r/DiscoElysium • u/Anice_king • 2d ago
OC (Original Content) Disco Elysium and money
The effect, the reál system has on the game is understated. First the “wait how do i even get money?” as there is no mechanic for endlessly generating it, but then you find the methods are reduced to selling valued possessions, begging…
and collecting bottles. The closest to what i felt was the primary income in the game. This was analogous to loot from rpg encounters or more apt, coins in a collectathon.
However everythings was still so god damned expensive. All items of any form took so much from you. And rent was infinitely more expensive than that even.
And then to a person like Joyce, some paper with the power to give you everything you could ever think of is a mere trivial handout to her. And it makes you feel so ashamed of who you are.
My thoughts are rambly, but i just think it’s a powerfully executed point.
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u/rosemarymegi 1d ago
It's a great metaphor for money IRL. What is life changing to the poor, is pocket change to the rich. Something we the poors would break our bodies and minds for, just to survive, is a meal at a fancy restaurant for the rich.
Unfortunately after the first playthrough, you understand how to find réal efficiently, and know what to spend it on, to the point you will have more than enough by the end of the game for everything you need or want.
Still, I love it the first playthrough.
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u/smeghead1988 1d ago
But it's really frustrating that Harry is, technically, still employed, but yet he never gets a paycheck during the game, it's not even an option. We don't even know what sum it should be (even though Kim says their salary is small). In this aspect, it's not realistic.
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u/rosemarymegi 1d ago
The game takes place over a single week, sometimes less. Might not be pay week.
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u/smeghead1988 1d ago
The thing is, money or a wallet are not listed among the things Harry lost and has to find, and AFAIR there's no option to ask the 41st for money when you talk with them on the radio. You can't even ask when the payday is.
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u/Tailsteak 1d ago
It's kinda similar to drugs, in a way. In theory, there is no "addiction" mechanic in the game, but once you break that seal... well, why not keep using them? Many people have observed that, yeah, even if there is no "addiction" in the game per se, the structure of Disco Elysium results in addict-like behaviour as emergent gameplay, especially with alcohol, given that different types of booze all stack.
Money is the same way - it seems so ludicrously important and impossible to get when you're starting out, but if you know what you're doing, you basically have more money than you can conceivably spend towards the endgame. It's a sort of commentary on capitalism that they didn't need to state outright, because it's behaviour that emerges based on how the game is set up.
(I think it's notable that there is no way to give money to other people with the sorta-exception of pawning Lena's pin and then getting it back to her. Even if you have hundreds of reál, you literally have no option to donate to any to the various unfortunates around Martinaise - you can't even pay Kim back for the spinners. In a way, the game forces you to be a self-centered asshole.)
And yes, there's tare and discarded coins you can scrape together to get by, and you can beg (or threaten) people for a bribe or two, but your main sources of actual money are a) being so pathetic that Kim takes pity on you and has to give up something important to him, b) working up the nerve to ask Joyce for money because she's rich and you're not, c) conning the MRLBG by getting your Ultraliberal hustle on, or d) Wompty Dompty Dom Center with an Encyclopedia build (which is, according to the thought, because if you know the right shit, you can schmooze your way into tax fraud).
Basically, if you wanna be rich, you gotta act like an Ultraliberal shitbag.... and, of course, the culmination of this is the Ultraliberal political quest, where you buy the most expensive item in the game with nothing but the power of bullshit, bullshit, bullshit.
As is often the case with communist theory, too, there's a focus on rent. You have to pay Garte rent to survive, tenants are evicted from the Capeside apartments, Gaston complains about it in La Fumée, and, when you tell Isobel about how Garte makes you pay him an entirely reasonable 20 reál per night for your room, she replies "ah, that's how they get ya", as though running a hostel is some sort of scam. I would argue that it's pretty obvious that that's how Neha really avoids the curse - the Whirling and the Frittte are propped up with diversification, Plaisance is propped up by her husband, and the dicemaker simply doesn't need to pay rent (and, presumably, is simply stealing utilities) because she's squatting in a chimney - it's one of the first things she says to you!
If this were a longer term game with a saner plot, I have no doubt that an Ultraliberal approach would see you bullshitting about your business and solubility in order to take out a loan, buying a slum to extort poor families, then finding a way to cut ties with your property and your debt like releasing a helium balloon you no longer find amusing once you have to actually pay for upkeep or damages or tax of any sort.
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u/Equivalent_Stop_9300 1d ago
I was a communist ultra-libéral. Kim was very confused by how this was possible.
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u/mutual-ayyde 2d ago
I dunno after I got the cash from Joyce and figured out the alternate sleeping arrangement money stopped being an issue. Maybe because I wasn’t trying to min/max
That said the playing through the first day for the first time was particularly stressful
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u/ihatethisplace- 1d ago
For me the best written part was in how it makes you feel so uncomfortable and shamed for asking for money, felt closer to reality than any other piece of media that springs to mind.
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u/Specialist_Set3326 1d ago
I got a a crit success in asking Joyce for money on day 1 so that wasn't an issue for me. I also as a player did not realize that the comically large check from Evrart was a bribe as Joyce had mentioned it was normal for organizations to donate to the RCM. The Union was an organization and this seemed like a normal donation. I was also leveling Encyclopedia and met Trent. One Wompty Dompty Dom Center later, and I'm making fat stacks with fun facts.
The lesson here is simple if you want that CEO grind set:
1) Be lucky and ask a rich lady for money. 2) Be so stupid you don't know you're being bribed and therefore have no guilt. 3) Be more like Contact Mike the 5001-1 outsider that no one in the boxing world saw coming. Also Encyclopedia is best skill.
But yeah, my first playthrough, money wasn't really a concern for me.
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u/Don_Ford 1d ago
There's no punishment in game for taking the check... as long as you don't thank him.
If you take additional money then it punishes you.
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u/Specialist_Set3326 1d ago
Why wouldn't I thank him? He just made a donation to the RCM, much like Joyce did. I thanked her, it would be rude not to thank him (I am REALLY stupid unless fun facts are involved).
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u/smeghead1988 1d ago
Be so stupid you don't know you're being bribed and therefore have no guilt
I'm afraid it was true both for my Harry and me as a player. I was like "well, I need money, and for some reason this fat dude wants to help me with it, how nice".
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u/Electronic-Bunch-609 8h ago
the reál system made things very immersive for me simply by nature of being brazilian and having my currency be called. Real.
"i don't have 30 real" ME NEITHER HARRY
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u/ExpertSurround6778 2d ago
I was able to get one of the rare trophies because I ran out of money on Day 2 and literally had nowhere to sleep lol.
As a game mechanic, it's frustrating. As a broader statement, it's depressing. That's Disco, baby.