When running the game through the Steam client achievements pop-ups will be seen at the time they are triggered, rather than when the game is relaunched.
Setting preferences are now saved on closing the pause menu when using gamepads and keyboard controls as well as a mouse.
The Storyteller's Festival
Hello all, and happy new year!
We’re excited to be featured alongside many other fine narrative games in The Storyteller’s Festival!
The Storyteller’s Festival begins on January 29th 18:00pm (GMT)/10:00am (PST), and we’ll be live streaming Mask of the Rose on the 30th at 10:00pm (GMT)/14:00pm (PST). Hope to see some of you there!
Update: Daffodil
We've also just released Daffodil: the latest update for Mask of the Rose, and one which will be the last for now.
Bugfixes Galore
Daffodil is mostly about bugfixing: bringing Mask of the Rose to a nice, tidy state so we can commence work proper on the console ports for PlayStation and Xbox.
Taught Griz to use the correct pronouns for Mr Fires.
Convinced David to stop playing gooseberry during other people's sentimental conversations at the Feast.
Revised what it means when the player selects that they dislike a person, so that it now means "I don't like them" and also "I'm not attracted": an improvement to clarity, if perhaps a disappointment to enemies-to-lovers tropers.
Discouraged Harjit from bolting immediately after the player's confession of feelings, no matter how overwhelmed Harjit might be.
Stopped Horatia from thanking the player for fulfilling her request when she never made such a request in the first place; gratitude can be carried to excess.
Prevented Reginald from teleporting into the player's bedchamber during a personal conversation with Moss.
Stopped Harjit from growling too many times in a row, no matter how fetching he finds the player.
Prevented Archie from initiating a second seduction immediately after the first, though it pained us to correct this.
Many typos and grammatical errors have been fixed.
Extended Harjit's memory so he can no longer forget something immediately after sharing it with you.
Taught Griz to use the correct pronouns for Mr Fires.
Fixed an option that was misleading about which witness you wished to interrogate on a particular topic.
Cleared up grammatical infelicities from the otherwise very literary self-insert fictions written for Rachel.
Discouraged Harjit from visiting Ferret's shop twice in one afternoon.
Convinced David to stop playing gooseberry during other people's sentimental conversations at the Feast.
Revised what it means when the player selects that they dislike a person, so that it now means "I don't like them" and also "I'm not attracted": an improvement to clarity, if perhaps a disappointment to enemies-to-lovers tropers.
Prevented the player from introducing themselves as a census-taker after Pages has already confiscated their badge.
Allowed the player to tell Barqujin about Batachikhan's success in a particular quest.
Discouraged Harjit from bolting immediately after the player's confession of feelings, no matter how overwhelmed Harjit might be.
Stopped Horatia from thanking the player for fulfilling her request when she never made such a request in the first place; gratitude can be carried to excess.
Prevented Griz from relenting and doing a favour she had already said she wasn't going to do.
Cleared up a confusion whereby an appointment with Pages about one topic resulted in a scene about something quite different.
Improved the text written concerning Virginia's history when the player selects certain motives for her.
Deprived Virginia of the mindreading ability to know things about the player that she had never been told.
Expanded the number of conversational gambits available to characters when speaking about themselves at the end of a scene.
Clarified some text surrounding situations where the player is both Griz' lover and her best friend.
Discouraged the murderer glossing over past misdeeds after they have in fact admitted to the murder.
Removed misleading epilogue line about encountering David only occasionally after the feast.
Removed spurious reference to Moss in situations where he should not be familiar to the player.
Removed Rachel's ability to guess the player's name without being told.
Prevented Archie from reacting to the player's banter about past cities as though the player were expressing deep fear.
Fixed situation in which Hogslain Market did not become permanently available to the player when it arguably should do so.
Corrected Archie's sense of personal space so that he will no longer stand right in front of Griz at the Feast in certain character groupings.
Prevented Reginald from teleporting into the player's bedchamber during a personal conversation with Moss.
Encouraged Harjit not to engage in displays of excessive affection in the courtyard.
Stopped Harjit from growling too many times in a row, no matter how fetching he finds the player.
Made Virginia (very) slightly more patient with the player, rather than expecting a certain quest to be performed instantly.
Adjusted farewells on departing from Pages' chambers to avoid certain faux pas.
