Developers of Disco Elysium, ZA/UM, have lost several key members, apparently involuntarily, including Robert Kurvitz (the lead designer and writer), Helen Hindpere (writer), and Martin Luiga (editor).
While it was already public info that some of these devs had left, the information that they had left involuntarily was not. It was stated in a Medium post from Martin Luiga, announcing the dissolution of ZA/UM Cultural Association. (This is very distinct from the company itself.)
The company has responded on Twitter, but it is very bereft of any information.
Of course, we should all be weary of Rule 10 here, but this is a pretty uneasy story to look at. I have many thoughts, but might save them for a Medium post of my own or wait to hear what others think.
Iāll try to keep my response (relatively) brief. My Twitter timeline over the weekend was pretty caught up with this news and seems to fall into two camps: one is basically ādo not feed the auteursā, pointing out the number of writers and artists who have not left the company and whose contributions to the success of Disco Elysium may not even have been clear when so much credit goes to a small group of founders; the other takes Luigaās allegation that this is down to quote-unquote āthe money menā and runs with it to assume very bad things about the way the studio is being run in the direction of commercial success over any creative goals.
Lacking (much) further information than the above, I feel like āboth of these can be trueā. I do think itās important not to minimise the work of other people at the studio, and itās not implausible to imagine a scenario where a few years down the line a Disco Elysium sequel (or thematically/narratively related work) comes out of ZA/UM and is still great because of the people who remain there. In some tweets, Luiga hints as much about the sequel anyway. That said, people have surfaced job ads for live service content, and old interviews with the āmoney menā talking up the pros of Brexit and shifting much of production to the UK for tax reasons while doing the classic publisher thing of saying āno no, our game isnāt political, it doesnāt have a viewpointā. It paints a concerning picture - again, itās not implausible to imagine a situation where the commercial success of Disco Elysium led the studio to grow and move away from whatever creative vision those founders had to the point they were driven out involuntarily as alleged.
(Iāve also seen the viewpoint that is basically āDisco Elysium pretends to have socialist aspirations but it was a commercial videogame so is essentially capitalist and no one should care about any of thisā, which feels very āguy emerging from a well to observe you partake in a societyā)
My personal view is pretty much āthis sucksā. It sucks that a creative team that made something so good is breaking up because I wanted to see more from them, and I think we can lament that without putting those who left on a pedestal, and I am concerned about the apparent direction the studio is taking away from the precedent set by the first game. We may yet get more information: Iām not aware of any allegations about ZA/UMās workplace culture or the leadership of those who left such key roles, and that could obviously change my opinions here. There are even scenarios where this is actually a good thing and allows other writers and artists still there to shine. But based on the limited information available Iām going back to my simple: āthis sucksā.
Well said top to bottom. As you say, every game is the product of a bunch of people, but even in development of the big olā AAAAAAAAAA (pronounced by screaming) games, if thatās followed by all of your leads leaving (voluntarily or otherwise), thatās rarely good news.
While I generally agree with the cries of ādeath to auteur theory!ā for Druckmann or Kojimaā¦ I do think this case could be messy, from an IP perspective. Iām pretty sure Kurvitz had published a book in this universe before even founding ZA/UM? Never read it, for all I know doing so would make compelling evidence of how important the other team members were, but stillā¦ Iām curious if he is legally protected if he wants to revisit the world. It feels messier than just saying Disco Elysium 2 will be another Metal Gear Survive.
Just chiming back in to say itās very possible that the IP is tied up in the company whether or not it predated the company founding, so the original author leaving is not necessarily an obstacle. Itās also possible a completely bizarre thing may occur where the rights are split between multiple parties - just look at stuff like Lord of the Rings, where different folks can develop based on the books, the existing film adaptations, the appendices; or Marvel, like the Fox/Disney fights over Quicksilver and Scarlet Witch predicated on whether they counted as mutants or Avengers. In such a scenario ZA/UM the company may be able to develop a sequel game while Kurvitz could write further novels and so on. In other words unless there is a definitive statement with actual legal backing speculation will not get us far.
EDIT: Feeling like I was too quick to say āletās not speculateā after doing lots of speculation myself here and in my previous post. My point was more āIP rights are complex and often nonsensicalā, so anyone thinking the existence of the novel is a guaranteed problem for ZA/UM the studio or a guaranteed way back in to that world for the original creators should temper their expectations.
I would also pump the breaks on the auteur criticism; obviously, we should avoid auteur worship, but this is a situation where itās a group of people leaving, not one guy getting kicked out. We know at least 4 people are no longer with the company, and they all seemed to be major players. Two lead writers, one of which was the director and creator, the art designer (Aleksander Rostov), and an editor who seemed to be present in the formative moments of ZA/UM.
Iām not gonna dig too deep into it, because Iām not sure the anxiety is actually warranted, but a while back, the ZA/UM website added a job posting for a sales and monetization role. I think the read of āmonetizationā could be just part of the descriptor, rather than saying theyāre gonna make a gacha game, but I donāt know. There were some concerns in the description that they would be leaning towards a live service business model, which would be a pretty major pivot.
It would also be pretty ironic, given that there is an entire storyline in Disco Elysium about a game company that crumbles because its live service model is unsustainableā¦
This is my most annoying opinion but you mentioned Metal Gear Survive so:
Metal Gear Survive is actually the perfect sequel to The Phantom Pain because it strip-mines and repurposes MGSV assets and series nostalgia to assemble a pointless, lore-adjacent grindfest from the bones of a game that criticised - and was consequently knee-capped by - global capital and growth for the sake of it.
It retroactively reinforces the themes of The Phantom Pain by doing everything it did but without the context or framing, resulting a game made from pure commercial pressure abstracted from any creative vision. Combine license with popular genre = profit!
Iāve long been confused by the status of the novel (I think English language reporting around the time of Discoās original release mistakenly stated the novel was being written when it already existed in Estonian; the issue was one of translation). In Tuesdayās pod, Ren stated the translation was being undertaken by the now-dissolved ZA/UM collective, the artistic entity separate from ZA/UM the company. If thatās the case, the translation may now be cancelled or otherwise imperilled.
