Due to some force majeure circumstances, there's no need for the game to be in the store, and to avoid any further confusion, it will soon be removed from sale.
Some questions you may ask:
Will Frail Faces (hereinafter - FrFa) move to any other store or platform? No, FrFa was planned to be exclusive to Steam and won't be sold on any other platform ever.
Will FrFa ever return to Steam? Although there's a possibility of this, please note that the decision of its removal was made with the expectation that it would be permanent.
What's the reason behind the removal? Due to the current situation there's no possibility for me to withdraw revenue from this game, and there doubtfully will ever be, so it doesn't make sense anymore to keep the game selling.
Why not make the game free? FrFa is designed in mind to be a commercial buy-to-play game, the price of which was planned to be raised after several major updates. Also such decision would be discriminative towards players who have already bought it.
What will happen to my copy of FrFa? Nothing. The removal of the game from the store won't affect it in any way, you still will be able to play it.
Will you develop some other games? I'm still actively developing several game projects. But keep in mind that there almost no reasons for me to publish them on western platforms for respective audiences to witness it.
v0.16.0: Pre-Update
An update that adds new experimental content to the game for a smoother transition to upcoming updates.
[General]
Music Library which contains an audio player and the complete game soundtrack was added into "Extras" section.
New soundtracks for W1-A and W2-A were added
Slightly reworked graphic assets for W5: Loud Plains and W8: Reality Edge
[Stages] 2-A Town Subway: a short-cut to various parts of the game. You can find an entrance to it by entering 2-1 as a mask who is familiar with Wortelm's surroundings. Wortan subway is a labyrinthine place which contains threatening cobolds and some secret pathways.
[Enemies] W8: Virtual Transporter, Virtual Siphon, Virtual Charmer Virtuals are consequences of exposure to lacunal energy. They don't pose a physical threat but they affect actions of nearby beings which is extremely threatening for masks who are dealing with dangers of Reality Edge. They're very tough opponents, however each one of them is bound with some enemy on a stage, Virtual will instantly die if its host is killed.
W2-A: Cobolds
[Ememies Reworks]
Faceless Chasers now have 3 different attack and run animations
[Optimizations]
Enemies' movement pathfinding was optimized
Lightning VFX were optimized to be much less performance heavy
Most of game's code was refactored for future needs
Several minor updates which include additions for implemented content will be made soon. After a long break, a major update that includes new content will be released in the summer.
Plans for v0.17 (The Grand Update, approx. mid/late Summer):
Up to 10 new masks and heavy reworks of some old ones
Rework of in-game achievements/unlocks
New Steam achievements
Further polishing of mechanics which were implemented in previous updates
Work on all bosses
Update Interchasm stage
Implement random miniboss encounters
Update the tutorial stage
Update game's store page and its description + new trailer
Due heavy core changes, current save files may become obsolete on the next update! Some import options will be added and every effort will be made to keep the most important parts of your progress.
v0.15.3: April's Fun Update
A minor update which reworks some masks and adds new effects and abilities to random-themed masks. Venaide and Karnex masks have been replaced by Casseau and Ike masks in Demo version.
[Item Reworks] Armament now changes a regular attack of next masks:
Taika (Magic Snake)
Casseau (Die)
Arida (Split Shot)
Miya (Kamaitachi)
Tarraxt (Dual Barrel)
[Mask Reworks] Bernard
Attack speed was decreased (15fr->45fr)
Movement speed was decreased (Sonic->Sluggish)
Special ability "Roar" was changed to "Warcry": Deals low damage to enemies in circle and pushes them
Ultimate ability "Decapitate" was reworked: Makes a circular swing which deals random damage up to missing health of enemies
Passive ability "Hibernation" was changed to "Adrenaline Rush": Increases movement/attack speed per (100/Soulpower) combo
Casseau
New SFX were added
Ike
Prank: 19 new random actions were added
Fidget:
"Bullrun" random action was added
Chance of activation is halved
The major update v0.16 which adds new content is delayed and will be timed to the next sale event.
v0.15.2: Small Score Attack Update
A little update which adds new Score mechanics and polishes some moments. Demo version was updated as well.
