Mask of the Rose (tuxdb.com)

Coming soon: the Mask of the Rose soundtrack

Happy new year! We hope you had a restful midwinter and have returned refreshed and, hopefully, excited to see Mask of the Rose launch THIS YEAR! Cor, blimey, etc! Mask is on track for an April release, and we can't wait to get it into your hands.
Were going to the indie game event WASD in East London from 30 March until 1 April. Therell be more to announce about everything were bringing to the event, and Im really excited about it; we havent felt ready to show a game on a showfloor since our last outing to PAX West in 2019 so this feels very special. I hope some of you will consider coming by and saying hi! This month for your development blog we have an interview with our composer, Laurence Chapman. You may know Laurences work from 80 Days and Heavens Vault by Inkle! The Mask of the Rose soundtrack will be available next month on Steam.
How do you usually find games to compose for? Do studios approach you? Id been working with Inkle for all of their projects from about 2014 when we did 80 Days, and that came about because I had a list of games companies that I was emailing, on and off, and I got to I in that list before getting a response! They were working with another composer at the time and couldnt quite get the sound that they wanted, so they switched to me instead. And a partnership was born! Whats different between composing for a game and for a TV show or a film? Im enjoying the game stuff because you get a lot more freedom and time. So for example, the wardrobe music in Mask of the Rose has ended up being three minutes long, and it could have been two. You have a lot more musical freedom to just say, well, this theme is really working so Im going to make it longer, and youre not restricted by the length of a scene. And the second thing is, the development process is that much longer. So I can see the artwork that youre producing right at the beginning. Paul sent me ideas over a year ago about what it was going to look like, so your musical imagination is already going, ideas are already going through your head. Whereas on a film, you can be told who the actors are, and maybe get a script, but its not the same until the film has been put together. In a film or a TV show, its not really until post production that a composer can effectively do anything, and then of course youre stuck to the picture. Which can be a good thing! Because its a nice challenge. Maybe youve got to go from one mood to another quite quickly and then quickly back to another scene. But Im really enjoying the artistic freedom of doing games. They say that films are made in the edit, right? And if youre the composer youre right in the middle of that. In fact John Williams was doing one of the JJ Abrams Star Wars, and there were some scenes that the orchestra had already recorded and JJ Abrams would say, weve edited that scene out now. That no longer exists and we need to do something different. Which for many composers is the worst nightmare because you think, right, we can tick that off the list now, thats done! And then the director comes to you and says, we need something new! But John Williams being who he is just says, oh fine, Ill just write you something new. Not bothered! It would be fine with me, because your job is to write music for the film. If they edit something out, then thats what you do. If I really wanted to keep a piece of music, Id find somewhere to put it in. Its a job, a service youre providing for other people. And its nice to feel useful, thats the thing. I spent years practising the piano and doing all kinds of musical study, and its nice to actually feel useful! What struck you about Mask of the Rose which set off your musical imagination? The nature of the artwork somehow made it look somehow dark, but not aggressively so. It clearly wasnt like an 18 certificate film, that kind of thing. It was a kind of nice, gothic atmosphere which I thought I could write quite well for. So when you see that kind of material to work with then its encouraging because you think, Im on to something; I can get the sound world match the visual world. Its not bleak, grimdark stuff. Yes, not scraping cellos and screaming monks! Is there anything you want to highlight from the soundtrack that you think is particularly successful for the game? Im really happy with the main theme and the market tune. The nice thing about that market tune is Tom, the clarinettist, said I love this tune. I could play this all day. I think at that point the sound engineer said, Well, we still need to get it right! [previewyoutube=-28XXB2yBd0;full][/previewyoutube] Is there anything in the soundtrack that might surprise people, or which people should listen out for? You could play a game called spot the sixth, if youre very musical! Theres a major sixth (E flat down to F sharp) which turns up in the main theme and comes out in various points around the game. It doesnt mean anything per se but its just a way of combining everything, if you like, so everything has a sound world. Thats one difference between the game and the film world, is that the themes dont necessarily develop. They will do in other games where theres a more definite storyline, where its less interactive. Its not the same way that in a film a character definitely goes from A to B and thats not in the control of the viewer. So you know that your theme for a certain person has to be able to do something else, whereas with a game you dont know which route the player is going to take to get to the end of the story. Yeah, in Mask of the Rose theres more of a defined order than were used to! But usually our players go off and spend 200 hours doing whatever they like, which we dont know about!

[ 2023-01-20 11:06:49 CET ] [ Original post ]

Mask of the Rose

Failbetter Games Developer

Failbetter Games Publisher

Coming Soon Release

Singleplayer Tags

Game News Posts: 37

🎹🖱️Keyboard + Mouse
🎮 Full Controller Support

Mostly Positive (212 reviews)

http://www.failbettergames.com

Steam Store

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Welcome to Fallen London: a darkly hilarious gothic underworld where death is a temporary inconvenience, the rats talk, and Hell is only a stone's throw away.

Thanks to an unknown bargain, London now resides in a vast cavern under the earth. Down here, the sun doesn't shine, and Parliament has sunk into the Thames. Queen Victoria never emerges from her palace. Cats spy on their owners and whisper their secrets abroad. The fabric of strait-laced Victorian society has begun to fray.

