Unusually for our games, in Mandrake a number of things are already determined about your character. You're always a Mandrake, the last descendant of the aristocratic family that once ruled the region. You're always a gardener-sorcerer, resuming arts long-forgotten and long-forbidden. And you're always a newcomer to Penhallion and the village of Chandley, having been born and raised in a far-off land.

But that still leaves plenty of room to decide things about your character: name, appearance, history. We don't want character creation in Mandrake to be complex or time-consuming – after all, you'll have plenty of opportunities to define your character with your choices throughout the game. But we do want to give you the chance to make some basic decisions about their past, to provide an initial glimpse of the world beyond Chandley, and to provide more variety for future playthroughs.

(I’ve used some screenshots to illustrate the choices. Please bear in mind all these are in-progress; they contain placeholder icons, and are subject to change!)

Presentation

The first thing you'll see when you create a new character is this set of options:

Here, you'll make a number of simple choices about your character's presentation: body type, skin and hair colour, facial hair, gender, and the colour of your starter clothes. None of these choices are dependent on others -- all of them can be mixed and matched.

In some of our previous games we've asked you to choose how NPCs address your character, but you don't get to choose a title this time around – that's already fixed: you're a Mandrake, and most NPCs will either call you that or by your first name (which defaults to 'Morgan', but you can change to whatever you prefer). The 'Gender' field allows you to choose male, female, or non-binary. If all goes well, we hope to translate Mandrake into other languages, not all of which share English's approach to pronouns, so a choice of gender which can then inform localisation techniques made the most sense this time around.

After you've made your Mandrake, we move on to a short set of narrative choices which determine some things about their past, and set your initial Traits.

Traits

Traits are facets of your character's personality: the way they see the world and the things they are attuned to. There are five of them, including Neighbour, Magnate, and Romantic. Neighbour represents your sense of community, of the benefits and compromises of being part of Chandley. Magnate, on the other hand, represents your affinity with your Mandrake heritage: your sense of familial pride or responsibility. While your Romantic trait describes your ability to see what might have been, your sense of optimism and tragedy, your poetic streak.

Occasionally, having a Trait at a certain level or above will unlock a new conversation option. But most of the time, what they do is provide Insights: interjections as you're talking to an NPC that provide context and interpretations of their opinions and behaviour. A high Romantic Trait might help you understand a character's regrets. A high Neighbour helps you know what's expected of you at a village festival. (Traits aren't the only things that can provide Insights, either, but that's a topic for another time…)

A specific Trait level will never be required to complete a story, but they might help you find another path through it, or provide additional perspective, or allow you to bond more quickly with certain characters. You'll be able to increase your Traits in play, but your narrative choices in character creation provide you with an initial spread of them when you start the game. And the first choice you'll make is…

Your Homeland

After the Mandrakes fell, their heirs scattered far and wide, their ancestry forgotten. Generations later, you were born and raised in a distant land. But which one?

Perhaps you come from the sea-swept Leeward Isles, to the east? Perhaps you were born in the marshy Heartlands of the old Sophoi Republic – that same Republic whose ambitions grew so great that the laws of the world were changed to overthrow it – and grew up amongst its ruined bones. Or perhaps you hail from the High Eld: a distant northern land in thrall to the winter-gods...

NPCs might occasionally react to your homeland, or it might give you experience to draw on. A newcomer from the Leeward Isles is likely familiar with boating and its terminology. An arrival from the High Eld might have opinions about the mild winters in Penhallion.

Conclusion

After you've chosen your homeland, you'll also choose the profession you were raised in, and the motive that led you to abandon your old life and take up this new one, each decision giving you another bonus to one of your Traits.

We want your Mandrake character to feel like a part of the world (even if they're new to this little corner of it), and to enter play with perspectives that help them make sense of their new home and new situation. The bulk of customisation will come about in play: through the stories you pursue, the choices you make, and the relationships you form – but in character creation you'll take the first step into a world we hope you'll be spending a lot of time in.

We'll be a featured game in the live stream, talking to some characters in Chandley and giving you a first look at character creation. It'll be 25 minutes of Mandrake that you won't have seen before!

We hope you'll come by; more details and links will be forthcoming closer to the point of broadcast. Stick around for many of the other games which may interest you! (For example we're very excited for the Esoteric Ebb retrospective.)

