"Since the last round of EMTERR ‘stabilisation’, they’ve been trying to force us lifers out," the phantom line engineer tells Zero Parades protagonist Hershel Wilk. "We can’t be fired, not easily, but they can take away the work that made us stay in the first place,” he continues. “I have two options. I could falsify my reports and declare line 9 safe for construction anyway, or I could quit. Either way, the company can’t lose."

Approximately 15 minutes later, I’m talking to a monkey sat atop a pile of goods in a random abandoned house. "YOUR PRESENCE IS WEAK. FATE DELIVERS ME AN UNWORTHY ADVERSARY," it says, before declaring its name to be the KING OF TRADE. Immediately, one of the voices in Herschel’s inner chorus, dubbed Statehood, starts shouting back about needing to defeat the forces of capitalism.

Both of these are scenarios I ran into while playing the Next Fest demo of the spy CRPG finally emerging from ZA/UM, following years of reported bad times and discord at and around the Disco Elysium studio. Both of them feel simultaneously like encounters you could plausibly have run into in the original Disco, and like they could just as easily be pale imitations dressed up to resemble that first game’s much quoted trenchcoat of surrealist detecting.

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Epic Games is currently running a hell of a campaign. Each day, a mysterious game is revealed to the world and given out for free in true Christmas fashion. Some of them have been bangers, others not so much. But today, on Christmas, one of the best cRPGs has been put up for free.

And the game in question is Disco Elysium, the incredible title from ZA/UM. Set in a fictional, politically ravaged landscape, Disco Elysium puts you in the shoes of a nameless detective meandering through the streets, trying to solve a strange case alongside his sharper, more focused partner.

The detective is a reflection of your (assumed or actual) complex political reality and can take on the role of anything you want him to, with each action carrying significant consequences, thus altering the outcome of each playthrough.

The game is as beautiful and stylish as it is well-written, and is a masterclass in video game narrative design in just about every way imaginable.

So unless you have a major hatred of Epic Games and oppose engaging with the platform in any capacity, you'd do well for yourself to pick the game up. It'll be free throughout Dec. 25, before being replaced by another mystery game.

This promotion from Epic is set to last throughout these last few days of 2025, closing off with Dec. 31. Of course, there's also a holiday sale going on, which will continue into 2026, ending in early January.

There hasn't been a better time to buy and get new games, so make sure you don't miss out on these amazing promotions, especially when a platform is giving out 10/10 masterpieces for literally zero dollars.

The post One of the best cRPGs is free to keep forever, but only for today appeared first on Destructoid.