Canceled Disco Elysium Standalone Spinoff Reportedly ‘The Most Hardcore Disco Since Disco’

More details have been revealed about the canceled standalone spin-off of the popular RPG Disco Elysium.

In February, it was revealed that work on that project, codenamed X7, had been halted, along with news of layoffs at developer ZA/UM. At that time, it was claimed that the spin-off was only “one or two years away from completion”.

Now, in a report from PC gamer with current and former ZA/UM Studio employees, lead writer Dora Klindžić said this version would have been “110 percent authentic” and the “most hardcore disco since disco”.

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X7 “would have advanced the story, emotional threads, and gameplay elements all at once to truly evolve the psychological RPG genre as Disco Elysium pioneered it,” Klindžić said. “For a while, it seemed like miracles were possible, and with them, redemption.”

Another developer told the publication that the spinoff was about “one of the most beloved characters” from Disco Elysium. “I feel like this was the best possible shot for a Disco type game without (Kurvitz), Rostov and the other people who created the original Disco Elysium,” they said.

Internal response to the X7 was positive when it was shared during a company-wide presentation late last year. “Everyone was looking forward to its development,” said a developer from another ZA/UM team, adding that “the internal announcement was a great morale booster after a difficult period of bad press around the studio.”

They also thought it was “exactly the kind of game (ZA/UM) should be putting out”. Several developers believed the spinoff could “reassure fans that ZA/UM is not a shell, that the intellectual property is in good hands, and that the studio is full of talented people with a true love for the world of Revachol”.

While some of those who spoke to PC Gamer said they thought this Disco Elysium spin-off could have launched this year, others thought next year was a more likely target. Klindžić said that if the team had to continue developing the title with less management interference, “perhaps it could have been a three-year development cycle from start to finish”, with work on the X7 initially starting in 2022.

Klindžić had initially left her job as an academic physicist and space mission scientist in February of that year, in order to work on a sequel to Disco Elysium. However, it was an inauspicious start to the project. “When I arrived, I was told that all the tracks were gone and replaced, but this was presented as a good thing, a healthy thing. Four months later, the project was abandoned overnight. I I started to voice my concerns, because I felt like I had just given up my whole life and my career to end up in a studio where the people I came to work with were laid off, and the project was over. where I was supposed to work was abandoned for no reason.”

Then, in August, studio management contacted Klindžić and Disco Elysium writer Argo Tuulik⁠about starting a spin-off. “We only had about a week to put together a full game pitch, and we worked around the clock to come up with a new story, new characters, new gameplay mechanics, and a new creative direction, including a initial vision for design, art and audio We presented the pitch to management, it was a resounding success It was given the green light and codenamed X7, and its production schedule. initial was set for one year.

However, even when the project was given the green light, Klindžić said the team was “doomed to fail from the start”, as they were not allowed a pre-production period. “Every time we expressed our concerns about this and expressed that we needed more writers to meet deadlines, we were accused of not wanting to do our jobs,” Klindäi said. said.

“Almost from the moment the writing team’s pitch was approved in August 2022, the other teams started production,” Tuulik added. “We didn’t even really know what the story or characters would be, when the art teams were already drawing up early concepts for characters and environments. I’m sure you can see what a big deal this is, when you are creating a narrative game.

“Essentially, the writing team had to work double duty from day one to provide work for other disciplines, while trying to write the first dialogues and outline the rest of the game at the same time. The team The editorial team consisted of myself and Dora at the time.” Another developer added: “I don’t know if Dora and Argo ever felt in control.”

As for why the X7 was ultimately canceled, PC Gamer’s report doesn’t give a clear reason. However, it is evident that a dark cloud still lies above ZA/UM.

“The whole X7 team loved the world of Elysium⁠,” Klindžić said closed. “As fan artists, musicians, iconic voices & NoBreak;, we only wanted to keep it going, rather than letting it languish in a dark, decrepit cellar of corporate intellectual property.”

Since the release of Disco Elysium in 2019, ZA/UM has mostly made headlines due to an extremely public legal dispute with key former members of the team. In 2022, ZA/UM founder Martin Luiga claimed that Disco Elysium designer Robert Kurvitz, writer Helen Hindpere and art director Aleksander Rostov had been fired following the company’s takeover by the Estonian businessmen Ilmar Kompus and Tõnis Haavel, previously convicted of investment fraud. This sparked a series of lawsuits and accusations of toxic behavior at the studio.