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Advanced Visitor Stories

The Lighthouse Institute

Lucid Tarot colouring book

"January 9th, 1838. A heavy snow falls on Brancrug. When the staff dig themselves out, Solomon Husher, third Librarian of the House, has disappeared from his quarters in the Long Tower, leaving a letter of resignation. 'Winter,' the letter concludes, 'does not wait forever; though Janus might.' Husher is never seen again, but every year on the same day, his footprints can be found beneath the Tree."

Localisation

• "Both suggest a cross in English. 'Rood' is an Old English term for the Christian cross, 'Cruciate' is from Latin crucis, cross. 'Chancel' has several meanings in English but one is the dividing screen between the more and less holy parts of a church - which is also known as the 'rood screen'. The terms are as you say all largely equivalent and the general sense of 'something that separates the profane from the sacred / more sacred from less sacred' would be good. If in doubt, I'd just use the same term three times."
  
  
• "There's an obscure adjective, 'nivean', from Latin nix/nivis, which means snow-white. I used a variant spelling because 'Nivea' is a popular European skin-care brand. 🙃"
  
  
• "Speculum is Latin for mirror, and later in English was used to mean (a) a particular kind of mirror used in telescopes (b) a scrying-mirror used by seers. So 'speculist' implies a mirror-specialist, probably with an occult connection. NB a speculum in modern English refers exclusively to a medical instrument used by gynaecologists! This is definitely not a reference I want to imply here."
  
  
• "Remember that all the commitments are alternate, sometimes complementary and sometimes contradictory versions. There is some intentional ambiguity here about how the Hours were counted. These texts could be used to support the interpretation that there were seven aviform Hours in total, although one was eaten; they could also support the interpretation that there were six, plus one who was eaten, plus the glitter-winged one; or that the glitter-winged one was the one who was eaten. Unusually this is something I have a firm private opinion on the truth of. I don't think it would be useful for me to share that, but I think it is useful for me to point out that 'glitter-winged' might be read as a reference to 'Glaeterfleoge', so it could be read as suggesting there was a Carapace aviform in the past."

HOUSE OF LIGHT

• Variety of outcomes from the Visitor stories. I actually loathe the term 'branching narrative' because it imprisons us in a 1990s idea of CYOA tree-diagram structures, but 'stories with variety in outcome' lacks zing. Whichever term you use, there ain't any of it in the Visitor stories as they stand. Partly this is just because I wouldn't have had time to write the things, partly because it's hard, maybe impossible, to write stories with variant outcomes in a game that explicitly tells you that there are no mistakes and you can't lock yourself out of anything (ask ten dedicated CRPG players of your acquaintance how many of them don't look at a wiki nowadays before making a key narrative decision - and then imagine finding you've missed out on a decision because the visitor came and went while you were unlocking the Wine Cellar). But obviously people were always going to want more (a) relevant story about (b) known characters with (c) choices that allow self-expression. So releasing that as an expansion neatly addresses both probs: we now have some months we didn't have before launch, and it'll be an opt-in for people who've played the game once already or who want a bit more variety in their outcome, FOMO be damned.
  
  
• Cooking, and social events. There's a bag of flour and a mixing bowl in the Hush House kitchens, but you can't bake a cake. This is because we started with art for the kitchens, which we sliced up and turned into manipulable objects, and some fitted more naturally into the crafting system than others. But that's not relevant to people who just want to bake a cake. Or have vegetables less generic than a sack. Meanwhile I've seen a heartening number of players talk about how they in-game RP afternoon tea with Visitors and villagers. And it ties together with more Visitor engagement. Some parts of this point may end up in the game as a free update - I don't know until I've worked through the design - it depends on how easy or not it is to tease apart from the rest.
  
  
• A bridge to the next game. Lottie and I have an unusually clear idea about Game Three - though we might change our minds and we won't be starting on it until at least 2025 - and I want to lay down a few barrels of the good story so it'll be aged and flavourful by the time it shows up in Three. I'm also planning ahead and trying out some ideas with design, with narrative structure and with UI that - by Three - should ultimately take us beyond windows-and-slots. It's a good model, it's brought us a long way, but it does feel sometimes like trying to write through a keyhole.

Wisdom Tree pendant

"Scholars and adepts recognise nine Wisdoms... though they disagree where one Wisdom ends and another begins."

"How dull it is to pause, to make an end,
To rust unburnished, not to shine in use!"

— 'Ulysses', Alfred Lord Tennyson

BOOK OF HOURS content expansion

"Only twins drown twice."

Europe, 1937. The War in the World is coming, and worse yet, the War in the Sun. In this gathering gloom, the notables of the occult underworld consider new weapons; new alliances; new paths. Who can they turn to for help, if not the Librarian of Hush House?

Explore visitors and their stories in much greater depth. Host exotic feasts and sophisticated soirées. And in your own quiet way, shape the genesis of the controversial Lighthouse Institute.

BOOK OF HOURS soundtrack

BOOK OF HOURS localisation

Secret Histories merch

Tarot colouring book

Wisdom Tree necklace

Hours notebooks

Reverend Timothy's gifts

Everything else

"[The music] was deep and wide and beautiful, but slow and blended with an immeasurable sorrow, from which its beauty chiefly came..."

- The Silmarillion, J. R. R. Tolkien

...a 25-day advent calendar of Hush House! 🎄🎁

Door 1: Seasonal art in BOOK OF HOURS

Trading cards and Steam Points Shop

Soundtrack coming soon

Next up: DAYMARE

• Mail ordering some items (from Cater & Hero, and from TRN Ltd). Ordering from a catalogue will be a baroque and leisurely process. It'll reinforce Brancrug's remoteness, and it won't be trivial to top up supplies. But it'll fill some gaps and it'll add some flavour.
  