[General]
Post-game screen was reworked
Unlocked masks now are immediately added to a mask pool of a current run. It will make a progress faster without need to replay each time to see new unlocks in action
Score statistics was added, it's equal to a total gained experience during run. You can enable a Score counter in the Interface options tab. Highest Score record also adds log10(ScoreRecord)% to your winrate slightly affecting your Rank.
Bosses (except Lacuna) now give you x4 souls, their base Soulpower values remain unchanged
Timer stops when you defeat Lacuna
Next things now grant you experience:
Dealing damage with regular attacks (+1 with 4% per 1% of gained energy chance)
Killing an enemy with a Special ability (+3)
Killing an enemy with an Ultimate ability (+7)
Picking up keys (+10), upgrades (+5/+15), and items (+25)
On-death invincibility window was increased (30->40)
Burden now slightly decreases an energy expense reduction granted by Soulpower
Burden invincibility penalty cannot decrease your iframes lower than your Soulpower
[Modes] Breach Mode:
Enemies' progression now is a flat increase which equals +2 instead of random value from 0 to 4
Angst Mode:
Enemies' progression bonus now is randomized from a base value to a doubled base value
[Mask Reworks]
Kazuki: No longer affected by the melee angle penalty
Ersnio:
Damage was increased (2->3)
Attack interval was increased (21->25)
Tarraxt
Damage was increased (1->2)
Attack interval was increased (5->9)
Zazzar
Damage was increased (4->5)
Rabyj
Damage was increased (13->18)
Attack interval was increased (24->28)
[Item Reworks]
Banner: Now Banner also halves your Burden value
[Bug Fixes]
Quitting a run during the game over sequence will show a proper reason of a game over
"Wipe Progress" option now clears experience progress
"Wipe Progress" option now clears Angst Mode runs
Fixed a mask bar not going to a new line after 16 masks
Fixed an extremely high Burden value may lead to unpleasant consequences
Fixed Revalg's Colossus Stroll crash due improper value reference
Fixed crash when Lieden activates Nightmare Stand
Player now can't be banished via Lacunal Gate during a mask death sequence
Fixed Hourglass anomaly not being affected by Amulet
Fixed crash when Scavenger spawns in the Interchasm
v0.15.1
An express bunch of new balance changes and fixes made after several playtests to improve the experience of the recent update.
[General]
Enemies killed by outsider masks now leave souls
Item names in TAB inventory now are in square brackets to make an inventory more readable
Next sources of experience are now proportionally distributed between all masks in a set, a current one gets twice as much experience than any other
Defeating Lacuna
Completing challenges
[LACUNA]
Decreased Lacuna's chance for a doubled action to prevent Lacuna's sudden frenzies
Decreased a number of enemies that needs to be next to player for Lacuna to spawn a Lacunal Ward
[Modes] Breach Mode:
Enemies' progression bonus now is randomized from +0 to +4 instead of a flat +4 increase
Angst Mode:
Mask loss now only halves mask's experience instead of fully resetting it
[Object Reworks]
Sacrificial Altar: now Altar releases a soul of a dead mask to get additional energy and experience
[Mask Reworks] Revalg:
Colossus Stroll: Now damage equals to Soulpower*Weight instead of just Soulpower
[Bug Fixes]
Hallucinations now don't approach during challenge levels
Otto's crash due improper Soulpower value reference was fixed
Fixed chest counter not properly showing chests on a stage after leaving a challenge/interchasm stage
Fixed crash on a mutation after a purification
v0.15.0: Soulful Second Devversary
Exactly two years have passed since the development of Frail Faces began. During this time, the game has undergone many changes that have only benefited it.
The game still has to go through a lot of metamorphosis before it reaches its final form, and yet, this year promises to be the last for the completion of Frail Faces' Early Access. This update will open the third year of development, it brings new interesting mechanics to the game that will saturate it with more interesting gameplay possibilities.
[Experience and Levels] Masks now can gain experience by destroying void fiends. Experience gain depends on a Soulpower of a killed enemy. After accumulating enough experience a mask gains a new level which permanently increases its Soulpower value by 1, the higher a rarity of mask the more experience it needs. Maximum possible level a mask can reach is 5. Gaining a new level gives you a long invincibility window which equals 1 second per level.
