The Disco Elysium Sequel Should Be An Adaptation Of Monday Starts On Saturday

thegamer.com:

I want to start this feature with an apology. Disco Elysium doesn’t need a sequel, and shouldn’t get one. It’s perfect as it is, and I don’t want that tarnished by a tacked on sequel, especially not the one I’m suggesting. That being said, ‘The Next Studio Za/um Game Should Be…’ just isn’t as exciting. If I told you my idea for a Disco Elysium-like game, you’d get what I was saying immediately. If I popped the phrase ‘Za/um-like’ into conversation, I’d get side eyes and confused stares. Everyone knows Disco Elysium, and I want another game from Za/um in that distinct style, but not a sequel. You get me? Easy.

Now that’s out of the way, I’ll get to my idea. Monday Starts On Saturday is a lesser-known science fiction novel by the Strugatsky Brothers. If that name rings a bell, you’re probably aware of Roadside Picnic, the book by Arkady and Boris that was the inspiration for the Stalker series of video games. If you enjoyed any of those games, go read the book. It’s more text-heavy and the graphics are worse, but otherwise it’s better in every conceivable way.

Related: Disco Elysium’s Gameboy Demake Highlights The Game’s Compelling Mystery

Back to Monday Starts On Saturday, though. The novel blends magic elements with science fiction in a satire of Soviet research institutions. Scientists and pseudo-scientists study all manner of baffling disciplines at the National Institute for the Technology of Witchcraft and Thaumaturgy (NITWITT), from ‘linear happiness’ to the meaning of life. One professor, Amvrosiy Ambroisovich Vybegallo, tries to create the “ideal man” by feeding a model human (which he hatched from an egg, of course) raw offal until it explodes. The allusions to the Soviet quest for perfect communism need not be