time, vs how the inhabitants like The Deserter feels

[@CraigNull]

@@ingridww The deserter isn't a foreigner in any relevant sense but there are others of his generation that do not share his disgust, or direct it at other things entirely. Some of the deserter's vilest words are for Rene, who has a very different historical perspective. If given the opportunity Rene would surely mirror that disdain right back at the deserter. Meanwhile Gaston, who is probably hated and hates the least among the three, seems to (if I recall correctly) basically favor the present progress/status of Revachol, at least compared to the nostalgia of the other two. None of them can claim to be a more legitimate representative of Revachol than the others. The contrast between them is not in how long they've dwelled in this city, the difference is entirely in their values and professed loyalties

[@ToriKo_]

Is no one gonna comment on the writing in this comment?! Holy shit that last sentence!

[@cf5397]

For the first few hours I played Disco Elysium I took the voices that interrupt dialogue as instructions. I thought the game was telling me what to do, a goal to orient myself around in conversation. It was only when several conflicting thoughts interrupted me that i realized these things were meant to represent thoughts and not instructions. Like even though I was in control, I chose the dialogue options, I really for a time wasn't. I was a slave to my psychie. And I wonder how often I am just the same in my day to day life, mindlessly following the orders of my most immediate thoughts instead of pondering for even a moment.

[@arrasectum]

The Klassje volition check demonstrates this perfectly. "The little bleeps and bloops you trust for info - you can't trust them anymore."

[@magnificmango336]

I knew this game was gonna be great when I finished the first day, chatted with Kim, and then he mentioned I wasn’t wearing shoes. I checked my inventory and realized that yep, I forgot to equip my shoes.

[@steve7745]

One thing that you said that really struck me was in your description of the skill Shivers vs. Encyclopedia, the way you described two ways of knowing something. It reminded me of something I learned while studying German, the two verbs they have for "to know". They actually have this dichotomy you describe built into their grammar in that the verb "wissen" directly means to know, to recognize and understand something, whereas the verb "kennen" means to know of in an intimate sense, of knowing who someone is or why something does what it does. An example would be, I might know the location of my house ("wissen"), but I also intimately know my house, the cracks in the tiles in the bathroom, how the burns on my kitchen counters were made, etc ("kennen"). Just thought that was pretty cool to think about, idk

[@JacobGeller]

Oh that's really fascinating, thank you for sharing

[@rbgg2010]

Reminds me of the word "grok" from Heinlein's Stranger in a Strange Land. That could be seen as an English equivalent to 'kennen' maybe? Or rather the Martian equivalent... "Grok means to understand so thoroughly that the observer becomes a part of the observed - to merge, blend, intermarry, lose identity in group experience. It means almost everything that we mean by religion, philosophy, and science and it means as little to us as color does to a blind man."

[@fakename2969]

知道/了解

[@fakename2969]

知道/了解

[@evanprice5470]

@@JacobGeller This comment is telling me I really need to join your discord.

[@buzhichun]

Just finished the game a week ago and all I can say is: Mr. Evrart is helping me find my gun.

[@johnthomason9980]

Mr. Evrart is helping me find my gun.

[@trixiblue4701]

Mr. Evrart is helping me find my gun.

[@_altoarcadevere]

Mr. Evrart is helping me find my gun.

[@banette6263]

Mr. Evrart is helping me find my gun.

[@perrisavallon5170]

Mr. Evrart is helping me find my gun.

[@IndirectCogs]

I watched for one minute, paused, bought and played the entire game and came back. This game is fucking devastating. One conversation in particular had me fucking sobbing. I was sad in a way I'll never be able to express to another: and that makes it worse. Disco Elysium is the real deal. An AMAZING RPG.

[@googiegress7459]

The game is so demanding, like a trainer you hired to drag you through stones. I believe people who played through it are silently a cohort. But instead of uniting us in conformity, it amplified what was in us for it to latch onto. Thinking about this game again, I make myself vulnerable. Insensitivity or ignorance are the only defenses against beauty.

[@afqwa423]

Not sure which conversation you're talking about, but talking to the one spider hermit man in the church really hit me hard for reasons I can't express.

[@IndirectCogs]

@@afqwa423 uhh... i'll give you one hint about what I mean. Dolores. I do love that hermit in the church tho

[@magicianvv489]

I never felt more attached to a character, than I did to Harry during "that" conversation. Honestly, it helped me realize and internalize the same thing that Harry needs to, to get better, which is that You need to move on, no matter how much it hurts.

[@garrettbyrd7426]

@@IndirectCogs The Phone Booth conversation hurts worse, personally. They both made me cry HARD, but the Phone Booth was rawer, imo

[@gyozapunk]

As someone who has lived in the same washed up midwestern town ever since I was born, and for reasons out of my control will likely never leave, this really choked me up. It's really something when you experience something that makes you see the same things you always have differently. This will probably stick with me for a while.

[@comedyman4896]

I'm really curious, what circumstances make a person not leave a town their whole life?

[@gyozapunk]

@@comedyman4896 When I said that I mostly meant I'll likely never be able to move, not that I'll never be able to travel. Though to answer your question, being poor can do that.

[@brandon9172]

@@gyozapunk "Uhhh yeah but akcutally you can move, just be homeless where you move" - some shit brained libertarian, probably

[@bandidocavalier]

@@brandon9172 i was ab to snap at you until i saw it was quoting

[@tafa_matai3184]

Me too buddy. Just another lost soul trapped in the American Midwest. My world is a post apocalyptic one

[@luccasliuti8098]

Disco Elysium Essays are my favorite kind of videos on the internet. This game means so fucking much for me. I actually broke up a 7 year relationship right before playing the game and was stuck in the past, i also tried to kill myself on this timeframe. So playing this game i didn't even see Harry as Harry, i saw him as me. Facing Dolores at the end was like facing my own dark toughts and it helped more then months of therapy could. I'm facinated by the power this medium has to change people, and i can say that Disco is maybe not the best game i've ever played, but it is the most important.

[@Cretaker]

I thought about things like how would a person that got through a heartbreak would feel seeing those scenes in the game. That last dream when SHIVERS tells me _All the roads will miss her footsteps when she's gone from here_ ...

[@johnsnider2956]

I had a very similar experience, I've been haunted by a relationship ending that was during the happiest 5 years of my life. After enough time, I see that neither one of us is wholly at fault. But I ended up making an attempt on my life afterword. The Dream tore me up so much, but was also extremely cathartic, because it almost gave me a sense of closure in a way that I could never find IRL.