[Soulpower] Just like enemies, masks now have a Soulpower value as well. Soulpower is a value which displays an approximate power of a mask.
Soulpower value depends on next things:
Base value of a Soulpower equals to the quality(rarity) of a mask plus its state
Each experience level gained by mask gives additional 1 Soulpower
Plus 1 Soulpower per 9 upgrades
Soulpower value can be seen in masks's ingame information box. (Shift key by default) Soulpower can't drop lower than 1 and can't rise higher than 25.
Soulpower affects next things:
Increases guaranteed increase by upgrades, reciprocally guaranteed increase of Damage and Energy Gain are decreased by Soulpower of an attacked enemy.
A random Soulpower value is added to your damage on enemies' pain threshold check
Randomly decreases energy spent on skills (up to 1% per 1 Soulpower)
If enemies' damage value is lower than a random number of Soulpower, a mask will lose 1 mask state instead of 2
Randomly decreases iframes loss when getting hit during invincibility, also enemies' can't reduce your iframes lower than your Soulpower value
Downgrade, banishment, radiation and mutation resistances
The power of each mask in an outsider party
Increases power of some masks' abilities (listed in Mask Reworks)
When attacking an enemy during its invincibility state you'll decrease its iframes by your Soulpower value but not lower than enemy's Soulpower value
[Mutations] Mutation is a mechanic which makes masks grow individual artifacts under some conditions. Malmutations have a higher chance to grow an anomalous artifact. Each mask can't have more than 4 mutations. Not all artifacts may be a mutation.
Sources of mutation:
Eldritch Disfigurator's attack with some chance (Mutation force = 1, malmutation)
Radiation with some chance (Mutation force = 2, affects a random mask)
Lacunal Emission (Mutation force = 3, malmutation, affects a random mask)
Mutagen artifact (Mutation force = 4)
[Modes] Breach Mode:
Soulpower of enemies in Breach Mode is doubled
Mask's death in Breach Mode will lead to experience loss (approximately 1 level)
Angst Mode:
Angst Mode increases experience gain for masks by 4 times (doesn't affect Soulpower of enemies)
Mask's death in Angst Mode will lead to loss of all experience
[General]
Removed stats increase granted by mask states (except a movement speed bonus)
Challenge rooms now also give you an experience reward
Progress tab: the best mask is now considered the one with the highest experience instead of the highest bodycount.
[Objects]
Soulpillar: Sometimes spawns on a stage, gives souls when you stand next to it
[Objects Reworks]
Purification Shrine: now Purification grants +3 Soulpower and doubles XP rate instead of increasing amount of picked up upgrades by 1
[Enemies Reworks] Soulpower:
Soulpower now affects guaranteed damage reduction by armor: 5% of armor per enemy' Soulpower. Player's Soulpower reduces it
Player's random Soulpower value is added to damage dealt on a pain treshold check, its decreased by enemy's Soulpower
Eldritch Eliminator:
Eldritch Eliminators now will prevent you from getting to a Portal on W8
Noise Screamer:
Now Noise Screamers can walk and will flank a player in their vicinity
Speed of sonic waves was drastically increased and randomized, range was not affected
Lieden:
Now Lieden gains energy which is equal to your Soulpower on killing your mask
[LACUNA] New Lacuna actions:
Lacunal Ward: Lacuna drops a ward which makes void fiends nearby stronger (iframes, heal, removes debuffs) and attracts their attention
Lacunal Emission: a slowly moving wall of energy which malmutates all masks in its vicinity. Lacuna cannot use it after Eerie Zones.
[Items]
Number of Items increased by 4 (from 118 to 122)
Artifacts: Magnet, Genome
Anomalies: Twinsoul, Mutagen
[Item Reworks]
Heat: was renamed in Swelter
Crown: Increases Soulpower bonus granted by Rarity and State of mask, removes Soulpower cap. Old effect of Crown was moved to the Helm artifact.
