Article: Pera Coda - Somewhere Between Life And Death by Kyle Hilliard

Çelik and Yeginer cite Disco Elysium as a point of reference, but mainly because both games are narrative-focused, branching adventure games that take place from an overhead perspective. While the former is more of an internal examination, Pera Coda is more external. “We are not trying to compete with Disco Elysium,” Yeginer says with a laugh. “Because of the camera perspective, they see [Pera Coda] and Disco naturally comes to mind, and it is definitely one of the inspirations, but not the only one.” Çelik cites authors like Haruki Murakami and Fyodor Dostoevsky as inspiration, but also movies like Palm Springs and TV shows like Russian Doll, among others.

Çelik and Yeginer are also proud to point out that the game does not have combat or grinding. Pera Coda’s focus is narrative, player choice, puzzles, and exploration. They want to be an exploration of a psyche that has experienced trauma. “There is a bit of dark subject matter there, but it’s actually an exploration for everyone and confronting their own inner selves,” Çelik says. “While confronting our inner selves, we didn’t want anything gamified that would hurt the ludonarrative harmony.”