New Masters are in charge. Why are they so… tall? And always cloaked? And why are they so interested in love stories?

The possibilities for personal connection in London are different now. Thrown together in crisis, you might befriend or romance many of the characters you meet, from Griz, your assertive housemate for whom the Fall was a chance to break free of Victorian societal norms, to the infernally well-dressed gentleman at the Brass Consulate with the amber eyes.

Even death itself has a twist here: the first murder victim since the Fall is feeling much better, and keen to see justice done. Unfortunately, as the doctor who treated him immediately before he expired, your housemate Archie is the prime suspect...

(Re)invent yourself: who were you before the Fall? Who will you be now?
Create outfits from a selection of clothing and unusual accessories to unlock different story options
Fall in love with a cast of diverse Londoners, each with their own secrets
Matchmake among your friends, or seek love for yourself (by any definition you like)
Write love stories in a delightful minigame, and use them to impress the new Masters
Pick up odd jobs to earn money and gather resources. How are you at rat catching?
Solve the first murder since the Fall, with the assistance of the victim
Discover cosy, mysterious and magnificent locations in a dark and delicious version of Victorian London
Seek deeper and deeper secrets over multiple playthroughs

Will you be a brilliant matchmaker, connecting friends and rivals while remaining unattached? Or are you looking for lasting love? Perhaps you're open to whatever comes your way? Every major storyline is accessible regardless of whether your approach to love is romantic or platonic.

Use an elaborate, dynamic story-crafting system to create love stories – and murder theories. Are the twists in the tale not to your taste? Then change the motive, the location, even the victim, and see how the stories adapt!

Your past will open different doors for you in London. What was your life on the Surface like? Were your family landed gentry? Or did they own a tailor’s shop, or dabble in the occult?

Your clothing will also make people think differently of you. Your outfits open new possibilities in conversation: be bolder, more commanding, more flirtatious. Ingratiate yourself with London's inhabitants by changing your style of dress – they won't be able to resist you in that hat!

You'll also work odd jobs and collect resources which will open new avenues in social situations. Your housemate Griz has found you work as census-taker for those curious new Masters. Fill your census-taker's notebook with intimate details about your fellow citizens and you'll find you can pursue deeper relationships with them, romantic or otherwise.

Griz

For your fellow lodger Griz, the Fall of London has been a liberation – the chance to throw off her corsets, dump the dresses and be taken seriously in a position that would have been forbidden to her when she was 'Miss Griselda'.

Archie

For your other housemate Archie, the change is terrifying. What is a medical student supposed to believe in when even the laws of death no longer apply?

Harjit

When the Fall struck, Harjit stepped up to help anyone who needed it. Now he’s settling into his role as a man in uniform, but the territory is unfamiliar – and, secretly, he has a missing person of his own to find.

Milton

Milton is the amber-eyed host of a literary parlour with a scalding handshake and a prior address in Hell. He’s an excellent listener, but does he only want you for your soul?

Rachel

Rachel was halfway through her serialised novel when London fell and everything she was writing about was turned upside-down. Her publisher grows impatient. Fortunately (?) meeting Milton has rekindled her passion – for more than just writing.

David

Rachel’s brother, and no fan of Milton, David is also destined to be Fallen London’s first murder victim. When he returns from the dead, you can ask him all about it.

Horatia

For a decade, Horatia has taken in lodgers and turned them into family. Since London fell, people need the security she offers more than ever. So when a man made entirely of clay knocks at the door, offering to pay handsomely for lodgings, she can hardly refuse.

Mr Pages

One of London's new, mysterious “Masters”, Mr Pages has embarked on the titanic endeavour of conducting London’s first post-Fall census! But why are its questions so concerned with the love-lives of London’s citizens? How do people declare their affection, in this fair city? How lasting are their attachments? Might a Londoner take an interest in a very tall, broad-shouldered, cloaked personage that leans towards the chiropterous, hypothetically speaking?

Explore this unique city in glorious, richly rendered 2D. Experience London through three seasons: the season of Confessions, the season of Yule, and the season of Love. Help establish the first Feast of the Rose, a festival of romance that will be celebrated in London for decades to come!

For players of Sunless Sea and Sunless Skies, Mask of the Rose offers a chance to immerse yourselves in the city that founded this deep, dark, and marvellous universe. And for veteran players of the Fallen London browser game, it marks your first opportunity to visit the city just after it fell. But fear not: Mask of the Rose is an excellent introduction to the universe we’ve been building for more than a decade, and you don’t need to have played our other games first. Come on in. Most things won’t bite, unless you want them to.

Explore the locales, lives, and loves of an impossible city. Exchange bon-mots with devils. Investigate the first murder where the victim can testify at the murderer’s trial. Dive into the sunken ruins of poor drowned Parliament. And if you’re truly reckless, fall in love.

MINIMAL SETUPOS: Ubuntu 20.04+. ArchLinux
Processor: Intel Pentium 2GHZ or AMD equivalentMemory: 4 GB RAM
Memory: 4 GB RAM
Graphics: OpenGL 3.2+. Vulkan capable
Storage: <8 GB available space

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