Because of this, Zero Parades carries heavy baggage. It\u2019s also impossible to divorce it from the shadow of Disco Elysium. From a design perspective, it takes almost every feature and standout mechanic of its predecessor as a foundation. Perhaps more notably, the fictional story, whether deliberate or not, seems to reflect the real-world situation. This baggage weighs Zero Parades down to the point that it can\u2019t match its predecessor, nor forge its own identity.<\/p>\n
It all starts by asking what kind of spy you are. You can either pick from preselected archetypes or invest your own points across 15 skills. Much like in Disco Elysium, these skills not only help inform your dice rolls during conversations and while carrying out specific actions, but they also inhabit Cascade\u2019s mind as separate entities sporadically chiming in. Depending on your choices, your Cascade can be a spy who is savvy with technology, one who thrives when reading the room and catching the slightest change in attitude or expression, or one obsessed with the metaphysical.<\/p>\n
Zero Parades has you balancing Cascade\u2019s fatigue, anxiety, and delirium, all of which are exacerbated by what she witnesses and any mistakes she makes. Hit a breaking point, and you\u2019ll be forced to lose a skill point you\u2019ve already invested. Notably, you can also exert certain actions by purposefully agitating one of the three conditions to get better chances of succeeding. It feels as if the spy is forcing her own body and mind to achieve her goals, even if that means losing parts of herself in the process.<\/p>\n
This exertion perfectly encapsulates Cascade, as she\u2019s constantly haunted by her phantoms. It\u2019s her defining trait. While the main story revolves around the assignment, you need to build a crew for it, which means tracking down your former colleagues and reckoning with the results of your screw-up years ago. Each character is broken in a different way, and you\u2019re not exactly welcomed with open arms.<\/p>\n
Here is where the espionage component of Zero Parades clicked for me. When it came to successfully pretending to be someone else in stressful situations, I botched it pretty much each time. But my Cascade became very effective in knowing exactly what to say and what buttons to push to assemble her crew \u2014 despite knowing that there was a chance that they might get hurt again. As a character puts it, \u201cYou break them, over and over, and still they stick by you.\u201d<\/p>\n
Image: ZA\/UM<\/p>\n In People Make Games<\/a>\u2019 initial report on the ZA\/UM situation in 2023, lead writer and designer Robert Kurvitz said that \u201cthis company has destroyed the lives of four of my closest friends.\u201d Kurvitz, alongside art director and designer Aleksander Rostov and writer Helen Hindpere, was dismissed in 2022. It was one of the many dominoes that have continued to tumble since, with allegations fired primarily between Kurvitz, Rostov, and what remains of ZA\/UM. It\u2019s a long, drawn-out ordeal: People Make Games\u2019 initial report is over two hours long, and there\u2019s also a follow-up investigation<\/a>, along with a separate five-part documentary by noclip<\/a>, and plenty of other reporting and statements.<\/p>\n The more salient points, however, involve a studio holding the rights to an IP without the founding members<\/a>, and ongoing disputes regarding the shares of said studio and how they fluctuated over the years as external stakeholders<\/a> got involved. There have also been allegations of toxicity<\/a> by present and former developers, with employees alleging that Kurvitz, in particular, was challenging to work with<\/a>. ZA\/UM has since dealt with layoffs<\/a> and reported<\/a> project cancellations, and to make things even more complicated, there are also four companies founded by former members of the team. Ironically, the success of Disco Elysium, which went on to sell more than 5 million copies, inescapably converted a romanticized art piece into a product. The result is all of these developments becoming antithetical to its primordial anticapitalist spirit.<\/p>\n The absence of Disco\u2019s key creative minds is readily apparent. There\u2019s a clear technological jump in how the game plays and how Portofiro looks and feels. Yet, the writing and worldbuilding are less elegant and arresting. The main story largely plays it safe, the city is quite condensed, most characters lack depth, and some of Cascade\u2019s dialogue options read as online memes. Seeing \u201cnow kiss\u201d and \u201cbig, if true\u201d rubbed me the wrong way, while attempts of recapturing the anticapitalist sentiment of Disco Elysium with throwaway phrases like \u201cdreaming is bourgeois\u201d feel like odd attempts at reclaiming that original spirit.<\/p>\n After the credits rolled, the ongoing problems within and outside of ZA\/UM kept lingering in my mind. I can\u2019t stop thinking about the developers who joined as fans of Disco Elysium and have been forced to achieve sky-high expectations while also being caught in the crossfire of disputes involving creatives who aren\u2019t even part of the studio anymore. In distinctive ZA\/UM fashion, Zero Parades voices the studio\u2019s worries and frustrations, while inevitably mirroring both sides of the overarching story, leaving much up to interpretation.<\/p>\n As Cascade, I did what I had to while pursuing forgiveness. I manipulated old friends into joining me in one last job, I deceived people who put their trust in me in order to obtain information, and I left multiple tasks unresolved, which will no doubt have ramifications for a city that I never plan to set foot in again. In Zero Parades, you get to choose the mask you wear. Force the right dice checks, choose the right words, and you may convince yourself that your actions were right all along.<\/p>\n Zero Parades: For Dead Spies launches on May 21st on PC.<\/p>\n Follow topics and authors from this story to see more like this in your personalized homepage feed and to receive email updates.Diego Nicol\u00e1s Arg\u00fcelloEntertainmentClose<\/p>\n Entertainment<\/p>\n Posts from this topic will be added to your daily email digest and your homepage feed.<\/p>\n FollowFollow<\/p>\n See All Entertainment<\/a><\/p>\n Games ReviewClose<\/p>\n Games Review<\/p>\n Posts from this topic will be added to your daily email digest and your homepage feed.<\/p>\n FollowFollow<\/p>\n![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/ss_557a7bbaffe3698d60dd5c854fb3c1e0f216c438.1920x1080.jpg\"\/)
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