[@danilthorstensson8902]

Yah, I quit alcohol the day I started playing the game and went through the game going through awful withdrawals. A very meaningful game and experience for me.

[@kevinc6971]

A year later i hope you're well, brother

[@hedgehog.of.cydonia]

i have a similar experience, as a depressed person for many years. the last hours of the game were like cathartic for me

[@s.masoodkazemi2748]

It is quite melancholic to see that a person (Robert Kurvitz) sees his homeland (Estonia) the same way I see my homeland (Afghanistan). To put in short, Revachol does reminds a lot of my country. My parents always tell me how good it was when USSR was in their, at least they know they wouldn't be torn to pieces because of a bomb each day they leave their home. Like Revachol, my country never was the same and never was fixed once the USSR was defeated. There are places in my city that you can still see the bullet holes, the fractured walls because of bombs, the fractured souls of all the people who died, who lost love ones, who lost themselves. Revachol is like a second home to me. As much as it is broken and torn to pieces, it is the only place I have.

[@milotura6828]

where are you now?

[@s.masoodkazemi2748]

@@milotura6828 Afghanistan

[@milotura6828]

@@s.masoodkazemi2748 oh my bad

[@s.masoodkazemi2748]

@@milotura6828 no problem 😃

[@milotura6828]

@@s.masoodkazemi2748 wait so what is the situation there now. Are you like relatively safe my brother cuz i hope to Allah you are

[@glasscreature9497]

I'm a senior in high school, about to graduate and leave my home, NYC, (well hopefully, yay pandemic) and this captured so well my sadness and excitement about leaving. NYC is such a personal place in that you can live there your whole life and yet never go to so much of it. It's so segregated, and not just by race, but by class, life experience, nationality, language. It's a "melting pot" in that these people coexist together, but oftentimes barely interact. One of my favorite habits is to just walk, try and find a street I've never been down before, to look up and see something so familiar in such a different way. I love it here, and yet it makes me so angry to live here, knowing how badly it fails people, knowing how stark the contrasts can be, and yet how easy it is for so many people to either ignore it or never see it. I feel sad to leave, and feel like all I've done is observe as neighborhoods get gentrified, stores I love replaced by "for rent" signs and laser hair removal shops. Even this summer's protests are only remnants; I saw the arches at Washington Square Park with scrubbed graffiti that said "ACAB" with two cops in front of it. The boutique stores with boarded windows are gone, and only the NYPD cars remain. Even CBGB's, which used to be a center of protest music, is now a John Varvatos store. It reminds me of Mark Fisher's book on Capitalist Realism, that capitalism acts like it was always here and will always remain. It is easier to imagine the end of the world than to imagine the end of capitalism. That was a long ramble barely having to do with Disco Elysium but! Thanks for articulating that feeling of city that is so hard to explain. Loved the video, thanks Jacob!

[@poweroffriendship2.0]

Since you are graduating, then congratulations. Just live on your dreams for NYC.

[@aaronolivarez2677]

Dang bro save it for Lit1301

[@thejacobin9406]

Currently a Queens native livin in Portugal. I know exactly what you mean, the nostalgia is hardcore

[@shiwakao]

im also a senior, except in my case it's boston. only three of the fourteen schools i've applied to are in-state, and none of them are at the top of my list. im excited to experience a different climate and a new community of people, but i also fear losing the familiarity i have with the neighborhood, not just knowing the back alleys and side streets but also knowing the memories i spent in those nooks and crannies and the neighbors acquainted with my parents that always remark on how i've grown. however, i also feel ashamed, as it seems like i haven't grown acquainted to the city as much as i could have. many of the main streets and highways i never memorized the names of, and those neighbors i never grew acquainted with myself, and i often forget their names as well. as i continue onwards, i wonder if i am leaving behind lost opportunities.

[@brandon9172]

"Its so segregated, and not just by race, but by class, life experience, nationality, language. It's a "melting pot" in that these people coexist together, but oftentimes barely interact." Unfortunately its not just NYC that's like that. It's the entire United States. It doesn't matter where you move to, no matter how small a town. You'll still see slums with people making piss poor wages, living in trailer parks, right across from gated communities where the rich dickwads that employ them live. And ofc none of the immigrants will live in either community, they're forced to live in slums that are even worse.

[@magnificmango336]

The greatest novel of 2019 is here, and it’s a video game.

[@ZeeTymian]

You're absolutely correct, but as much as I love Disco, that novel is actually Pathologic 2

[@magnificmango336]

@@ZeeTymian Nah man, it’s just a rewrite of Pathological 1

[@user-hm3ni1wd3f]

@@ZeeTymian it terms of narrative and writing, i think disco elysium is better than pathologic 2

[@qee4617]

@@ZeeTymian Pathologic 2 is a stage play, DE is a novel

[@pabloborroto4692]

@@qee4617The CORRECT take

[@MrTreespace]

Man hearing those horns gives me goosebumps every fuckin time.

[@Moonshadownova]

It's so strikingly beautiful, I was shocked how easy it was for me to get lost in my memories of playing the game as soon as they started playing

[@ramblelime]

You could say it gives you... shivers?

[@jennbaker6964]

Same feeling as when the beautiful violin comes in on GY!BE’s Providence

[@itsinna01]

@@ramblelime qq

[@relicondqypq]

Please, love and support the developers of Disco Elysium, we need another game from them

[@joebob327]

They are doing a remastered version of Disco, entirely voiced and with a new area 😮

[@relicondqypq]

@@joebob327 everyone that owns the original game would get it for free

[@Skid235]

@@joebob327 Thats great to hear, i allready thought about playing it again but i guess im gonna wait for the remaster then. But i still hope they gonna do another game like this, it was a masterpiece. They could even do it in the same universe as the groundwork for it is allready there and really well done so far.

[@ZeeTymian]

The entire game is actually based in the universe of a book that Robert Kurvitz wrote - the book is currently being translated into english. So there's more of this where Disco came from :) Also Kurvitz spoke with great excitement about making a sequel and having a "fifty voices in your head screaming at each other" sex scene in it, so here's to hoping!

[@markusa5293]

@@ZeeTymian Furthermore the book and the game are based on a long-running DnD campaign by some of the developers.

[@PurposelessRabbitholes]

What an incredible game this is.

[@danielwaterman4228]

Hey I love your videos man

[@benplace5714]

Yo dude your videos are the best! I love u your style!

[@BlueBeetle1939]

Truly one of a kind nothing else has ever made me feel like I was sitting at a table with a friend playing a tabletop game and that is only one thing about it

[@KmiloO13me]

What are You doing here rabbit man!?

