Rejoice, delicious friend, for our descent into Nith is near. It’s been four long years since the release of Sunless Skies, and while Failbetter Games’ steampunk speculative future Fallen London left the station with a triumphant wave of steam, it’s been a long time since we stumbled upon the gas-lit cobblestones of Sunless Skies itself. doomed city. Enter The Mask of the Rose, a visual novel that promises to bring attention to Fallen London. To get to the heart of the matter, we caught up with Failbetter Games Senior Producer Stuart Young at WASD 2023 to talk about love, death, and bats. So lots of bats.
In the Fallen London universe, gothic horror tugs at the buttoned-down buttons of early Victorians, creating a delicious friction that lends itself well to a dating sim. In The Mask of the Rose, this is exacerbated by the immediacy of the fall itself, which took place hundreds of days before. “It certainly had an impact on society: In this emergency, many generally accepted morals and decency have been suspended,” Young said.
Some of this cultural upheaval can also be attributed to the Bazaar Masters, haunting masked figures who have taken over the mercantile economy of Fallen London itself. Fallen London veterans know the Masters well, but in The Mask of the Rose they are unlikely to act as catalysts for social change. “They may not be fully human, but they are in charge of a new situation. They don’t see gender the same way.”
In terms of character set, Mask of the Rose takes a micro approach compared to Sunless Sea or Sunless Skies, which themselves are tapestry of faces and places in a large open space. “It’s Fallen London in HD,” says Young. “It is a smaller volume in terms of the number of locations and characters, but let’s go to the art, the characterization; All.”
It’s also a much more forgiving take on Fallen London than what we’ve seen in previous games. Contrary to the harsh and brutal reality of life on Zee, there is only one death in Mask of the Rose, and it’s not even your own. At the heart of this gothic tale is a murder mystery, and the main (albeit unlikely) suspect is one of your roommates.
“The murder will be brought to justice,” Young says, though the outcome of that process largely depends on your actions. You can ignore romance for you to consecrate entirely to the enquête, but if you consider yourself more like a Casanova than like a Sherlock Holmes, you don’t have pas à vous soucier d’un petit mystère de meurtre qui se dresse entre vous et the true love.
As for the art of seduction itself, Mask of the Rose takes a naturalistic approach rather than inundating the player with stats. “You’re not trying to raise people’s standards by giving them gifts over and over again,” Yang says. “Your relationship with the characters is more like talking to a real person than a mercenary system where you invest resources and get love.”
The link to this focus is your codex, which records all of the characters you encounter in Fallen London, as well as the choices you make that will change the course of your personal relationship with them. Romantic endeavors may consist of light flirtations and dreams of marriage, but friendship is also a viable business. You can choose casual camaraderie to encourage estranged characters to reveal their dirty secrets or earnestly start a family.
When it comes to your own preferences, Rose Mask’s character build avoids gender by asking you to provide an address name instead of assigning your gender and the type of love you’re looking for. The available options cover all romantic and sexual orientations, including asexuality. That’s not to say that it doesn’t matter how you choose to present yourself; in fact, your choice of clothing can unlock dialogue options and shape the conversation in many ways. An extravagant bodice can incline you to coquettish vulgarity, and a sailor suit will cause universal contempt from the upper strata of society.
Young cites lead writer and designer Emily Short as inspiration for these systems, which serve to balance character freedom of action with player imagination. “We really want to bring romantic options to a wide range of people so everyone can pick their favorite envy trap and go after it if they want to,” Yang laughs.
The search for love does not only benefit the player. Some characters will naturally gravitate towards one another over time, a gravitational pull that you can boost by acting as a go-between, passing notes to each other, and manipulating the flow of conversation to pull them towards each other. “You can matchmaker or befriend the characters, and those are considered equal goals,” says Yang.
This near-total freedom to explore Fallen London gives birth to Failbetter’s gothic visual novel, with a degree of replayability that goes beyond the usual romance quests. Of course, that’s one of the reasons why it’s worth going back to the streets of Fallen London, but there are plenty of secrets hidden within the city itself.
In short, Young assures us that hardcore Fallen London fans can find Easter eggs full of lore and celebrity references, some of which were selected by Kickstarter backers: “The Bishop of Southwark is like a cleric crossed with Oliver. Reed and Brian Blessed—very God-unpleasing warriors. He’s right there as a fan favorite.” The sprawling entrepreneur will also return in a visual novel, proving there’s something for everyone in The Neath.
Mask of the Rose is due out on June 8, 2023 on Steam after a short delay. In the meantime, why not dive into the murky waters of Fallen London with our Sunless Skies review? We also have a list of the best story-based games to sink your teeth into while you wait.
Source : PC Gamesn
