EDIT: Read cfabbro's post below mine for additional context and make up your own mind. It's my opinion that you should not give ZA/UM any of your money. Here's an article with some detail:...
EDIT: Read cfabbro's post below mine for additional context and make up your own mind.
IMO, it's not nearly as black & white as you and all the other people calling for a ZA/UM boycott are suggesting. I highly recommend everyone actually watch the People Make Games video that...
IMO, it's not nearly as black & white as you and all the other people calling for a ZA/UM boycott are suggesting. I highly recommend everyone actually watch the People Make Games video that article is referencing to judge the situation for themselves, instead of relying on random internet strangers interpretations of it. But for what it's worth, here is my own comment on the video from when I submitted it here ages ago:
In this video, People Make Games delves really deep into all the various allegations and lawsuits surrounding Disco Elysium and the studio behind it, ZA/UM, and IMO does some incredible investigative journalism on the subject. They even went so far as to interview ZA/UM's CEO, Ilmar Kompus, as well as a bunch of other current+former employees (one of whom, Argo Tuulik, was also a founding member of the original ZA/UM Cultural Association artist collective, is still with the company, and strongly disagrees with Robert Kurvitz's version of events). It puts everything in context, and shows just how insanely complicated and murky ZA/UM's history, ownership, and the current legal situation really is.
And just my personal opinion, but despite how dodgy the whole ownership debacle was, and how shady many of the investors were/are, the video also does not paint a very flattering picture of Robert Kurvitz, or his partner Helen Hindpere either. Kurvitz is talked about by all the other employees as being incredibly difficult to work with/for, toxic, selfish, and self-aggrandizing, and Hindpere as a bit of slacker who didn't actually do much work at the company, and didn't actually do much writing either despite her job title. Aleksander Rostov is about the only person that was talked about fondly by the others, but also as being a bit of a stooge for Kurvitz.
So take all that for what you will... but to me the whole things sounds like an absolute mess. Kurvitz may have been naive, and taken advantage of when it came to ownership shares of the company and its IP, but it doesn't sound like he's entirely innocent here either. And regardless of whether he should have been given a larger slice of the pie for his original ideas for the world, and his contributions to the game, it still sounds like he was actually fired for genuine cause (esp if he really did try to steal the game's source code, as was alleged, and sounds likely).
Noclip is also going to release their own Disco Elysium documentary soon: https://www.patreon.com/posts/119396288 (And a series on Dwarf Fortress btw:...
Noclip is also going to release their own Disco Elysium documentary soon:
Noclip makes a lot of "making of" documentaries for video games. They get posted to Tildes pretty often: https://tildes.net/?tag=noclip They actually made a video about Dwarf Fortress back in...
I honestly felt (and still feel) that the PMG documentary didn't really help the case of Kompus &c too much. Like, sure, I agree the situation was complicated, and sure, I believe there were...
I honestly felt (and still feel) that the PMG documentary didn't really help the case of Kompus &c too much. Like, sure, I agree the situation was complicated, and sure, I believe there were problems with Kurvitz. But I also believe that ZA/UM was a victim of immense fraud, and that no, nobody should give the artless & corporate husk that remains any money.
I don't think these two viewpoints are mutually exclusive.
I agree with you, and I think the PMG documentary is a bit too credulous when it comes to the stories told by the investors. I also don't think enough thought was put into the incentives people...
I agree with you, and I think the PMG documentary is a bit too credulous when it comes to the stories told by the investors. I also don't think enough thought was put into the incentives people still working at the studio would have given their employment situation. I also don't think that the defects in Kurvitz as a boss or as a person justify his losing ownership of in the company through fraud much less in his creative work -- I think the intellectual property side of this is really upsetting. In addition I think the fact that ZA/UM have since laid off the vast majority of the rest of the development team (including people who were interviewed in that documentary) only serves to cast the studio in a worse light.
I apologize for the harsh rhetoric but that documentary is an anti-labor pro-capitaliat piece of hot garbage. The fact that his conduct is even mentioned is a spit in the face of the real evil...
I apologize for the harsh rhetoric but that documentary is an anti-labor pro-capitaliat piece of hot garbage. The fact that his conduct is even mentioned is a spit in the face of the real evil that these, let's be clear, convicted financial criminals have stolen from Kurvitz, and society at large.
If you or anyone else watches that documentary, you have to watch No Truce With Capital https://youtu.be/tDtfcknELe0
I also highly recommend the more straightforward what went wrong with the pmg documentary https://youtu.be/K1b5zyvsUBY
EDIT: Read cfabbro's post below mine for additional context and make up your own mind.
It's my opinion that you should not give ZA/UM any of your money. Here's an article with some detail: https://gameworldobserver.com/2023/06/02/disco-elysium-zaum-shareholders-crunch-kurvitz-kompus-toxicity
IMO, it's not nearly as black & white as you and all the other people calling for a ZA/UM boycott are suggesting. I highly recommend everyone actually watch the People Make Games video that article is referencing to judge the situation for themselves, instead of relying on random internet strangers interpretations of it. But for what it's worth, here is my own comment on the video from when I submitted it here ages ago:
You're right, I'll edit my post to be more clear that it's my opinion.
Noclip is also going to release their own Disco Elysium documentary soon:
https://www.patreon.com/posts/119396288
(And a series on Dwarf Fortress btw: https://www.patreon.com/posts/early-access-of-123627343)
Ooooooo I dunno what NoClip is but I’ll watch anything DF related.
Noclip makes a lot of "making of" documentaries for video games. They get posted to Tildes pretty often: https://tildes.net/?tag=noclip
They actually made a video about Dwarf Fortress back in 2020:
Dwarf Fortress Creator Explains its Complexity & Origins | Noclip Interview
I honestly felt (and still feel) that the PMG documentary didn't really help the case of Kompus &c too much. Like, sure, I agree the situation was complicated, and sure, I believe there were problems with Kurvitz. But I also believe that ZA/UM was a victim of immense fraud, and that no, nobody should give the artless & corporate husk that remains any money.
I don't think these two viewpoints are mutually exclusive.
I agree with you, and I think the PMG documentary is a bit too credulous when it comes to the stories told by the investors. I also don't think enough thought was put into the incentives people still working at the studio would have given their employment situation. I also don't think that the defects in Kurvitz as a boss or as a person justify his losing ownership of in the company through fraud much less in his creative work -- I think the intellectual property side of this is really upsetting. In addition I think the fact that ZA/UM have since laid off the vast majority of the rest of the development team (including people who were interviewed in that documentary) only serves to cast the studio in a worse light.
I apologize for the harsh rhetoric but that documentary is an anti-labor pro-capitaliat piece of hot garbage. The fact that his conduct is even mentioned is a spit in the face of the real evil that these, let's be clear, convicted financial criminals have stolen from Kurvitz, and society at large.
If you or anyone else watches that documentary, you have to watch No Truce With Capital https://youtu.be/tDtfcknELe0
I also highly recommend the more straightforward what went wrong with the pmg documentary https://youtu.be/K1b5zyvsUBY
This is the ONE case where using a vertical video would have been preferable
Eurogamer breakdown: https://www.eurogamer.net/disco-elysium-is-being-reimagined-for-mobile-devices-to-captivate-the-tiktok-user
All I can say is that I'm happy more people might experience the game.