[@GigaDrilla]

why?

[@neonneon892]

That Venice bit really struck a chord with me, with my experience with Disco Elysium. I've recommended this game to others, and have heard how they picked Inland Empire, or like in this video, Shivers, as their favorite skill, and I picked neither, yet everyone seems to have a similar excitement about how they found the game's core meaning in that skill or other aspect of the game.I can't really describe what Disco Elysium really is to me, and I don't think I should. What if part of it is the not-exactly-knowing? I think it's like those horns, you play Disco Elysium and experience Revachol, and whatever you associate with it (the music, your favorite skill, some place in the game you remember) will bring Revachol as a whole back into your mind. Pardon if this comment doesn't really relate to what you were speaking of in the video, I was just taking in the Disco the entire time.

[@Kushufy]

the meaning of this game is who gives a shit about politics, theres a motherfucking 3 meter tall stickbug right behind you

[@clara1291]

I grew up in an economically depressed city and moved with my mom after my dad died. I remember in elementary school, I would walk home imagining what it would be like to live somewhere else and know different people. But after I moved, I found that I missed it. I am now perpetually homesick, and have been for years. The place that I left doesn't even really exist anymore; it's been too long. The funny thing is, I know a bunch of people from the same city who feel the same way. Sometimes, I run into someone from the area, and we always spend a few minutes trying to figure out who we know in common. There's a sense that there will always be someone, or someplace, we have in common. This seems strange, but to me it just feels familiar. I wrote a song about this city once. It started: You're my love, don't ever change Life's too sweet, life's too strange To go away and not come back again

[@slothbaby2104]

I need to hear this sound in all its glory

[@bacicinvatteneaca]

@@slothbaby2104 There's a Limmy skit about that, let me find it

[@bacicinvatteneaca]

Ok here it is kzbin.info/www/bejne/iIirf4mtra94m7c

[@slothbaby2104]

@@bacicinvatteneaca thanks

[@RhysticStudies]

as a Calvino scholar, this video hit all the right notes for me, and you continue to inspire me with your ideas.

[@MisterKabukiMask]

Just wanted to let you know I love your Blue Map Essay videos as much as your Rhystic Studies videos :)

[@leonardomagri4379]

Calvino? You mean the writer?

[@RhysticStudies]

@@leonardomagri4379 yep, italo calvino.

[@spinakker14]

hah! when I watched this video and heard Calvino's name now the first thing I thought was you, Sam :)

[@lucaspintooc]

wow look who i found here: the popping snare guy from the delta sleep livestream

[@epicmagicplatypus]

Jacob, you once said you believed that we should evaluate games based on how much time they occupy in your mind. On that metric, DE is the best game I have ever played, by far. I first played this game at the end of 2019, a time when I had done a lot to improve my life and was generally pretty happy. Then Covid, among other factors, caused things to fall apart. Through this year, through changing circumstances, I have often found my mind traveling back to the world of Elysium. Revachol is no paradise, but everyone in it finds their own way to go on, to keep striving for a better future even as they struggle to survive in the ruins of the past. That last encounter at the end of the game reaffirmed how beautiful, how surprising life can be. Even through all the pain, there is beauty in being able to feel at all, to keep going despite all odds. It is that underlying message of hope that has stuck with me and made this a game I will never forget.

[@lurox5183]

Bring on the final cut so we can all experience it again, hopefully with some great extra content. I whole heartedly agree with your comment

[@NeostormXLMAX]

i still think of lisa the painfull and cave story more than this

[@jadefae]

I find it interesting how I'm perceiving a very different game to Jacob, and yet it too is just another version of the "city" that is the game. Like, Jacob has seen an aspect that I wasn't capable of seeing, because I was too terrified of the main character. TW Self Hate, also spoilers I think: I wasn't able to see past Harry, because I hate myself just as he does. And the part that terrifies me is that in my lowest moments I want what Harry has. I want to forget everything I've ever done, I want to free myself of the burden of these sins that no one remembers except me. But what truly fills me with dread is that Harry has that, and it doesn't help. The self hatred persists. No amount of forgetting can help him. And, sometimes its too scary for me to imagine that.

[@jordanmoscovitch]

And the trees are green and overhanging Featherlight, free and everlasting Want to be free Burn Baby Burn Eternally Burn Baby Burn Disco Inferno

[@MrOwNaGe95]

It persists because his pain and self-hatred reside not in his memories but in his conception of himself. The memories only remind you of the wounds you have, they are not their cause. Forgiveness is all that can heal. Mistakes are how we grow as people. If you forget what you've done, not only do you strip yourself of the ability to know why you are dissatisfied with who you are, but you are also unable to know what to change. Things can't look better for Harry until he really looks into himself and accepts all that he's done, until he has that final conversation with his image of the woman he once loved. Being better is the absolute best, and all, that we can do. Therefore, it is enough.

[@dopaminecloud]

@@MrOwNaGe95 Grow into what?

[@Marewig]

That kind of reminds me of what I've read in some story with fantastic/supernatural elements. "You think you can escape your problems by killing yourself, but you know what? You can't. Why? Because you have a problem with yourself, and you're still the same person you can't live with, no matter which realm you've managed to drag yourself into." (Definitely liberally paraphrased). Oddly enough, it's one of the things that help me to _not_ consider suicide; because there's still a chance I'd be hauling my same self with me all the way.

[@lessevilnyarlathotep1595]

@@dopaminecloud something else. even in death, change never stops

[@adrianbourceanu9145]

