Tips for Beginners in Disco Elysium

Disco Elysium is one of those games where you understand little at the beginning. The tutorial is so sparse that even halfway through, you may encounter difficulties. Therefore, we have collected in this material everything you need to know from the very beginning for the most comfortable gameplay.

Seriously! This is the first and most important tip. There's catastrophically little money in the game, and you need it. However, there are quite a lot of bottles.

But the most important thing you need to understand is — find a bag for bottles and inspect every corner. Bottles can be sold at the Frittte store, which you will definitely visit in the course of the story.

Or rather, almost never let it go. Tab highlights all active points in a specific area. You will be able to see all points of interest immediately. This not only saves time but also helps not to miss anything.

The game does not tell you that the character can be quite fast and move around the locations by running. Double-click the cursor on the place you need to reach, and the character will speed up.

Your clothes seriously affect the outcome of various checks. Depending on the items chosen, your characteristics will change. Something will significantly increase, while something else will decrease. So, it's worth keeping your clothes. Don't forget to change regularly. That's how it's intended.

To cancel thoughts or to successfully re-pass white checks by increasing the necessary characteristics, you will need free skill points. It's better to always have 1-2 characteristic upgrade points in reserve.

Since your character has lost any idea of who he is, certain ideas in conversation can trigger a thought in his mind. These new thoughts go into the thought cabinet. By themselves, they do nothing. However, if you unlock a slot in the cabinet using a skill point, you can start contemplating.

Each new thought initially starts as a problem. From this moment, you can place it in a free slot to internalize. Once this process starts, a countdown begins. The thought will give a temporary buff or debuff to one of your skills.

The countdown uses the game timer to show you how much time it will take. Usually, it takes several game hours. After you internalize the thought, you will receive its solution. These solutions offer a permanent increase or decrease of one or more skills in the four ability categories.

Thoughts absorbed in the thought cabinet ultimately create a unique version of the main character's inner self. These thoughts can influence some of the things the character might say in dialogue, and the buffs further enhance the character's skills.

To forget a thought, you need to spend a skill point. This is useful when there are too many negative effects.

This point is closely related to the previous ones. Never level up right away. The vast majority of skill checks in Disco Elysium are colored white. This means you can try them more than once. Almost never should you invest points in a skill before you make a choice and check. Regardless, there's always a tiny chance of success.

It's better to step away from a conversation before performing a white check. Make sure you're not wearing any clothes that lower your skills. Then, make the initial check. If it fails, you can level up the needed skill and increase your chances of success.

The game does not warn in advance about the consequences that arise if negative thoughts and clothing reduce any characteristic to zero.

Perhaps the most terrifying and problematic would be zero perception.

In such a case, your character will not be able to recognize objects they can interact with.

For example, the hero will enter a room through a door but will not be able to recognize the same door as a way to exit the room. This, in turn, will lead to being stuck. Tab will also stop displaying points of interest and interactive objects.

The problem can be solved by changing clothes or the ability to forget one of the thoughts.

In the game, any door can be opened. If you encounter some barrier, do not despair. A possible solution will appear later. And be assured, it definitely exists. Thus, the strange locked doors in Rags Dance can be opened later in the story after discovering them, by passing a series of checks or just using physical skills.

Therefore, if you want to explore absolutely everything — you will have the opportunity. Behind the doors, there might not always be something valuable, but you will definitely get a dose of internal conversations or communication with your partner, which will expand your knowledge of the world and characters.

You might have noticed the clock in the bottom right corner of the screen. This is the time of day in Disco Elysium, and it may not work as you expect. Time changes every time you interact with objects, your subconscious, or other people. You spend about one minute for every 1-3 dialogue options.

The clock does not move in real-time. However, time is a key factor in the game. You need to make some progress in the murder investigation by a certain game day. This shouldn't be a noticeable problem, but it's still possible to run out of time.

Time of day is a more significant factor. You will receive positive and negative modifiers for certain skill checks depending on when you do something during the day. Some options will become unavailable if you wait too long. Kim, your partner, won't be around at night, which also affects the development of dialogues, sometimes negatively.

Walking does not accelerate time. Also, time does not move forward when gathering most items (such as money and clothes). You are entirely free to look around as much as you want. Just remember to keep an eye on the clock. If you do not investigate some clues in time, they may disappear.

Here's another reason to save your skill points: hidden ways to unlock white checks. Talking to the right people, completing certain thoughts, and finding clues can increase your chances of a successful check. You can see what affects your chances by hovering over the white mark. It will say something like talked to X person or gave Y person a hat. This not only increases your chances of success. Such necessary actions can also naturally unlock white checks.

Kim won't be with you 24 hours. A good detective likes to go to bed before midnight. On the other hand, your character might not sleep until the morning. This is an excellent time for work.

Most checks in dialogues are more successful if Kim is around. However, there are several things that become easier if you are alone. You can collect items in the world or spend time on a bench (to develop thoughts) without Kim. Finally, since most game checks are repeatable, you can always come back with your partner in the morning and try to pass them again with his help.

The small colored circles that appear in all locations of Disco Elysium usually do little. However, sometimes they can be very useful. They can lead to internal monologues and even fully developed thoughts that help you in the investigation. Some circles even cause objects to appear in the world that were not there before.

In the game, you can unlock a thought so that every time you click on an observation circle, you get 1 experience point. It's not much, but the experience needed to unlock skill points never scales. To unlock another point, you always need 100 experience units. Considering there are hundreds of observation circles in the game, it's worth it. Not to mention that even 1 experience point, if it turns out to be the missing one, can give you a new skill point.

Actually, this applies to most of the main tasks in Disco Elysium. Main quests are usually multi-step and can't be finished immediately. You will probably need more information, higher skills, and/or bonuses from clothing to progress in the investigation. But! Starting to work on key tasks can often give you the much-needed direction for your investigation. You will be able to orient yourself on what you still don't know and decide on which goals you need to focus. Some preliminary information might even help you gather evidence that you can use later on.

The day limit in Disco Elysium is intimidating. Time flies much faster than you expect. This might discourage you from peeking into every nook and cranny of the game you come across. Such an approach is fundamentally wrong. In Disco Elysium, there's rarely anything that won't be useful in one way or another eventually. You might not even realize it at first. So, play slowly and thoughtfully, otherwise, you risk missing out on a significant portion of the game's charm.

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That's all we wanted to share. Disco Elysium can provide you with a wealth of emotions, even if something is done incorrectly. That's the whole point. Don't be afraid to experiment and enjoy the game.