A missing person, an absconded tomb-colonist, a high-speed beach cruise and a daring attempt to escape the confines of the everyday. How far would you go to flee a suffocating life? What would you leave behind? And what is the price of a complete transformation? Begin a voyage of discovery in the pleasure beaches of the tomb-colonies. Once begun, there may be no turning back.

• Writing: Giada Zavarise
• Editing: James Chew
• QA: Michael Bunning
• Art: Paul Arendt

EXCEPTIONAL FRIENDSHIP

Exceptional Friendship is the ideal way to support our work on Fallen London. In exchange for your coin, you receive:

- A new Exceptional Story every month

- Memories of a Tale from each story to spend on exclusive companions and items

- A second candle (up to 40 actions at once)

- An expanded opportunity deck: ten cards instead of six

- Four additional outfit slots

- The ability to run an additional concurrent plot, once Agents are unlocked

- Access to the House of Chimes including monthly gameplay perks

Enhanced Exceptional Friends receive all of the above, plus:

- A past story, or two resets of stories they've played from a monthly menu

- Memories of a Tale from every past story or reset

- Extra monthly perks in the House of Chimes

- Another two outfit slots

- Three seven-action refreshes per month

- The ability to run a further concurrent plot, once Agents are unlocked

London is prepared for any conceivable disaster. And nothing happens. 

It's going to be a quiet summer in Fallen London; the first in a long time. At this time of year, some disruptive event typically hits the Neath, requiring citizens to band together and restore (relative) peace and quiet. However, this year we need a break from this most intensive of events to devote some extra time and attention to Mandrake. 

But! Even a quiet summer can distract and delight. This year, we're putting on a bonanza of previous Estivals in the Waswood, starting today, the 27th of July, and running until Monday the 17th of August.

All previous Estivals are available to replay without the usual timing restrictions, and we're granting all characters – regardless of how far they have progressed through the game – access to the Waswood for the duration. 

Reliving past Estivals will help unlock various goodies and rewards for all players. You’ll also gain Estival Tokens as usual, and be able to spend them on items of equipment from previous years. There are even a handful of new items to collect! 

The debut of 'Hell is Missing!' 

As part of the festivities, we’ve just made Hell is Missing available in the Waswood for the first time. Last year’s law-bending, clue-hunting festival has a somewhat different shape in memory, but if you missed it at the time, this is the closest you’ll get.

After the 17th of August, the Waswood schedule will go back to normal, slightly adjusted to add Hell is Missing to the rotation.

I've been trying to start up a new enterprise for a while now. A research body." The Focused Resurrectionist lets out a short, barking laugh. "And not the kind I procure for the doctors and dentists, if you catch my drift."

Today we're releasing new Agents for Fallen London, focused on the Shapeling Arts and the Neath's monstrous anatomies! Save a 'colleague' of F.F. Gebrandt from the law's overzealous attention, and establish a new bastion of scientific innovation. There is much yet to be learned about the bodies of the Neath…

This is a basic set of Plots to introduce the characters and concepts; like with previous concerns, we expect to expand and complicate the opportunities available to these Agents in future releases.

Agents are capable retainers who will gladly take care of business on your behalf. Engage agents of different types, with their own skills; equip them with your second best gear and send them on various Plots.

Once you’ve unlocked Agents, you can run a single Plot at a time, and unlock the ability to run a second through gameplay. Exceptional Friends can run a further Plot – and Enhanced Exceptional Friends another still! – provided they have enough Agents to assign.

Players who have attained ‘A Person of Some Importance’ at tier-two status, and who have University laboratories with at least 25 Prestige, can begin this endeavour from 'A Scientist at the Door' in your Lodgings.

We haven't shown at Gamescom with any of our games before, so we'd like to thank IAB for this fantastic opportunity!

Here are a few of the other titles which we're excited to see:

Bad Magpie is very compelling, as a kind of cross between Untitled Goose Game and Thank Goodness You're Here. Cause mayhem as a one-winged magpie with a fixation on a fallen star!

Watch on failbettergames.com

The Midnight Barber is an unusual rhythm game where you're cutting your somewhat supernatural clientele's hair to the beat of a moody soundtrack. Love a rhythm game!