I think you managed to put into words something I've been feeling for a long while. Not just about Disco Elysium, but about cities in general. A bit of background: I live in a country that used to be part of the Communist Bloc, in a small city that once was a centre of industry, but saw itself grow poorer and poorer after '89. Not "pornographically poor", but a long shot from nice and comfortable. A place that everyone young hated, that everyone wanted to get away from in order to go search their fortunes somewhere else. And though I understand their sentiment, it is one I could not bring myself to experience. It was like a revelation, in a way. It happened when I was in ninth grade, riding a bus home from a kineto-therapy session. It was late in the evening, in June I believe, and the bus was passing by this huge tower block that housed an apartment complex, a tall and grim piece of brutalist architecture. The sun was setting, and I raised my eyes at the exact moment to see the entire sky drenched in violent orange, even the clouds seemed to be small brushstrokes of red and purple against a huge canvas, while I just sat there, looking up at the amber light washing over concrete slabs with hard edges, reflected in small square windows on the side facing the street, illuminating the faces of passer-bys, and... something just rose in me. It was like a high note that entered through my lungs and resonated inside my body. I sensed a certain beauty then - not in the traditional sense, not purely aesthetic, but a beauty that was all-encompassing of the building, the city, the world, cast there in that fragment of a second. Yes, it did send a shiver down my spine. I became aware that it would soon fade away, and I would be left with only a memory; that no matter how hard I tried, I could never relive that moment in time and space again. Wasn't that tragic? Wasn't that worth mourning? And how could all the people around me just be... impassive to this? Were they so uncaring that their eyes pierced straight through what I was seeing, eyes that grasped in vain at something they had become too worn to comprehend? Ever since, I have experienced it again and again, only for a moment, in what I had called "bouts of melancholy". I could never quite put into words what I was feeling then, but I knew that it was not coming from inside myself, not entirely. Something outside triggerred it: the old communist-era blocks in the West of the city, built close to the old steel mill profiling on the horizon, dark and silent; the Danube river, ebbing and flowing to the South, beyond the boardwalk; the street lights turning on late at night or turning off in the early hours of the morning; travelling with the bus on a cold autumn afternoon, on my way home from school; a sunset seen from the boulevard; the great roundabout, before which opened a valley where an old church was hiding behind a newly-constructed office building; a crow resting on a bare tree branch outside my house, in the midst of December, and me focuse on it while struggling to study for a chemistry test the next day; the powerlines... the damn powerlines strung from roof to roof and pole to pole. There's much more than that, I am certain. The point is: while playing Disco Elysium, I managed to capture that magic again, that sense of being-in-the-city, of experiencing it intimately. That sense of - strangely - being at home. Or, rather, of feeling at home. Captured there, like the alcohol in that bottle I purchased from a drunk on the coastline for 3 Real. To be honest, I dreaded the moment when the game would end, when I would be unable to return to Revachol, to the Whirling-in-Rags, to the library in the abandoned plaza or to the church near the shore. The moment that did it for me was, in my playthrough, at the end of the fifth day, when I had finally discovered Ruby's hiding place and I was running around town to complete my sidequests, since the game warned me that there was no turning back after that point. Joyce had told me about what would come next, and I knew it would not be pleasant. So I stood there, on Rue de Saint Ghislaine, as the clock was ticking towards 20.00, with the same thought in my mind I had many years ago, in a bus on a June evening: all this is beautiful now, and it will only last a moment. Nothing we can do will ever give it back to us. Perhaps that is where beauty truly resides: in the passing of things, in our awareness of it - and in our acceptance to let them go, even if they still cling to us in the form of memories, retaining a small fragment of ourselves as we were in that moment. A whisper on the wind. A tune on the radio. An electrical shiver, going down the spine.

[@morpheus7144]

That is beautiful. I'm sure this would apply to many cities, but I suspect you're talking about Bratislava (which I've also lived in) and from which I draw similar experiences to the game. It was only for half a year from half a world away, I was staying with my uncle who I'd only seen a couple times before in my life. I'd finished my studies and felt utterly empty, and felt a need to connect with my distant family. Although I'd had my fair share of miserable experiences (my mental health was quite poor at the time), I wasn't working, which allowed me to really experience the city. It drew me in, night after night and over time I felt it as an entity, rather than just as a bunch of buildings with things to do. Like you, I cannot put these experiences into words, but what I felt during that time was a beautiful kind of melancholy, connection and attachment with the smallest of things. Perhaps I wasn't distracted with working or studying, all I could do was take in my environment. There's something to be learned there I think. I've had similar experiences in other cities since, though not the same intensity. And now that I'm married I don't have the same sense of isolation I did have back then when I was alone. I would never want to go back to that space, but I still kind of miss it. I wish I could say more about it, but I was reminded of this when reading your comment. Thank you.

[@rileys.4169]

what incredible writing. what a profound glimpse into this city, thru your eyes, what a pleasure to have a glimpse into ur mind

[@IsaacSchubert]

it isn't isolated to cities. I've seen the last sunlight streaming through forest fire choked skies and beetle-eaten pines. understanding the pain of the world doesn't remove it's beauty

[@KavsLockedOut]

yeah you talk like a jacob geller fan

[@broomguy7]

The cop - my cop - was haunted by the worst parts of himself, all of the worst things he had done. The recurring dreams of a final unwanted kiss. The rigorous self-critique of a sorry cop. The immobilising weight of failure after failure. He drank to free himself from the past, but he ended up sinking even further. But by the time the case was close to finished, things were different. He had found the scattered fragments of his self in the streets of Martinaise. Kept only the important parts - the flowers of the windowsill, the distant sound of a radio - only the still lifes. Painted in blood and motor fuel was a promise to the past: un jour je serai de retour près de toi - one day, I will return to your side. A wish for a future that could never really come to be. A longing that kept him tied to the failures of the past. He lit a cigarette and tossed it on the graffito. There's a case to solve, a future to live, and freedom from the past could only come from sending up that promise in fire and smoke. Wake up / In a new life / By the seaside.

[@shadowgirl221]

I got to the part about Shivers and knew I'm going to buy the game. You just have such a way with words, man. It's difficult to articulate it, but the best way I can say it is that you make every game you talk about sound like the most beautiful and complex work of art. Its powerful and wonderful

[@Moonshadownova]

It's an incredible game! I hope you get as lost in the world as I did

[@TheCivildecay]

Something that totally caught me off guard while playing this game was that klaasje mentioned coming from Lelystad, which is a actual town in the Netherlands where I was born (about 45 minutes from Amsterdam), which was such a strange detail, especially since its such a unremarkable town.

[@Ozzianman]

I remember the game describing the town as unremarkable as well. Pretty clear Oranje is based on the Netherlands.

[@Dreamfillah]

Another such mention is Vaasa named as a city in the northern parts of Elysium's world. Vaasa is a city on the western shores of Finland.

[@TheCivildecay]

@@Dreamfillah a cool, didn't know that

[@that1geekychick]

Another aspect of the gameplay that really drives home the "multiple cities" theme is that the different skills don't just give you additional sets of information. The different voices in the player character's head will, at times, directly contradict one another, both in terms of advising you as to the best course of action to take and in terms of evaluating the "truth" of the situation. All the skills, IIRC even Encyclopedia, the "historical facts skill", are very much positioned as unreliable narrators. They are, at the end of the day, just figments of an amnesiac alcoholic's imagination and memory. One of my chief complaints about the game is that it's actually possible to miss this, if you get unlucky and pick a build that doesn't happen to showcase these contradictions.