Discouraged Griz from asking the player for the same favour twice in one afternoon.
Adjusted order of events around providing Archie with certain supplies, in order to make it less likely that the player might accidentally waste a visit.
Prevented the interface from speaking of a lover as though they were only a friend in circumstances where the romantic relationship has reached its full development but some friendly conversation scenes remain to explore.
Corrected missing information about what has happened to the player's badge when it has been taken away by someone other than Mr Pages.
Prevented Archie from initiating a second seduction immediately after the first, though it pained us to correct this.
Removed case where the term PlayerStandin could appear in the codex; there was nothing to see here, no, definitely not.
Prevented David reiterating some dialogue in response to certain love scene patterns.
Corrected inaccurate reference to the player not having been to Parliament when in fact they have.
Prevented Griz from insensitively asking why the player hasn't been to work lately after Mr Pages has fired them.
Prevented Phoebe from popping up in the midst of a scene between David and Rachel when she had no good reason to be there.
Made Phoebe drop the topic of the player's family if she has already asked once and been given no answer.
Made it possible to interview Ivy for the census when Phoebe is also present at the market as a possible census-filler.
Corrected repetition of intervening text when changing the subject from Milton to Virginia while taking the census with them both.
Prevented Mr Pages from referring to relationship interference when none has really been clearly called out by the text.
Improved codex instructions for a certain quest involving Harjit.
Made it possible to confirm Ivy's intent to assist at the trial in advance.
Prevented Harjit from interjecting into a private greeting with Archie merely to share his opinion of the news.
Once unlocked the synagogue will always be available on the map.
Many typos and grammatical errors have been fixed.
Tech bug fixes
Sigils are now unlocked correctly when playing offline on Epic builds, allowing players to access additional backgrounds after completing the game.
When loading the game, cloud syncing will no longer stop sigil data from registering and prevent players accessing additional backgrounds during character creation.
The intermittent crash experienced when closing the game on Epic has been resolved.
The question mark icons on the stroycrafting interface will no longer obscure the token text when text size is set to the largest setting.
The suited and booted achievement will now unlock when acquiring hats and torso items from NPCs as well as from shops.
Ink commands will no longer be seen in dialogue when Phoebe's Storycrafting token is unlocked.
Laburnum update: Murdercrafting!
Hello everyone!
Welcome to Laburnum, also known as the wholesome-sounding murdercrafting update. (To see the changes you’ll need to start a new save game, so please don’t worry if you’re continuing a save and don’t see anything different.)
Our overall aim with this update is to reduce the cognitive overhead involved in crafting murder-related stories. We’re making changes to help clarify what murderboard choices actually matter, and you should feel like you have more understanding of and agency over the trial itself.
We've made the initial Ministerial Exposé assignment that Archie gives you after the tutorial more linear. The idea is that it guides you, step by step, through the process of first forming a question (a hypothesis) on the board and how this opens up new options to explore on the map, which lets you unlock new tokens before being able to form solutions (a theory) which can be handed in.
We’ve made the murderboard smaller (every slot on it now potentially really affects the trial outcome). This will only impact murder-related stories; stories about rats, revolution, romance, etc will have the same number of slots as they currently have.
We’ve also made both the generated text and Harjit's response much clearer about what you've generated, whether it's a hypothesis or a final theory, and what it's likely to achieve.
Harjit will now expressly warn you if you've formed an "incorrect" murder theory, something that's plausible but hard to prove, and which will therefore mean the trial is likely to go sideways.
You now can't invent explanations that are too fundamentally incoherent (like that Griz took the candles in to David, because everyone knows she didn't).
It'll be harder to get into a bad situation in the trial unless you do it on purpose, but also easier to get out of said situation using One Weird Trick (can’t wait for you to discover this one, hahahah).
We hope this makes the whole experience simpler, the categories of murderboard outcome easier to understand, and the generated text more consistently satisfying (because it's less likely to be full-on bonkers).
Laburnum also introduces more autosave points, and all the bugfixes we can squeeze in.
We hope you enjoy. Barring any hotfixes, this is the last Mask of the Rose update you’ll get from us until the new year! So until then, perhaps you’d like to join us in Fallen London, where the Christmas festivities will begin with our advent calendar on the 1st of December.
