Soma or Disco Elysium?

[air_show]

I'm trying to figure out which game to play next and these two have been sitting on my HD gathering dust for too long. I'm not looking for deep answers, just give me your gut reaction.

 

[Voncaster]

I've not played Disco Elysium.

Soma is short and good. IIRC Soma is between 5-15 hours and has some great sci-fi and horror atmosphere.

 

[FelixSH]

I have played neither, but Disco Elysium sounds like an exceptional RPG, if you don't mind reading.

 

[zonetrope]

I haven't played Disco Elysium, but Soma has stuck in my brain more than almost any game in recent memory, from both a tonal and thematic perspective. It's brilliant.

 

[fanboymaster]

Disco Elysium is a game that I think about almost every day since playing it, and one of the finest bits of writing I've ever encountered.

 

[Lokii]

Disco

 

[Exposition Owl]

Disco Elysium is a thought-provoking detective novel that takes its time and ponders things, with a lot of different tones over its length. Soma is a smart science-fiction horror movie, very sharp and very bleak, with an ending that will haunt you. Which of those sounds more appealing to you right now?

 

[MetManMas]

Disco Elysium is a fairly open cRPG that puts a huge emphasis on dialogue with loads of options and tons of memorable characters who are all fully voice acted. You're a quirky amnesiac detective with a party inside his head who's trying to solve a case and get his life back together.

SOMA is a linear first person existential survival horror game (the run from monster kind) where you traverse and try to escape an underwater facility filled with monsters out to get you. There is an option to make it so the monsters can't kill you, which I'd recommend if you just want to experience the story 'cuz said story is a major part of the game's appeal.

Both games are really good, but if it helps you make your decision Disco Elysium has significantly more options for how to play it and SOMA is shorter.

 

[air_show]

So confession time, despite the overwhelming landslide in favor of Disco Elysium as far as the voting itself goes, and the fact that I am playing Disco Elysium now, I did start SOMA first. I got a modest amount of the way in, second trophy popped and the game does seem very thematically interesting and has a great atmosphere and design.

But like I wonder if SOMA made me realize that I'm too good at Frictional Games? So a few years back I finally tried to play Amnesia. It was on my friend's Steam Box that he got. And I got a good few days worth of game play in I think? But I really lost a lot of steam when I realized I had basically gotten past the first monster of the game without ever seeing it more or less. I was so damn good at hiding and moving carefully that I avoided it entirely but for a brief glimpse at one point. After all the hubbub of people screaming at this weird melty-mouthed thing attacking them on Youtube I felt kind of let down by my own experience and never finished it.

SOMA should have everything I find fucking terrifying. Weird techbug monstrosities that violate your bodily sanctity, the smothering horror of The Deep, the idea of your consciousness simply being copied and awakening somewhere else as something completely different while the real you went off and died long ago. But like, none of the monster chases or existential underwater segments have given me but a tiny fraction of the unwavering primal terror an otherwise much less intentionally horror-themed game like Subnautica could elicit in me. And I think about how easily I've dodged all the underwater drone things so far and for the record maybe the game is faking me out, maybe it'll get a lot more threateningly scary over time and I'm underestimating it, but you know, I had that Amnesia feeling again so I switched over to Disco Elysium and have been glad I've done so.

Still though I do plan on seeing SOMA through though it's way too cool and interesting to not. Though I do wonder if I'm past the point of caring about spoilers in it.

 

[Exposition Owl]

Yeah, SOMA is interested in telling its story, but it’s not especially interested in being challenging. It’s not so much a survival horror game as what some people call a “walking simulator.”

It’s sort of weird: I capital-L Love Subnautica, but I’ve never really understood what people find scary about it. I don’t really get what makes a Reaper Leviathan scarier than, for instance, a Lynel in Breath of the Wild. SOMA, on the other hand, really got under my skin. I wasn’t so much scared of what the places and creatures in SOMA could do to me; I was scared of what they were. Maybe if I were more insightful that would tell me something about myself and my relationship with fear, but I don’t really know what that would be.

 

[MetManMas]

So a few years back I finally tried to play Amnesia. It was on my friend's Steam Box that he got. And I got a good few days worth of game play in I think? But I really lost a lot of steam when I realized I had basically gotten past the first monster of the game without ever seeing it more or less. I was so damn good at hiding and moving carefully that I avoided it entirely but for a brief glimpse at one point.

Which area was this "first encounter" in? A lot of the early appearances of that thing are just teasers and fake-outs. It's not until the second hub area that it becomes a legitimate threat.

 

[air_show]

It was my understanding that once I was dealing with the invisible monster in the sewers, the melty face monster part of the game was over.

 

[air_show]

Yeah, SOMA is interested in telling its story, but it’s not especially interested in being challenging. It’s not so much a survival horror game as what some people call a “walking simulator.”

It’s sort of weird: I capital-L Love Subnautica, but I’ve never really understood what people find scary about it. I don’t really get what makes a Reaper Leviathan scarier than, for instance, a Lynel in Breath of the Wild. SOMA, on the other hand, really got under my skin. I wasn’t so much scared of what the places and creatures in SOMA could do to me; I was scared of what they were. Maybe if I were more insightful that would tell me something about myself and my relationship with fear, but I don’t really know what that would be.

I think the "walking" part of the walking simulator may be a huge part of it. Subnautica's free range of motion conveys the sense of overwhelming deepness so much better than walking on a clear, videogamey path between deep sea stations as a character who doesn't need to breathe.

I'll weigh in on the Reaper Leviathans though. I'll also agree that their design isn't the most... inspired. If someone asked me to design arguably the biggest scariest monster in their alien ocean game I'd do better than giant eel with a scary skull face. That said their weak design doesn't seem to detract from how intimidating they are in game. Once you know what to listen for you always hear them before you see them, and for me at least it always put me into a very tense state, afraid to venture too far out into any kind of open water for fear that one could come at me from any direction and destroy my precious watercraft in seconds. The way it makes me want to ping my radar more often and use up more batteries contributes to the intimidation.

Also I think a point that counts against them is that Subnautica, at least outside of VR to my knowledge, does a poor job of conveying the scale of its creatures. The Reaper Leviathan should be overwhelmingly enormous according to its measurements, but it only feels pretty big in-game. I often wonder if this is because of the field of view scaling.

 

[MetManMas]

It was my understanding that once I was dealing with the invisible monster in the sewers, the melty face monster part of the game was over.

Nope, wrong. The only thing you're done with is Melty Face not actually doing anything to you.

 

[Aurelia]

I've still been meaning to play Disco Elysium, but from the little I've seen from streams, and friends' impressions I think that it's a game that shouldn't be missed.