[@googiegress7459]

I was very much struck by certain times when the internal narrators were so clearly unreliable, but just did their best.

[@jbrooks4865]

Talking to a certain very important character who lies frequently and having Volition point out that their lies were working *on my other skills*, and the other skills argue back that they're seeing clearly and they proceed to argue with each other, was such an electric moment. I knew that skills could be wrong, but I was so used to passing skill checks, having skills say "pick this option", and just taking it at face value that that moment made me reevaluate everything. God this game was good.

[@nvk3435]

@@jbrooks4865 Holy moly the bit with (spoilers) Dolores Dei when there's a suggestion check to kiss her, and if you choose it, suggestion starts apologising for suggesting it, that bit fuckin slaughtered me

[@Oryxification]

One of the worst things I ever did was mod the playthrough to have 10 in all stats. Like having a crowd of people in your head all fucking screaming.

[@youtubeuniversity3638]

@@Oryxification How do?

[@owenlee3291]

I just got this game and wanna go in COMPLETELY blind so I’m gonna save this video for later

[@timinimification]

enjoy! be careful retrieving your tie...

[@gavinjasper98]

Good decision!

[@captainsavs]

Totally worth it

[@zeroblue720]

"A cold wind down my neck, and a shiver down my spine." That happened every time you let those horns play, as it did when you said that line, Jacob.

[@darthplagueis13]

Kim Kitsuragi is one of the best written characters I've seen in a videogame in a long time. When you first meet him, you think he's just gonna be a simple straight-man act, but as the game proceeds, you get to know him so well... Frankly, I think having high Esprít the Corps is worth it just for the fact that it helps you understand Kim better. Not to mention that, at times, it functions very simularily to Shivers.

[@karhu7581]

"If an assault were launched on this building right now - if the windows came crashing down and the whole world descended upon you - this man would hurl himself in death’s way to save you. You are sure of this - but why?" --the first passiev Espirit de Corps check in the game, when you meet Kim for the first time. it's also very interesting or funny, depending on your outlook, that Espirit De Corps seems to point to some kind of literal shared hivemind of cop minds that Harry is able to tap into. He's able to hear the conversations of his unit from miles away, intuit what Kim is thinking, know that another cop just got stabbed on the other side of town, that sort of stuff.

[@greymatter6850]

⁠​⁠​"He is your half-brother."

[@goldfishzzz]

I've never felt so emotionally impacted by a game before in my life and felt as if I was looking at another version of myself that I've never met yet felt so familiar with. I'm sure a lot of people here and myself can relate to Harry a lot especially if you struggle with depression, anxiety, and overall feelings of worthlessness. For me personally, I was able to relate a lot with his self-hatred and feelings of guilt about hurting others whether it be emotional or physical, and the overall crushing feeling that depression really does to someone's psyche. It's difficult to come to terms with your past, especially to accept what's happened and move on without the simple feeling of wanting to be ignorant, to forget that it ever happened in the first place. When I initially played the game I tried to make Harry as good of a person as I could, not just because I believed that he was worthy of redemption and can better himself, but the fact that I too try my best to better myself so that I feel that I'm actually worthy of anything, Harry almost felt like my own parallel self-insert in a way due to the decisions I force him to make. But despite my feeling that Harry was the most relatable character, I found that Kim was not only my favorite character because of his actions and overall personality, but someone I wanted to be. Although Kim has some flaws like being impatient and somewhat materialistic, I found that he had a great work ethic from waking up at 6:30 A.M every day and his attitude towards the overall investigation on how he wanted to get it done asap in a quick efficient way. Not only that, but he shows great compassion and kindness to Harry such as when he encourages him when he's unable to take down the body on the first day and gives him his handkerchief if he vomited from the stench of the dead body. He's in fact one of the only people in the game who treats you with any respect and warmth. I also see myself relating to him on a very personal level. Kim's character being a Seolite are obvious parallels to Asians in our world and I myself am Asian, specifically a South Korean. I also may be reading too much into his character too much but his name is often a common Korean surname and Seol sounds very similar to "Seoul" which one of Korea's biggest cities and capital. But just like Kim I wasn't born in my home country but rather in the U.S and found myself loving this country despite its many flaws, he considers himself a citizen of Revachol, a Revacholian, when speaking to the racist lorry driver and in the church if you call Kim something racist. Kim is also taken by surprise if you defend him against any racists in the game and will appreciate, respect you a lot for doing so. I also find that it's rather uncommon yet interesting that Kim was written as a patriotic Revacholian as many Asian characters in fiction I feel don't tend to be patriotic about any other country other than where they're originally from. For me I grew up in NY around other Asians, I found that many of them weren't born in the U.S and felt closer to their Asian roots. However, despite me also being Asian, I was often isolated and disliked by them for being more Americanized, unfamiliar with my Asian heritage. Although I'm a full-blooded Korean with Korean-speaking parents, and can speak Korean decently, my parents were often too busy to spend time with me, let alone talk to me about Korean culture due to them working all the time. I often found myself being treated nicer by others who saw me more than just a Korean outcast and accepted me for who I was. For the same reasons as Kim, I felt that I was an American first and then a Korean second. There's more I'd gush about how much of a masterpiece I find that this game is, like the soundtrack and depressingly realistic portrayals of city life, but it's already getting far too long to read, but if any of you have read this, thank you for reading my long-ass essay of a comment lol.

[@lurox5183]

I enjoyed your contribution. Excellent observations and well articulated

[@RichBurrell]

The soundtrack was fully composed by British band Sea Power. Some of the songs including the horned theme, came from album several years ago. I urge anyone who loved the game to check out their discog.

[@herman1francis]

I am what, some people from my millennial generation call, a functionnal alcoholic. I drink, a lot, every day, I cannot remember when was the last day I did not drink a beer, probably around 9 years ago. This game made me reflect on that, my choices, my actions, not harry's or costeau's, as I ended up being called. But mine, my actions were the source of my realization. It was the flow of dialogue. I am now a barcelona born catalan guy battling against alcoholism because of disco elysium. And if a game can do what no doctor, friend, or family member was able to... that must mean that this game is a masterpiece.

[@maxducks2001]

For anyone playing this game for the first time, a word of advice: Shivers NEVER lies to you.

[@Gm-ce5kg]

it just cant

[@joeholley3178]

Such a great aesthetic to this game, I think it speaks to the "outsider", non mainstream games aesthetics you've discussed din other videos. Amazing music too -- I think I've listened to "the hanging man" about a thousand times, just to feel the goosebumps.

