ZA/UM announces its mysterious, highly anticipated follow-up to Disco Elysium

On Tuesday, Disco Elysium studio ZA/UM shared a short video teasing the follow-up to their 2019 cult-hit detective role-playing game. The game, which is currently titled C4, is described as a “mind-warping espionage RPG” that blends play introspection, deep character-driven dialogue, and high-stakes encounters steered by dice rolls.

The video feels like peering into the mind, or “thought cabinet,” of an agent saboteur, rife with macabre psychedelic imagery and bursting with metaphorical significance. “My mind is eating itself,” says the voice of an unknown woman with a British accent, “One hundred intelligence agents caught between its teeth; a crimson mist of deceit and paranoia.”

It’s been a tumultuous past couple of years for the Estonian game developer. In October 2022, Disco Elysium game director Robert Kurvitz, along with art director Aleksander Rostov and writer Helen Hindpere, were involuntarily ousted from ZA/UM, with studio later citing allegations of poor management and creating a toxic work environment on the part of Kurvitz in particular. In the time since, several studios have been founded by former staff with the goal of creating a successor to Disco Elysium, and several internal projects at ZA/UM, including a purported sequel to Disco Elysium and a standalone expansion codenamed “X7,” were cancelled amid layoffs at the studio.

Jim Ashilevi, the lead voice over director on Disco Elysium, and Siim “Kosmos” Sinamäe, a producer and writer for the game, will serve as writers on C4. While unconfirmed, it appears that the art featured in the teaser trailer was created by Anton Vill, an artist on Disco Elysium who has remained at the studio as an art director.