Clear UI signalling for forming hypotheses (questions) and theories (solutions).
The initial Ministerial Exposé that Archie gives you is more linear to act as an extended tutorial.
We’ve made the Mystery Solutions murderboard smaller.
We’ve made both the generated text and Harjit's response much clearer about the hypothesis or final theory, and what it's likely to achieve.
We’ve added more save points (including immediately after character creation and each evening before supper)
The new game intro message can now be dismissed.
Narrative bug fixes
Ivy's name will not be revealed before she has introduced herself.
We’ve prevented David from making an appearance when visiting Rachel to discuss motives for murder.
The option to visit the thing in the basement will no longer lock out after performing the Hallowmas ritual with Horatia.
It will no longer be snowing when recalling the past.
Misalliance novel plots can now be handed into Rachel if the heroine is a non-Neath character.
Milton will no longer mention potential murder methods that the player has not yet discovered.
The academic gown is now removed immediately if caught stealing a forbidden text from the Masters.
Ferret will no longer mention the use of firearms as a form of pest control after they have befriended Algernon.
We've fixed a rare circumstance where you could solve the murder during Confessions, skipping the season of Yule entirely.
You will no longer lie to Ferret about having met the Rat Prophet-King if you have not done so.
Rat Hagiographies are now removed from the Storycrafting interface once they've been handed in to Theo or Ferret.
The correct murder method is now referred to in the generated text at all times.
References to eating mushrooms have been removed during supper scenes when you are eating suspicious fish stews.
All tokens for the Haunted novel plot can now be unlocked.
Batachikhan's name now appears correctly in the journal.
During Hallowmas the fox mask is now correctly linked to desire rather than fear.
Griz will now refer to Theo by name if you are acquainted.
Griz will no longer ask you to take her to Parliament after you've already shown her the way.
Horatia will no longer mention Moss at the Feast if you turned him away from Chapman's.
When talking to Horatia during supper the player will no longer mention tentacles in the basement if they have not yet discovered them.
Moss will no longer be confused as to whether or not he has met May.
Ivy will now refer correctly to the people you have implicated as a culprit when interviewing her about the murder.
After confessing to a crime, inhabitants of the Neath will no longer supply you with clues to implicate other people.
You will no longer respond bluntly to Ferret when you have chosen to be polite to them.
Milton no longer confuses Rachel and Phoebe when interviewing him about possible murder methods.
We've tweaked the sub-goals for the 'higher power' quest to make it clear when you are able to speak to Virginia about the dept she owes you.
When kissing Ferret you will no longer hear cheering rats before it has been revealed that they now have the power of speech.
When speaking to Milton, soul acquisition will no longer presented as a mystery if the player has already learned about it.
Ferret's dialogue at the Feast has been fixed to correctly reference their baptism.
Dialogue will no longer be repeated when saying goodbye to Mr Pages.
As always, a few more typos have been fixed.
Tech bug fixes
The pause menu can once again be accessed on the character creation summary screen via the HUD.
All sound effects can now be muted.
NPC expressions once again change on the Storycrafting interface.
The placement of the mouse cursor will no longer interfere with keyboard controls on the summary screen of character creation.
It is once again possible to navigate the wardrobe with a gamepad or Joy-Con following the removal of the academic gown when stealing a forbidden text from the Masters.
Laburnum Update Beta
Hello everyone!
Hope you had a lovely summer. We're back with a preview of the next Mask of the Rose update, just for you.
Laburnum is going to focus on the Storycrafting element of Mask of the Rose. It will also introduce more autosave points, and all the bugfixes we can squeeze in.
Our overall aim with this update is to reduce the cognitive overhead involved in crafting murder-related stories. We’re making changes to help clarify what murderboard choices actually matter, and you should feel like you have more understanding of and agency over the trial itself.
We've made the initial Ministerial Exposé assignment that Archie gives you after the tutorial more linear. The idea is that it guides you, step by step, through the process of first forming a question (a hypothesis) on the board and how this opens up new options to explore on the map, which lets you unlock new tokens before being able to form solutions (a theory) which can be handed in.
We’ve made the murderboard smaller (every slot on it now potentially really affects the trial outcome). This will only impact murder-related stories; stories about rats, revolution, romance, etc will have the same number of slots as they currently have.