[@thatsalotofdamage8568]

The full portrait of the thought tree

[@shards-of-glass-man]

I teared up several times during Disco Elysium just because of the overworld music waking the Ancient Primordial Brain of my own and having it wail in despair. These horns tore into -me-, somehow. Whirling-in-Rags was a small island of comfort in a deep sea of sadness... an island that the Detective has already rampaged through some time earlier that he couldn't even remember. I've played as a Sensitive archetype with high Logic, and my physical stats weren't great at all, but yet, somehow, -somehow-, Shivers was the only skill that kept growing. And growing. And growing. By the end of the game, I had 10 Shivers. 11 with the coat. As I played, the city latched at me. The city spoke to me, more and more and more, constantly. The horns spoke to me, constantly. I ran away from my own Revachol to attempt to find a better life in a big city. I didn't like things so reminiscent of my past staring at me every time we stumbled past the bookstore or a pile of rubble by the shack Cuno called home. I hated the apartment complex, so, so similar to the set of three hives I lived close by in my past...angry angry angry little shiver strings trembling in my brain. What am I so bitter at, the city itself or the state of decay it has found itself gripped in? It is dying and it will die, someday, inevitable, and my escape has only contributed to its demise and I know it. Yet the decay is still clinging to my bones. I still hear the horns, whether I want it or not, and the primal voice wails, over and over again.

[@righteousham]

Those horns, to me, faded majesty echoing out from the past. Soft now, and so tired.

[@ddeegan6532]

Disco elysium is absolutely everything to me, hell yeah!

[@saintmara9864]

"Attaching pieces of ourselves to the places we inhabit. Unable to extract our emotional memory from the streets and archways and roofs." This line brought tears to my eyes. As a result of the pandemic, I was made homeless last year. Forced to leave behind the people I loved and the place I had called home for the last 4 years. Luckily I had family members that took me in. But almost a year on, this new city still feels alien to me. My thoughts ever take me back down south, to where my heart still lingers. A beautiful video as ever, thank you.

[@andrewjerome8729]

I think you would love Pathologic 2

[@theeagle2138]

I have the same feeling

[@zp6182]

Leave it to Jacob Geller to make us wanna buy a masterpiece that we've never considered before. This man single-handedly made me buy Control, Outer Wilds, and Ape Out and I'm so thankful

[@TheCivildecay]

That's a good set of games :)

[@jessechuff]

I still need to finish outer wilds but it gives me similar feelings (albeit not as powerful) as Disco Elysium. They both have this haunting sense of discovery and sense of place. Disco definitely feels like a more lived in and run down environment to me, but the worlds paired with the soundtracks really hit a similar spot for me. I got a little overwhelmed with Outer Wilds trying to beat the clock to get certain things done, but I think after stepping away for a while I just need to play it and go with the flow more than try too hard to accomplish tasks. that's how I dealt with Disco Elysium in a way and also how I dealt with Pathologic 2 (another game I haven't finished due to the punishing nature, but loved what I've played). Anyway, you didn't ask for these paragraphs but these games really get me excited haha

[@vagabundorkchaosmagick-use2898]

Outer Wilds here, as well.

[@zp6182]

@@jessechuff The excitement is mutual. Funny that the game that gives you 22 mins to save the world ultimately teaches you to let go and look at the flowers along the way

[@TheCivildecay]

@@jessechuff i actually installed outer wilds because I wanted something like no man's sky but without the random generated world. I installed it, did all the tutorial stuff, flew to brittle hollow and scanned a few nomai texts, felt kinda bored and quit the game. Then I watched Jacobs video on the game a few months later, afterwards I immediately rebooted the game and it became one of my favourite games of last generation

[@LewisDWilson]

When that trumpet kicks in at the start of the video I got goosebumps. An iconic piece of music.

[@olly3231]

Thank you for a clear spoiler alert. I am really tired of video essays not being clear about this and ruining stories before someone actually gets to try them.

[@steampunkerella]

because of shivers, i learned to enjoy to take in the cold winter air and just... enjoy being outside, taking it in. it was a pleasant experience* *the winter of 2019 going into 2020 when the game came out. aka, pre-covid

[@KitDivine]

"When I left cities I visited I thought about them constantly, but when I was there, I thought about where I was from." Man that just resonates with me when I travel on such a primal level. Thanks for the words for that feeling. =)

[@Snes_Controller]

Jacob, tired of talking about houses, has decided to start making videos about cities.

[@boochie-yj7un]

He’s leveled up

[@AstraIVagabond]

Watch out, world! 'Cause next time, he'll be... Talking about _planets._

[@giehlemanns]

as soon as the screen turned black at the beggining and that deep raspy voice started to talk into my soul while i had headphones on i knew i was in for something special

[@underarmbowlingincidentof1981]

19:33 Now thats a quote that resonates with me.. Sometimes when I walk back from the shops or from the bus I turn a corner and, just for a split second, I feel like I've never walked that street before. The next moment I snap back without having missed a step but that feeling of seeing the objective beauty instead of my subjective boredom of that street always leaves me feeling weird. And that quote sums it up. I never see the beauty because it became just another street, just another room, just another bridge for me. Yet when I, for that short second, lose that memory I see it like a tourist. And that is when you see the beauty and not just the feelings and the memories you have connected with it.

[@chelseatheatre]

shivers was immediately my favorite skill. revachol as a character is so interesting, i hope they dive more into jamrock if they end up making a second one.

[@cowboy4187]

Shivers was really amazing, I liked the ominous vibes of the inland empire ones even more.

[@Grandmaster-Kush]

"Beat" it 5 times, something about it just clicked with me entirely, Revachol is the most human place in a videogame imo

[@lucassoaresmachado5112]

So glad to see Calvino and Disco Elysium together. As a researcher of urban history, I can't recommend these two enough. And it's funny that you mention the horns. Every time I exited the Whirling-in-Rags and heard them playing I, too, thought they were a sound of the city, or rather some kind of vignette. I still have to play the game focusing on Shivers. My first playthough had Encyclopedia telling me all about the raw data; with the game getting a definitive edition on March I guess it's time to see the city through the eyes of a taxi driver. Great vid, bud, keep up the good work! Greetings from Brazil.

[@JaneDoe-tz8tw]

The way you talk about games I've played and can still elucidate on subjects I didn't even think mattered in the slightest is something so fascinating about your videos. The amount of detail and research you put into every piece is always so damn inspiring. Hearing Polo speak of cities and places when I'm sure most of us now wish we could be anywhere else brought a tear to my eye and it was even harder through the lens of watching Revachol's slow decay. I love my city, but I can only hope I am not beholden to it, as to say I hope I have not given myself to much to it and not taken enough in return.