Watch on failbettergames.com

Rinthine will be going into Early Access when it first releases, just as we're planning to do with Mandrake, and they seem to be doing everything with a great deal of thought and care. The art style is really appealing, and when I saw that doric column start jumping and bending in the middle, I had to hit the wishlist button.

Watch on failbettergames.com

The University has been a bit of an outlier for a long time – very few other parts of the game remove access to certain activities once you've progressed past their moment in the spotlight. But once you'd solved the mystery at the heart of the University storyline, that was it – its associated activities were also gone. Coupled with the University activities possessing some genuinely useful benefits, this all resulted in a structure that, for some players, incentivised not playing or finishing the relevant storylines so that they could retain access to desirable resources.

Our changes today aim to bring the University more in line with our current design sensibilities, and make it feel a little less like a container for a late-game player's laboratory. We have:

• Accelerated progress through the 'Term Passing…' activities, so that completing a term no longer takes so many actions;
• Removed the Sudden Insight effects from the 'Talk to the Porters' branch in 'Investigations in the University';
• Released a new version of the 'Term Passing…' activity that is available once you've finished the University storyline (and restored your academic reputation).

The new 'Term Passing…' activity combines the highlights of the existing activities (wine-tasting at Summerset! 'Fun' with the Stoats! An eternal and ill-understood game of something called 'cricket'!) with a chunk of new writing, exclusive to this later stage in the game. Dispute noise complaints against your laboratory, test your students in the Correspondence, and impress other departments with the notes from your scientific voyages. And, yes, perhaps even chat to the Porters. They may have an insight or two to share. 

If your 'Featuring in the Tales of the University…' is 30 or more, you can go back to University today and see what's transpired in your absence. If you find yourself banned from the University, you'll need to pursue a Voyage of Scientific Discovery at zee, and earn your way back into academia's good graces.

She is no painting you've ever seen. Whorls, smears, and stains halo her as a blood-clouded angel. Endless red hair surrounds her, a phantasm of hate. In one hand, she crushes a snake to death. It goes to its squeezing willingly.

A red obsession. A fevered dream. A spate of artists, missing. The Goblin Poet's brother – one Rugged Paintslinger – is the latest of these bohemians to disappear, each concerned with the same scarlet subject. Follow the art. Enter their dreams. Explore a chequered court, and confront the source of this bloodied inspiration.

• Writing: Baudelaire Welch
• Editing: James Chew
• QA: Michael Bunning
• Art: Paul Arendt

EXCEPTIONAL FRIENDSHIP

Exceptional Friendship is the ideal way to support our work on Fallen London. In exchange for your coin, you receive:

• A new Exceptional Story every month
• Memories of a Tale from each story to spend on exclusive companions and items
• A second candle (up to 40 actions at once)
• An expanded opportunity deck: ten cards instead of six
• Four additional outfit slots
• The ability to run an additional concurrent plot, once Agents are unlocked
• Access to the House of Chimes including monthly gameplay perks

Enhanced Exceptional Friends receive all of the above, plus:

• A past story, or two resets of stories they've played from a monthly menu
• Memories of a Tale from every past story or reset
• Extra monthly perks in the House of Chimes
• Another two outfit slots
• Three seven-action refreshes per month
• The ability to run a further concurrent plot, once Agents are unlocked

It takes a lot of legwork to turn information into power. Happily, you have a little power already – which means you have people to do that pesky legwork for you.

As an enterprising business owner, extortioner and nautical power you can now pursue additional plots at zee, in the Great Game, and in the depths of your honey-den. Yet more new opportunities for your Agents are here!

You can now:

• Command a Nautical Agent to hunt down monsters that suit the Bone Market's desires, or continue the endless work of the postmen of Nuncio!
• Assign an Intelligencier to recover ciphers, and break them in your Cabinet Noir!
• Share the secrets of Helicon House with a Silvered Agent, or deputise them in the name of your current Campaign in Parabola!

In addition, Enhanced Exceptional Friends with access to the Agents feature can now run a further concurrent Plot.

What are Agents?

Agents are capable retainers who will gladly take care of business on your behalf. Engage agents of different types, with their own skills; equip them with your second best gear and send them on various Plots.