Helm: Increases state of masks by 1
Rune: Now it doubles resistance check by Soulpower
Augmentation: Increases Soulpower granted by upgrades (per 9 -> per 5) instead of giving a maximum guaranteed increase
Onelander: Now you get unique artifacts from bosses in form of mutation instead of a droppable item
Reactor: May cause a meltdown with a chance which depends on lost energy
Brain: Now it gives a guaranteed reduction of an energy expense granted by Soulpower instead of its old effect
Leech: Now also decreases Soulpower of enemy by 1 on each activation, down to 1
[Mask Reworks]
Most of iframes granted by skills were reduced (Specials: 30fr->24fr;Utimates: 60fr->42fr)
Most of skills cooldowns were raised (Specials: 30fr->50fr;Utimates: 60fr->100fr)
Iance:
Martial Artist: Now it adds Soulpower value to combo counter when you get energy by landing regular attacks instead of doubling energy gain by attacks
Elenor:
Leech Seed: Leech Seed decreases Soulpower of enemy by 1 on each tick, down to 1
Revalg:
Colossus Stroll: Damage now depends on Soulpower
Jihun:
Autodrones: Number of drones is limited to Soulpower value
Arida:
Inner Sight: Soulpower increases radius, chance of weakening and its duration
Miya:
Sword Dance: +4% CritChance bonus per 100/Soulpower combo hits instead of 1% per 1 combo hit
Fenn:
Guardian Spirit: Fenn's frequency of Guardian Spirit is randomly increased with Soulpower
Avilora:
Frostbite: Now Soulpower is added to a freeze duration
Cooper:
Iron Crumpler: Now damage bonus equals to Enemy's armor multiplied by Soulpower of player instead of Enemy's armor to the power of 2
Boone:
Plunder: Chance for doubled pick up now equals to 1% per Soulpower instead of 1/6
Flegmin:
Heat: Soulpower increases radius of heat
Karnex:
Corpse Explosion:
Damage of gibs depends on Soulpower of killed enemy
Exhumation:
Number of bones that may spawn due this ability is limited to Soulpower value
Health amount of bones created by this ability is increased with Soulpower
Karnex's number of summoned skeletons now depends on Soulpower value instead of a sum of upgrades
Venaide:
Soul Bomb:
Soul Bomb damage is 5 times less
Soul Barrage:
Soul Barrage now spends 15% of souls per use
Damage of Soul Barrage projectiles was increased from 5 to 15
Soul Harvest:
Soul Harvest's maximum number of souls now limited to 55*Soulpower
When this passive ability is active or a number of souls is lesser than its limit souls don't increase energy
Now Soul Harvest grants +1 damage by 25 souls instead of 15
Venaide's starting souls amount now equals to 125 instead of 55
Soul Cascade:
Now it sends a random amount of souls, affected by Fortune and Soulpower
Zazzar:
Overload: Radius and damage dealt by Overload now equals to Zazzar's Soulpower
Delshad:
Hurtbeat: Now along with a percent damage, Hurtbeat additionally deals a random extra damage which depends on Soulpower
Otto:
Phantom Army: Otto's Soulpower increases duration of clones created by Phantom Army
Clone: Soulpower of killed enemy increases duration of clones
Rabyj:
Chain Reaction: Damage of a shrapnel now depends on Soulpower of enemy
Tarraxt:
Reload: Tarraxt now has 50 base ammo and +10 per 5 Soulpower until reload
Undal:
Puddle: Soulpower increases radius of pool
Jomow:
Digest:
Soulpower increases digestion speed
Now affected by Restrainer
Xzavax:
Event Horizon: Soulpower increases radius and duration of weakening
Lieden:
Lieden's unique item Fortitude now considered as an inate mutation instead of an item.
Plans for v0.16 (April Fool's Day update):
Implement some WiP plans of a previous update
Work on random-themed masks
New enemies
Work on masks' animation
Some preparations for the Grand Update (v0.17)
v0.14.1: Preparations for the Next Major Update
A minor update which adds new attacks for the item which was added in the previous update and slightly changes some things to get prepared for the next update. New QoL SFX were added as well. Second Devversary update is planned on mid-February and will contain a lot of drastic gameplay changes.