[@crushermach3263]

The bit about being blind to the things around you really struck a cord with me. In particular it reminded me of a semi-recent (within the past couple years) revelation in how I think about my home. See there's this silo in my yard (the place used to be a farm) and it's been there since before I was born. To someone passing by it might stand out a little, though not too much since this is a rural area. You might think of what might be or could have been inside of it at one point or another. I know, because I've been to working farms and wondered the same thing once or twice, but I've never had the same thought about our silo. It's never been used or maintained in my lifetime. For all of my life it's just kind of been there, like a shape with a name. One day in a passing thought as one so happens to have now and then I thought about what I might do with it if I had the time, money, and motivation and that lead my to think what it was made of... I didn't know. For all my nearly 3 decades of life I'd never thought to wonder what a building next to my house was made of nor was it immediately evident to me. Turns out it was a concrete stave silo, which low-key blew my mind, because I'd never thought of concrete being so comparatively thin as the sides of this thing and still being structurally sound. Heck, I hadn't thought there were concrete buildings of any description being anywhere near me, but all of that's beside the point, which is that now I don't just think of this old house and the surrounding property as an unchanging immovable object anymore. The walls aren't just *there*. They're filled with boards and insulation and wiring, which academically I knew, but just clicks differently now. It's not just my house either. I finally understand how those home makeover shows can just break down the walls of someone's home and they can be happy about it. My house isn't just a home anymore, it's property, a *thing*, and it can be taken apart and reshaped and added onto like LEGO bricks if someone has the motivation to do so. It's both liberating and mildly terrifying, because it's also made me realize the impermanence of it all.

[@joex-mn4we]

Hey Jacob!!! I'm the essay guy, I got a 9.5/10 and was the highest in my class. Thank you for making my hobbie an experience and a vague review a genuine testimony. I hope you know how important your content is to me and, as i say in every video of yours: Thank you, Jacob.

[@discodetectiive]

holy shit! i JUST finished disco elysium (and i’m going back for another play-through), so this video came at the perfect time! thank you jacob!

[@gavinjasper98]

Considering waiting a little bit! The developers are going to release a free update with full voice acting and some bonus content in 2 months or so!

[@John-uh1pb]

@@gavinjasper98 Amazing isn’t it - this game was /so/ good & did /so/ well that the authors have been able to afford to pay for voice acting for /every/ line in the game. In multiple languages at a million+ words per language!

[@ThatDangDad]

Incredible video, thanks Jacob. Disco Elysium is one of those games that just haunts me constantly. For me, it's Revachol as Mark Fisher's Hauntology writ large, a place where we live out the ghost of the future that never happened. I feel it so strongly in real life and DE helps me process that in a way that I don't know what else could.

[@venomvenomvenomous]

The role of the Volition skill when you interrogate our Orajanese disco queen is absolutely amazing. Stopping you in your tracks to revaluate and arguing with the rest of your conscience to realize you're being played was one of my favorite parts.

[@Username-bk5ug]

It may sound pathetic, but „Disco Elysium“ is one of the only things, not games but things, that made me feel something in years.

[@Mizels]

Your voice feels like home Jacob. Thank you, once again :>

[@CanelaAguila]

I was born and raised in Amsterdam, widely considered one of the more beautiful cities in the world, but I irrevocably fell in love with "ugly" harbour city Rotterdam when I moved there to study. It is a city that isn't easy to love, but when you do it is all the more personal because it's yours, you chose to love it and you see it now. Even then I mostly moved in the university spheres with many internationals that did represent part of Rotterdam's spirit, but were not born and raised there at all either. But they were different from Amsterdam's internationals, and either way you didn't need to talk to people on the street to see how different the streets are, to feel the way people are in shops and public transport. All my friends have moved on from Rdam and I myself had to move back to Amsterdam, but I still get choked up and emotional everytime my train rides into Rotterdam station.

[@minejumper6662]

Ah man your anecdote at the start really hit home for me, i was walking to work like over a month after finishing the game, id liked but maybe not fully understood it yet, and i just randomly put on the soundtrack and it affected in ways that music hadn't in years. When i first got the game and wasn't familiar with the setting, in my head i always imagined those horns playing over a series of loud speakers all across the city and that all the people i spoke to could hear it too. That's the image that stuck in my head the whole game.

[@handel2502]

I've moved to a completely new city in a completly different country and yet, all I am seeing in this fabled and old city is an apartment with white walls. But the place I moved from, most of my time I also spent in an apartment with white walls. In college, I spent most of my time in dorm rooms. Only in my childhood did I have more room than a bedroom it seemed. But it was out in the country, and near alone, what company and family I had felt like they barely tolerated me. At least now in this new room, I have someone that does more than tolerate, that actually loves and cares about me. I feel the pressing need to leave, to explore but danger awaits outside as the air itself is something I can not trust.

[@davidsharp4400]

No matter how big of a fan anybody else is in this game I maintain that I love it more. Watching Harry turn from a drug addled mess into a self aware supracop is the most philosophically gratifying experience I can imagine. I breathed my life into Harry and the world all around.

[@heytherenewton9302]

seeing those flashes of the game world made me feel so nostalgic, and i couldn't understand why because i am quite literally taking a break from my second play through to do some laundry, until i realized that world really did feel like home. anyway game of the century ruby are you free thursday night

[@FrankieProkop]

Holy crap is this soundtrack incredible.

[@Minilena]

Ouch. Music from Journey too? My heart, my poor poor heart, it can't take all this - two of my favourite games combined like this...well I guess I'll just pause the video until I've finished sobbing

[@toastergoblins1530]

Out of every skill in Disco Elysium, Encyclopedia is the one I’ve always loved most. Because of how similar it acts to my brain, especially when it tries to help with the pop quiz on Innocents. Just this voice that pops in with random, tangentially related, oftentimes useless information that I can only use to impress some of my friends sometimes. And it lets me pick dialogue options that feel like something I would say. Such as bringing up the rate at which hornets can kill bees when interrogating the Hardie Boys, even without context it makes sense in my head, but not to anyone else. I just don’t see myself or my thought processes so perfectly captured in media very often, so I’m always happy to hear that little guy chime in with information. Go you funny information voice!

[@thewatcher9237]

I can’t believe this beautiful essay didn’t even mention once the single most important driving force in my playthrough of Disco Elysium: Kim Kitsuragi’s approval

[@Illegiblescream]

A game critiquing capital was eaten by it. Shocking.

