The Infernal Engine of Disco Elysium

     “Hours turn to days. Soon he will get up again and go through it – again! Again! Finally, we know what the infernal engine was, outside –the clarion call…”

            “The engine of a Coupris Kineema…”

            “No. It was HIM. HE is the infernal engine, can’t you see? He never stops. He only gets worse.”

            Disco Elysium is a game about a lot of things. It’s about being a detective, about exploring an unfamiliar place that soon becomes like home. It’s about choices and meaning and experiences. It’s about brokenness, with a broken protagonist in a broken world trying to piece things together no matter how pointless it may seem. But more than anything else, it’s about what it means to be human. Humanism is the lifeblood of Disco Elysium, the philosophy that there’s no higher power, no afterlife; you get one life, one chance, and that’s it. But if that’s true, then what’s the point? Why even bother existing, or even living? What meaning is there to be found in a world surrounded by emptiness and disappointment?

            In Disco Elysium you play as Harrier Du Bois, a broken man in the depressing, war-torn city of Revachol. Harry is a top class detective, arguably one of the best in his precinct; at least, that’s who he used to be. Harry’s life, and his entire identity, have fallen apart right in front of him. He doesn’t see any meaning in his existence, and the voices in his head ask him time and time again why he even bothers to go on. He has no family to speak of, aside from an ex-wife who left him heartbroken, and he pushed away any friends he had. He went to Revachol to investigate the murder of a government official, but if his actions from the night before the game begins, and the very state you start the game in, he most likely wanted his life to end in that moment. And yet, he keeps on going. He begins working with Kim Kitsuragi, who was brought in to check on Harry and make sure he saw the case through to the end, and as the game goes on they become closer as partners, and even friends. Kim is more often than not a driving force for Harry during their days in this city of brokenness, the ever-present and ever-prepared detective who never leaves your side until the dead of night, and in that sense, he becomes one of the reasons for Harry to keep going, to keep that infernal engine chugging along. Harry comes to enjoy the time he spends with Kim, the first person in a very long time to help him find his sense of purpose. Kim makes Harry’s life meaningful.

            One of the defining aspects of Disco Elysium is how it leaves you feeling empty. Every single side mission or investigation you can take part in aside from the one at hand starts off with a compelling, oftentimes mysterious premise: a dead body on the docks, mysterious noises coming from an abandoned apartment complex, and tire tracks outside the hostel cafeteria you’re staying at. All of these mysteries, just begging to be solved; except the reality beneath them is all but trivial, leaving you feeling disappointed, or even melancholy. The body on the docks? Just an old drunk who fell, hit his head on the corner of a park bench, and died on the spot. Haunted apartments? Simply a broken intercom system. The tire tracks? From your own government-issued car, which you crashed into the lake in your drunken stupor. All of these distractions which at first seemed so special amounted to nothing. So what was the point? Why even bother with stuff like this? Why even do anything at all?

            I mentioned earlier that the Philosophy of Humanism is the lifeblood of Disco Elysium. And despite how it may seem from what I’ve described, Humanism is a truly beautiful thing. Why do you do the things that you do? If what you do ultimately amounts to nothing in the end, then why do anything at all? Humanism responds to this with another question: why do you do anything in the first place? Because it was what you wanted to do. And regardless of how it turned out, you still have that experience. Your choices, the things you do and what you ultimately value in life, are what define your existence; they’re what give your life meaning. The beauty of the experience, that’s what humanism (and Disco Elysium) are all about. Why does Harry keep going? Why does he do the things that he does, ask the questions he asks, why does he even continue to life his life? It’s because those things are what he wants to do. Every choice Harry (and by extension you) make is an active one; you don’t have to do anything, but you’ll do it anyways because you want to. You’ll choose the skills and ideas you want; you’ll answer things as you please, and you will live your life how you desire, with what you are right now. That’s what Disco Elysium is about: finding meaning in a life that might seem meaningless.

Disco Elysium is a game about a broken detective in a hollow, soul-crushing world trying to piece his life back together; a game that says, “life is what you make of it, so live the life you want to, because in doing so you’re find something truly special.” And there’s something really beautiful about that.

 

It’s been like 3 months since I last wrote something like this, so if you made it to the end, thank you so much for listening to me ramble about one of my favorite games, I hope I was able to make you at least somewhat interested in playing this masterpiece. And if you haven’t played it already, I absolutely recommend it, it truly is something special. I’m going to cap this off with one of my favorite exchanges from the game, I wasn’t able to include it in the essay itself, but I just had to put it in here, it means a lot to me and it was undeniably the moment that hit me the hardest during my playthrough.

“I exist.”

“I exist too.”

“Tell me what it’s like for you.”

“I’m ill.”

“What is your illness?”

“It’s my heart. For me it’s sadness—input after input.”

“That must be incredibly hard. We are in silent and meaningless awe of you. Know that we are watching—when you're tired, when the vision spins out of control. We will be looking on. Rooting for you.”