[General]
Dynamic background was added on W6
Bosses now give souls like regular enemies
HUD was redesigned to fit in future mechanics
Added sounds for:
Special or Ultimate going off cooldown
Activating skills during reload/lack of energy
[Item Reworks]
Armament now changes a regular attack of next masks:
Hector (Gun-kata)
Berab (Killing Spree)
Arkin (Arc Lightning)
Albert (Halberd Slash)
Arkhip (Cat O' Nine Tails)
Estel (Tripled Boomerang)
Boone (Ricochet)
Gudozaj (Spitfire)
Avilora (Arctic Blast)
Fenn (Spirit Blast)
Ersnio (Auxiliary Shot)
Sierptal (Branching Structure)
Dreamcatcher now is affected by Fortune
[Mask Reworks]
Iance: Added new SFX
Albert: Added new SFX
Berab:
Backtrack Stab:
Backtrack Stab is not AoE anymore
Backtrack Stab's backpushing was increased a bit
Arkhip:
Decreased attack damage (15->12)
Decreased attack speed (35->37)
Mick: Added new SFX
Fenn: Added new SFX
Miya: Attack damage increased by 3 (8->11)
Rabyj's mask title was changed to Saboteur (Previous title: Exploder)
Stijn's mask title was changed to Peddler (Previous title: Merchant)
Radek's mask title was changed to Merchant (Previous title: Barterer)
The Sipper 9->13; The Quiet 9->16; The Languish 9->19; The Divide 9->22; The Malady 9->25; The Trickster 9->16
Lieden 7->17
The Line 9->111; The Core 9->100; Lacuna 111->1111
[Bug Fixes]
Fixed darkened screen left after a hallucination event
v0.14.0: New Year's Update
New update to meet 2022! First shortcut stages were finally implemented adding new choices in game's playthrough. New game changing items were added in the new update, including a powerful Armament which drastically changes attacks of some masks. A new object Stash allows you to manipulate with artifacts throughout runs easier allowing more bold experimentation with items.
[Stages] Shortcuts are alternative stages which player can enter after completing some condition. They are highly rewarding and allow you to skip several stages for faster progress but they can be more challenging than the regular ones.
1-B Keldal Village: a shortcut to 2-2. You can find an entrance to it by entering 1-3 as Iance. Dangerous treants are lurking around guarding a lot of wooden and bronze chests.
1-A Shoals: a secret shortcut. You can enter it by finding an entrance deep down in the void on 1-1 making it's extremely risky to find. It's full of dangerous hordes of Nymphs and contains an artifact chest and a diamond chest. Beating this stage will send you to 3-1.
[Objects]
Stash: Spawns on 1-1 and 7-1, allows you to put up to 2 artifacts which you can retrieve at any other stash, for example in the beginning of the next run.
Mirror: -0.5 resistance instead of -1, halves iframes instead of dividing it by 10
Headband: Headband now increases damage by 50% per cooldown instead of doubling it per each cooldown
[LACUNA]
Lacuna may perform several actions, chance depends on Lacuna's power
Inactivity timer sets to random amount up to a square of Lacuna's power, so it acts more frequently
[Bug Fixes]
Arkin's powercoils crash was fixed
Tarraxt's guns now affected by Z-axis
New update will be supported with few smaller updates throughout the next month to tweak new gameplay mechanics and get prepared for the next major update.
Plans for v0.15 (approx. late February/2nd devversary of Frail Faces):
Another one challenge room, another one short-cut stage
Mutation mechanic which works an individual inventory for each mask
Change AI of some enemies
More work on VFX and SFX
Add more optional texts and work on existing ones
Happy New Year!
v0.13.2
A bunch of small fixes and tweaks.
[Mask Reworks] Frej
Frej's icicles now also bounce off props and obstacles
Lieden
Now regular melee attacks deflect projectiles
[Bug Fixes]
Fixed Lieden not being affected by Z movement
Fixed Venaide's souls not being affected by Z movement
Fixed Estel's glaive not being affected by Z movement
Fixed Rooks' swords not being affected by Z movement
Fixed Trickster's shuffle adding an Iance mask during Lieden Mode
Fixed an entrance to the Reality Edge doesn't send you to the next stage during Lieden Mode
Lacuna now deals damage to player's allied creatures
