Ok so I just finished disco elysium for the first time and I gotta say I'm kind of, surprised I guess for all the hype I saw for it from here? Feel free to call me dumb and that I missed that whole point but I felt like it was so hard on communism as an idea and communists as people that I was left with nothing at the end but "communism is a hopeless shot in the dark and trying to be a decent person in the hellscape world will end up with you dead, safer just to be a musclebound fascist who fucks bimbos all day or an elon musk who accumulates so much wealth they are above the laws of physics" Like I get those characters and ideas in the context of the situations and what they are saying there, but the over all vibe left me feeling nothing but demoralized about communism. Did I just not "get it?"
The developers did say they went a bit far in making Communism hopeless and riddles with corrupt union leaders and such to counter the fact they're openly communist/anarchist. They're also from the old eastern bloc, so they are putting their own feeling about the failure of Communism into it.
That said, of all the ideologies Communism is the only one portrayed even slightly humanly.
Moralism is utterly bankrupt and detached from any sort of meaningful action. People who believe in it are the worst people, because they believe in nothing at all, or in power and control for its own sake.
Fascism is obviously pathetic and even the guys who are on the surface kind of badass like Measurehead are just a giant mess of ridiculous self justifying contradiction
Ultraliberalism is orthoganal to any sort of actual human emotion, so you either turn into the light bending man, or you compartmentalise like Joyce and cheerfully admit you're a complete monster literally destroying the world, but hey, you like Disco and your boat is tasteful and you're a blast at dinner parties, so it's all good right?
Communism has failed, it's been stomped into the ground by all the others, and it is flawed and struggling and Harry isn't Lenin no matter how many memes he says. But it's the only ideology with any hope.
The vision quest shows that. Sure the tower collapses, but for just a moment it works, and even Kim believes. Then the mentions of the RCM actually being the remnants of the communist ICM, and if your Esprit de Corps is high they're plotting something. The talk of The Return. The idea that Communist thought might actually be able to combat the Fade.
And finally, the very end. "Do it, for the working class."
I found it immensely hopeful. Because it's all about working past failure and hoplessness, and finding a new path.
This sums it up really well. In that world we failed, but for that brief moment we succeeded and it was beautiful and hopeful and then it all collapsed. In a way as you said, it alludes to the fall of the USSR.
At the same time it is an acknowledgement of the impossible odds we are faced with and in spite of that saying "Try anyway".
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lmfao this is great
She is literally Thatcher, down to appearance, mannerism, and cheerful self awareness of her absolute monstrosity.
She's possibly the best written NPC in the game.
Yeah , I think it really was about how a couple of particular lines came off, it felt like it was playing into the whole "communism when no food and failure"
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They even left the boot prints (craters) in Martinaise as a reminder.
The failure of the people's pile did kind of dig things in a bit far.
But communism did fail in real life. But, as in Disco Elysium as in real life, it failed but it's not dead. There is some sweetness and optimism buried deep in the unflinching depiction of what remains among the pieces of a revolution that was just shattered.
And another dimension of this is that
explicit spoilers
Harry is not a reliable narrator. He is not a blank slate onto which you can write "FULLY AUTOMATED LUXURY GAY COMMUNISM". Disco Elysium is a role playing game in the truest sense. You may think you are shaping Harry into being a cool communist, but by the end of the vision quest especially it becomes clear that, no, the sudden bizarre, cartoonish political radicalization is just one of the many ways Harry can act out in an attempt to process the things which led to his breakdown. This is made most explicit if you fail the "Ask the most important question about communism" check at the end of the vision quest. When you fail that one, Harry blurts out "Are women bourgeouis?" and spirals into another embarassing spectacle where it's abundantly obvious that even the communism thing is, for him, another way he's trying to get over Dora. So I think that should color your reading of communism's portrayal whenever Harry's thoughts and dialogue choices are involved.
It's worth mentioning that this is also the game's overall theme and is expressed through the mechanics as well, and Communism is the only ideology where this theme also applies.