• In-game shelf labels! The Skolekosophy section? The Possibly Contaminated section? Unconfirmed Crafting Recipes? Useful Memories (though the book/Memory system may be coming up for a change)? Notes to yourself about who Janus is and who Hendrick was?
  
• Some UI refresh stuff - e.g. what Lottie refers to as 'spiffing timers' to make workstations a bit prettier
  
• Some more zoom tuning (restoring simultaneous arrow key movement and zoom-to, and I'll look at the zoom levels again)
  

• Zoom-to-cursor is back! I've reworked it from my eccentric experimental version to be more what people expected, and switched it on by default. You can still turn it off in the options menu if you don't like it
  
• Auto-arrange changes; undo button, separate merge and arrange, variant ordering on reclick
  Keep clicking the arrange button (or pressing Tab) to see the effects
  
• It's now possible to dream on a Memory when night comes, preserving it for the following day
  You can't do this with Weather, and you can only do it after nightfall
  
• Dedicated verb icons for workstations
  Lottie wanted these in to add character - and they're also pavingthe way for another UI upgrade
  
• Added a small feature to make the endgame, and rare scenarios in the midgame, easier (psst it relates to Numa)
  psst psst there's a way to finish the game when you're ready without waiting for the right time
  
• More performance optimisations! Still ongoing, still experimental
  I'll keep working on these, but do drop me a mail if you're still struggling on a machine that's above minimum spec
  
• There's now a second phonograph in the House
• on new saves only* (i.e. if you haven't opened the Severn Chamber yet in this playthrough). The Governor's phonograph also now accepts different aspects (run something through it to update)
  
• TAKE NOTE! If a Soul card becomes contaminated after this update, it will sometimes be able to pass on the contamination to books
  Expect more from contaminations and maladies later - but I'm feeding these in very cautiously
  
• You can now mute copied-text popups (and/or re-enable them in Options)
  Sorry, folks, finally got to it
  
• The harp in the Windlit Gallery is a little different (on new saves only)
  
• The Librarian can now burn correspondence
  Right now that means 'spare reminder from St Rhonwens isn't wirh you forever' but it may be more relevant in future updates
  
• You'll no longer get two simultaneous Numa incidents when playing on 6x speed
  I was hunting this one for a while - thanks to D.K. for giving me the final piece in the puzzle via their bug report
  
• One candelabrum moved in the nave of St Brandan's so you get a little more space in the window-shelf
  We'd have done this a coupla weeks ago, but the other half of Weather Factory, who does the art, just put in a couple of fifty-hour weeks to get the Lucid Tarot finished. WELL DONE LOTTIE. Same with the art bits below
  
• Entrance hall chairs now show in front of shelved objects
  
• Added a visible path down from Earl Brian's field to make the cliff-link clearer
  
• The Mirrors in the Hall of Division now accept Grail (as usual, you'll need to run a recipe through them to see this, if you're playing an existing save)
  This is more thematically on-point; also there was a single solitary Soul evolution where you could still lock yourself out of an upgrade, and this resolves it. Thanks to those who reported this!
  
• You'll only see the Wisdom Tree tip once (finally got around to this)
  
• Swimming in the sea is now possible, though not always wise, and a swimmer should ensure they know where their towel is; AND examining Fabric no longer destroys it; AND clean fresh linen now has restorative properties
  All these three points are related. I wanted to stop destroying Fabric, as part of upcoming feature tweaks for both analysis and Mommet work. So I wanted to give towels and linen something else to do. (previously they were one-shot Memory generators - they had just looked nice in the room art, and it's often hard to find a use for these objects). PS people should stop trying to give their dirty laundry to Mrs Kille, people, she's a midwife not a laundress
  
• Added an extra quarter-second delay to the room preview window
  still too intrusive? now too slow? needs to be configurable? we'll see, it's all a grand adventure
  
• Added a Revert button to the crafting helper panel, which returns the window to the first available recipe
  
• Added a missing connection from Gullscry Loggia to Gaol Bridge
  
• Lucid Tarot cards in ending screens display at a better ratio
  I didn't even notice, and I don't know if anyone else did, but it was upsetting my wife to see her art squashed
  
• Fixed some Ouranoscopy hint and recipe issues, and added a new recipe
  
• Fixed some Stone Stories hint and recipe issues, and added a new recipe
  There'll be more of this sort of thing
  
• Options in crafting helper panel are slightly easier to click
  
• Fixed an irritation where mousing over Period aspect could bring up an irrelevant unlock preview tooltip
  
• Father Schaller now admits that he reads Sanskrit
  Expect him and other visitors to show more of an interest in some other relevant books in the future
  
• Westcott Room scroll cubbies now work
  
• Fixed an issue where Memories found as random gathers would sometimes only appear once (with thanks to M.W.)
  
• Wormwood Dream is persistent
  
• Crafting is no longer possible in bed. It was rarely useful, usually confusing, always a health and safety issue
  Are there other things coming that you can do in bed? no wash your mind out, not that. But one of the potential expansions has to do do with dreaming
  
• A terminological issue re: scientific instrumentation has been addressed.
  Can't believe I forgot what an astrolable looked like
  
• Added a missing sound for some small things being dropped
  I only noticed this because I was tuning the volume of the spookier sounds in the caves below the House
  
• Fixed a problem where detail messages weren't showing on consumable objects when they were Considered
  
• Clearer slot labelling on Skills
  So fewer people will get to hour six and only then realise you don't need to use up Lessons for every slot?
  
• Saves and Backups button doesn't suffer from desynced text
  
• Detail images for very small objects no longer pixelate
  Surprisingly fiddly to fix, but glasses of water are now much charming-er