Greetings, friends and colleagues. When we last met, we promised to reveal more skills, but we’re fickle creatures, prone to fits of spontaneity, and today we bring you something better: an interview with cer, Child Art Prodigy and Actual Thought Leader. As the Thought Head, cer has been living rent-free inside DCA’s head from the inception of this project and has the body horror sketches to prove it.
For the uninitiated (or the forgetful): the Thought Cabinet is the mechanic through which Disco Elysium’s protagonist Harry Du Bois “internalizes” various Thoughts ranging from the philosophical to the deeply unhinged — each of which impacts his skills and stats. It resembles a very sad skill tree, with each branch laden with the fruits of your trauma and intrusive ideation. DCA has one too, and cer designed and painted it.
DCA is a very different character from Harry. How does that change the visual tone of the Thought Cabinet?
Most of my artistic choices have been vibe-based! I knew I wanted to include more body horror, like viscera and the big double eyeball. Faces are a lot more prominent as well, due to the decreased scope and resulting larger subjects. I took advantage of this by having a lot of the figures directly face the viewer with easily readable expressions!
Harry’s abstracta feel rich, overwhelming, and vivid to me, mirroring his desire to chase the threads of his memory down and understand. Conversely, DCA’s desire to run away from himself makes his Thought Cabinet…hostile, almost! I think it’s fun.
Walk us through what making a single Thought looks like, start to finish — what does the process actually involve?
I stare at the actual given text of the Thought, try to imagine its corresponding fever dream, and then sketch the resulting *Thing.* After that, I’ll lay flat colors underneath the sketch using a square brush with tons of pressure sensitivity, and then I render on top using a grainy pencil brush. I use that same brush to add the characteristic line art, and after that, I’ll tweak stuff on top of the line art until I’m done (or really, really want to be done).
What reference images end up in your folders when you’re designing a Thought? Will you show us your weird stuff?
There’s a looooooot of fear and hunger stuff. The moon-scorched termina contestant forms — they’re so cool. Medical illustrations too!
Is there an artist (in games, illustration, anywhere) whose influence is visible in what you’ve made, even if no one else would clock it?
The copout answer is Rostov himself; most of the way I render is inspired by his work. The fun, if repetitive, answer is that I’m really inspired by Miro Haverinen’s painting from his fear and hunger games! He gets weight and form across so well, it’s gorgeous.
What is your favorite Thought from the ones you’ve made for the mod?
Probably Brick-o-Layer!
What Thought from Disco Elysium would you internalize in real life?
The Precarious World. Going from high school to college is a scary prospect that I am severely lacking the motivation and self-actualization for.
The world is a game of frayed nerves…
You’ve spent more time looking inside DCA’s head than almost anyone. Is he doing okay in there?
DCA stands for Damage Control Antidepressantsassoonaspossible.
We’d say cer’s one of a kind, but frankly, everyone on this team is, and not always in a reassuring way.
Since we didn’t get any new questions over at [email protected], you’ve reached the end of this devlog. Next up: skills, for real this time, we swear. Unless something more interesting comes up. Like maybe a playable demo or something. We’re assembling a (hopefully mostly bug-free) build this week. We’ll let you know how it goes!
Ghostwriteringly,
Skullhead McShay,
Professional Goobster, Amateur Serious Person™