[@moresnqp]

can i just say, can we PLEASE TALK ABOUT THE PALE? I WAS PLAYING THIS COOL DETECTIVE GAME with a bunch of cool voices in my head and suddenly i never know if im really seeing the world properly? i never know what time it is? the clock could be lying.

[@abilisha8460]

Man as I started this video and you saying “shivers” I swear I was so happy because it is by far my favourite in this game.

[@bobjohnson1437]

Wanted to watch this spoiler free so i quickly bought the game and many hours later can finally watch this.

[@safe-keeper1042]

Same

[@asdad123ify]

For me is hard to call it just a game, is an entirely new experience, a mixture of a classic dystopian book, a cult movie and a CRPG (not so far from what the ZA/UM guys are (check a doc that's here on youtube). I've consumed it like a good wine, slowly but steady for about one year, spoilers free, savoring every single word. In that year the person who i loved the most died, and i ended a six year relationship, can't say this game is been a therapy for me but it's been pretty close don't know why, like a good entheogen. I feel so related to Harry, his relationship with drugs and alcohol, his apathy with the world (and the world with him), dealing with his own thoughts, preety close to the reality where i live (south america). Pretty serious stuff that i can't remember if any other videogame had ever touched this topics with such a profound approach, just superb... Now im 80 hours in and I think i'm near the end of it, but oh boy, what an experience has been... Definetly is more than a videogame... EDIT: I was reading the comments and we are so many Harrys around there...

[@pahbody5336]

It is almost as if you’ve seen Noah’s video and has decided to make a companion to it Each theme a perfect cheese to fill a hole he left I was so surprised when he didn’t even touch on Shivers even once, not a sole mention You are here to vindicate me, Jacob

[@122josh]

I loved shivers I remember the first time it popped up outside of the whirling and the first thing I said out loud was "oh wait is Harry re-remembering things through the haze of his amnesia" he remembers things only a man who has walked the bullet ridden alleyways and snow covered streets thousands of times it gets abit more supernatural when he sees events far away and events that may come to pass so I think it's 50/50 at times but yer shivers and encyclopedia show how much thought and effort was taken to build such an incredible world I recently played this game its definitely in my top 5 ever.

[@mikoaj9598]

"This is somewhere to be. This is all you have but it is something. Streets and sodium lights. The sky, the world. You're still alive" - Volition someplace in the game

[@AssasinZorro]

The horns and the stylized aesthetics of Disco Elysium remind me of one of my favorite games - "else Heart.Break()". The music of that game lives with it very well too.

[@grammarjedi]

I'm just here for your impressive narration. Love your video essays, thank you!

[@cowboy4187]

I finished my first playthrough as a communist sober cop, it felt like such an amazing story of Harry overcoming his past. That last dream and the final interactions hit me so hard. What a beautiful game, I hope to see more from these guys. This entire game is just so wonderful. The setting, the writing, the emotional drama. I was blown away by how much I loved thiss.

[@DrunkBiden]

This game gave me chills like no other - through the protagonist's struggle to understand who he himself is, you get a glimpse into yourself and how your choices over the course of the game shapes him into either his best or most terrible self...it blends the distinction between player and character

[@im19ice3]

i never cease to love how you zoom out of anything you're talking about to an omniscient existential perspective, and at the same time i relate, since i tend todo that with mundane life things, your view is always so beautiful and smells vaguely of hope, i'm not great at coming by that substance much, so i'm grateful for you sharing it.

[@CSXIV]

Not sure why I'm getting a bunch of Disco Elysium takes right now, but it's fascinating because every one I've seen has a different take on what the game is about. And having played through it, all of them true. One thing I always mention to people in an effort to get them to try the game out: the game has two main plot threads. One is a murder mystery, where you're trying to solve a murder. The other a more personal murder mystery: why you went on a bender so epic, your erased your memory. The answers to both are very complex-and paradoxically, also very simple. And then I refuse to elaborate and tell them to play it, while also warning them that the game will fill you with existential dread and can be very depressing.

[@thefrostbee4182]

i agree with this entirely! every person sees something different in Disco Elysium. Even though we look at the same pixels and talk to the same people, what it all means and how it affects us is unique to ourselves. though we can all discuss it together and relate to one another. its quite beautiful in a strange way. ive never felt so many sad emotions playing a game, yet to me somehow its hopeful and welcoming.

[@spikey9004]

How did I never hear about Invisible Cities until I tried solving a very cryptic puzzle in Fallen London? That was a damn good read. Looking forward to Disco Elysium for ps4 because this is very much my kind of game.

[@chrono4998]

man I just started playing fallen london, which puzzle?

[@TC-mo9on]

@@chrono4998 It is an enigma.

[@ladyhoratia1709]

your video essays always make me cry at the end. always and i just love it. thank you so much for everything you do. i learn so much from you

[@vissersixty-nine6246]

oh MAN, I can't put it into words but everything about this essay makes me want to recommend I Am In Eskew

[@buckett9758]

I have been waiting for Jacob to make a video on this, rock on.

[@WritingWomen]

Absolutely perfect timing! I just finished playing yesterday and wnet through my To Watch list of all the videos that have come out about the game.

[@unintentionally_edgy5867]

encyclopedia will tell you how many died in the revolution. shivers will tell you their names and faces.

[@ivan-jb6nd]

been hoping for an essay on this from someone and i'm glad it's you

[@Teiran42]

That horn drop... It still hits me every time they play and they invoke so much. That's the city. Perfect way to say it.

[@Jessie_Helms]

This game made me tear up _3 times._ A game has never done that to me before.

[@ryan-or8vb]

i adore your work, i hope to one day be able to support you for real through patreon because, without exaggeration, every essay of yours i have listened to has brought me to tears. absolutely incredible!

[@Zeverish]

I love you're work, you do a fantastic job elucidating the beauty of things.

[@philippwolber1465]

Dear Mr Geller, Connecting Disco Elysium to Invisible Cities from Italo Calvino is so brilliant, it brings me to tears. Thank you!

[@michaelandrews117]

God I love this game. An easy 2019 GotY for me. It's just a phenomenal experience that deserves to be remembered as one of the greats of the medium.

[@jessicaboccabello4158]

You captured everything I love about this game so beautifully Jacob. Thank you for putting my feelings into words. This is your best video yet.

This is a masterpiece. Thank you for this video. As someone who spend a lot of time playing, thinking and writing about this game, I'm glad to hear somebody express some of the exact thoughts that I had. Your intro moved me, as I had experienced the same process.