This might be a little disjointed since I literally just watched the credits roll, but I don't think I'd ever have enough time to fully process how I felt about this.

Absolutely incredible. It took me a little bit until the story fully hooked me, but once it did I was all-in. I feel like I've been saying this a lot recently but honestly - truly - some of the best writing I've ever experienced in a game. Also helps that makes true use of it's medium. It not only knows that its a game but it uses that to its advantage consistently throughout the story to great effect. The commentary on politics, games, cops, and the world at large is genuinely some of the best I've experienced in any art.

That same level of effectiveness is translated over into the game mechanics here as well. The skill point system feels overwhelming initially but quickly made sense once you spent a few hours with it during your first day. Aside from the writing itself, Disco Elysium manages to make dialogue engaging through its expertly crafted skill checks and dialogue options which made the story feel as interactive and dynamic as one could hope for from a game like this. Carefully choosing how to allocate my points was difficult not just from a gameplay perspective, but also from a roleplaying perspective. What kind of Cop was I going to be? Is it worth the gamble of taking on a mew thought which could have negative impact on my version of Harry? Every click through the menus felt like it had meaning in a way that I've rarely felt while playing a game.

Disco does stumble in some small areas, but none enough to ruin my experience. I do think that, despite that really being the main way of interacting with the game, the length and wordiness of certain character interactions can become very tiresome. I basically didn't interact with Joyce because I didn't want to waste 5 hours of my day talking to her, and thats a shame because it feels as though I missed out on some important story bits by doing that. I also think the very ending of the game does fall into the trap of trying to generalize my character, which felt awkward when Kim said I was a raving communist despite my version of Harry being pretty evenly split between a few different political ideologies. It's not awful, but for a game that maintained such a high bar of quality throughout it was weird to see a minor dip right before the finish line.

Disco Elysium fucking rules. It absolutely is a game worth exploring and obsessing over and all the ravings about its writing are so well deserved. It's a really unique type of game that had me thinking "I can't wait to see how that might go differently during a second play through" and that's a magical feeling that you just can't put a price on. I generally don't enjoy RPGs but this one quickly became one of my favorite games of all time once I fully bought into its story. Disco is a game that everyone should try, even if it doesn't seem like it'd be your thing. Games this special don't come along very often.