We’ve also made both the generated text and Harjit's response much clearer about what you've generated, whether it's a hypothesis or a final theory, and what it's likely to achieve.
Harjit will now expressly warn you if you've formed an "incorrect" murder theory, something that's plausible but hard to prove, and which will therefore mean the trial is likely to go sideways.
You now can't invent explanations that are too fundamentally incoherent (like that Griz took the candles in to David, because everyone knows she didn't).
It'll be harder to get into a bad situation in the trial unless you do it on purpose, but also easier to get out of said situation using One Weird Trick (can’t wait for you to discover this one, hahahah).
We hope this makes the whole experience simpler, the categories of murderboard outcome easier to understand, and the generated text more consistently satisfying (because it's less likely to be full-on bonkers).
Opting in to the Laburnum beta
If you'd be kind enough to opt in to the Laburnum beta and send us your thoughts, we'd be so grateful. We'll be taking feedback until the end of October.
Instructions for accessing the beta
From Steam, install Mask of the Rose and open the menu on Mask of the Rose from your games library.
Select “Properties” Select “Betas”
Enter the access code “DarkdropCoffee” under “Private Betas”. From Beta Participation, select “laburnum_beta” from the drop down. That’s it - Steam will automatically update.
The Beta test is only accessible on Steam, but the patch will be available on all platforms.
For avoidance of doubt, the build numbers you're looking for are as follows: Windows 1.4.903 Linux 1.4.904 OSX 1.4.119
Starting a New Save
While existing save files will work with this patch, we’d like to request that you start a new save.
How to send feedback
Please use the in-game bug reporter to submit all feedback. Select the category that closest matches your feedback. Normally this would just be used for bugs, but please use this method for everything to do with the beta.
What feedback are we looking for?
There are two elements of Storycrafting that we'd like your thoughts on:
The “Ministerial Exposés” assignment from Archie has been streamlined. We’re interested in learning if this is a clearer and more comprehensible way of introducing the storycrafting mechanic.
Do you feel like you understand what to do and where to go next?
Do you feel concepts like the difference between hypotheticals (questions) and conclusions (solutions) are clear?
The “Mystery Solutions” (murder case) assignment that Harjit gives you has been simplified.
Is it easier to form questions and theories?
Do you feel like you know what to do and where to go for answers?
Do you feel able to form solutions and present them to Harjit?
And we'd like to hear about any bugs, of course.
How long should you play?
Any amount of time is appreciated, but to test the major changes introduced here, we ask you to play up to Yule and experiment with the revised “Mystery Solutions” storycrafting assignment.
Saving
If you’ve already got three saves in progress already, we suggest you rename one of the existing save files temporarily, and start a new save file. You can then delete the new save file when you are done, and set the name of the save you wished to retain back to the previous name. Where to find your saves.
New saves created in the beta branch will not be backwards compatible - if you switch to the standard branch they will not work. They will carry forward, however, and be compatible with the release version of the patch.
Note: The final version of this patch will increase the frequency of autosaving, but this is not in the beta version.
Thank you, delicious friend!
Update: Foxglove
Hope you’re all faring well and have been enjoying plumbing the depths of Mask of the Rose since the Constance update! We’ve been busy planning and putting together this update, as well as looking ahead to the next.
Foxglove largely focuses on bug fixes for many of the issues you’ve sent through so far. Among other things, we have:
Increased Rachel's repertoire so that she no longer runs out of things to say on being seduced more than twice.
Calmed Ferret's fear of spiders so that they will no longer drag the conversation back to that subject rather than letting the player get on with the business of their visit.
Removed a crack in your wardrobe through which falling snow could occasionally be seen.
Stopped Ferret from recommending rodent-based cuisine once they are on speaking terms with rats.
Discouraged Griz from acts of ventriloquism whereby she spoke at the supper table despite not being visibly present.
Corrected several instances in which the code sigils that control the working of the universe inadvertently became visible to the mortal eye.
Improved David's understanding of graveyard etiquette so that he will no longer pay calls on Horatia whilst deceased.
Given Mr Pages the moral courage to meet the player at the Feast even after it has done something quite regrettable to London. Previously unseen emotional confrontations may ensue.
We have also introduced an autosave point: the game will now save when you change your clothes in your bedroom.
The next update, Laburnum, will focus on your feedback about storycrafting and the murder investigation. We also hope to introduce more save points to break up known moments where there’s a long stretch of story without an autosave.
Many of us have annual leave, sabbaticals or childcare commitments now we’re practically in August, so you can expect to see Laburnum emerge in Autumn.
Thank you, everyone, for your support and bug reports thus far. Until Laburnum!
Increased Rachel's repertoire so that she no longer runs out of things to say on being seduced more than twice.
Formerly, the whole world could screech to a halt when the player asked Griz certain pointed questions about her relationship with Rachel Landau. Now her discomfiture takes a less dramatic form.
Clarified a conversation with Batachikhan to make more evident that the player is suggesting they look for Barqujin instead of going directly to Mr Pages.
Prevented Ferret from holding grudges: previously they could become uncooperative in circumstances where they asked the player's help with a baptismal matter; the player refused; and the player later chose to take up the task after all.
Calmed Ferret's fear of spiders so that they will no longer drag the conversation back to that subject rather than letting the player get on with the business of their visit.
Gave Mr Pages the moral courage to meet the player at the Feast even after it has done something quite regrettable to London. Previously unseen emotional confrontations may ensue.
Made Harjit more observant in his constabulary duties, such that if one visits him with books to hand over in evidence, he will now receive them from the player.
Made Harjit more receptive to certain trial arrangements involving the intervention of May; previously it was possible for him to refuse to cooperate under seemingly arbitrary circumstances.
Eliminated a temporal distortion whereby a particular visit to Rachel would consume a full day rather than only the morning.
Further diminished David's precognitive abilities by preventing him from talking about culprits in his murder before he has died.
Corrected a misunderstanding of Phoebe's, whereby she could misinterpret what the player said about commitment levels in their relationship.
Removed Rachel's arbitrary distaste for storylines about characters becoming infamous; it is no longer impossible to turn such stories in.
Disallowed the player from asking Theophilus the same trial-related favour more than once: he will remember his commitments, even without nagging.
Improved the behaviour of the storycrafting board in several contexts where a story is generated about the player character.
Corrected David's deja vu so that he no longer treats his first seductive encounter with the player as though it were his second.
Taught Griz not to narrate her own actions in the third person, as it puts people off.
Made an option to kiss Reginald respect the player's preferences about romantic involvement.
Stopped Ferret from recommending rodent-based cuisine once they are on speaking terms with rats.
Discouraged Griz from acts of ventriloquism whereby she spoke at the supper table despite not being visibly present.
Made the player's memory more accurate about the number of encounters they have had with Milton.
Discouraged Rachel Landau from referring to certain persons as murderers as a point in the story where no one has even died.
Made Ivy finish her thought in a context where she previously broke off mid-sentence.
Corrected several instances in which the code sigils that control the working of the universe inadvertently became visible to the mortal eye.
Taught the player not to feign misunderstanding at inappropriate moments.
Prevented Phoebe from acquiring false traumatic memories, as in one case she could refer to a very bad experience that had not befallen her in this timeline.
Prevented the player from asking May the same question twice, so he will not be put to the trouble of repeating himself.
Cured case of mistaken identity whereby option text could refer to Ivy as "Rachel".
Revoked David's precognition so that he can no longer refer to his own death before it happens.
Improved David's understanding of graveyard etiquette so that he will no longer pay calls on Horatia whilst deceased.
Reduced Harjit's expressions of grief so that he now only shows the player a certain photograph once.
Repaired the storycrafting board so that crafted novels are no longer so prone to confusing the protagonist and side character when generating stories.
Many typos and grammatical errors have been fixed.
Tech bug fixes
Addressed an issue such that holding the ESC key too long could open and then rapidly close the pause menu again on some systems, making it difficult to operate.
Removed a crack in the player's wardrobe through which falling snow could occasionally be seen.
Icons on the journal's status page are now aligned correctly.
The Go Back button on the setting menu no longer appears greyed out.
Inputs on the bug reporter should no longer affect interfaces open underneath it.
Switch specific bug fixes
The game will no longer crash when spamming the X button as the Storycrafting tutorial closes.
The game will no longer crash when spamming X as the character background interface loads.