Once you’ve unlocked Agents, you can run a single Plot at a time, and unlock the ability to run a second through gameplay. Exceptional Friends can run a further Plot, provided they have enough Agents to assign.

Players who have attained ‘A Person of Some Importance’ at tier-two status can begin to gather Agents to their cause. Start to build your intelligence network in ‘Playing the Game in Wilmot's End’, located (you guessed it) in Wilmot's End, or pursue opportunities at zee in ‘A Zailor Down on his Luck’ in The Blind Helmsman. Players with their own Parabolan Base-Camp can also find allies in Parabola via 'A Golden Opportunity' in the Singing Mandrake.

Fallen London: The Roleplaying Game

Alongside everything that follows, we’re continuing to work with Magpie Games on finalising and delivering Fallen London: The Roleplaying Game. Backers already have their first preview of the core book, with another coming in July! If you want to back the campaign then there’s still time, but the campaign will soon be retired while we complete the work on the books. Pre-orders will then become available later this year. (What’s the difference between backing and pre-ordering, you ask? Backers get the best deal on the various items, both individually and in bundles!)

Agents

Hot on the heels of this post, we're releasing some new Plots for our three existing Concerns. This release is aimed at fully developing the remaining ideas and possibilities in our Glasswork, Zeefaring and Spywork Concerns before we turn our attention to new stories. We'll release this expansion next week, on the 23rd June.

Shortly after, we'll be cooking up an all-new Concern with some all-new Agents. Gather your Monstrous Anatomy equipment; consolidate your skills in the Shapeling Arts. Devotees of the aspirationally inhuman rejoice, for enthusiasts in the arts biological will soon look to you for guidance! Expect this new Concern in late July.

Estival

London has had a poor track record with summers. This year, people are ready. They lay in extra supplies. Emergency blunderbusses are unsafed. Several revolutionaries are witnessed wearing Masters' robes, 'just in case hierarchy goes squiffy again'. 

London is prepared for any conceivable disaster. And nothing happens. 

It's going to be a quiet summer in Fallen London; the first in a long time. You may have heard us say that we're putting Estival on hold this year so that we can devote some extra time and attention to Mandrake. This is entirely true. It bears repeating: this isn't a fake-out or a trick. But! Even a quiet summer can distract and delight.

This year, we're putting on an Estival Waswood bonanza, from Monday the 27th of July until Monday the 17th of August.

All previous Estivals will be available to replay within the Waswood, without the usual timing restrictions, and we're granting all characters – regardless of how far they have progressed through the game – access for the duration. This will coincide with the debut appearance of 'Hell is Missing!' in the Waswood, leaving five years' worth of summer chaos available available to relive for three weeks. In addition to the usual effects, reliving past Estivals will help unlock various goodies and rewards for all players.

You will also gain Estival Tokens as usual, and be able to spend them on items of equipment from previous years. There may even be a handful of new items to collect! It will certainly be a change of pace from previous years – but one we hope you will enjoy. 

Firmament

The story of Firmament thunders towards its conclusion! We've been very pleased with the reception of the last few chapters, and we're excited to – at long last – finish our journey across the wild expanse of the Roof.

Chapter Nine of Firmament will be released in August, and bring the storyline to a close. If you've played through Chapter Eight, then the news that the story is reaching its climax will hopefully not surprise you; if you haven't yet, I shall not say any more, for fear of spoilers. The end of the journey is in sight; thunder rumbles in the east. It has all been building to this.

Chapter Nine will conclude the main threads of the story, after which we expect to release an epilogue in Autumn to wrap up any loose ends and introduce one final location. It has been a delight and a tremendous challenge to work on this storyline, and I hope you like what we've got left in store.

As ever, there will be no rest for the wicked. Soon after Firmament is done and dusted, we'll be ready to share what's coming next! We're still ironing out the details, but I think it is safe for me to say that the format will be very different.

Surprises and Delights

As always, there are a whole host of things we've got planned outside of major festivals and story releases. For now, I'll collect them under this subheading, and leave you guessing as to when they might arrive:

• Another Candlefinder Mystery: These stories are fun to produce, and we continue to be pleased with the feedback. Expect to solve another heinous and terrible crime alongside the Urchin Detective.
• A Little University Love: The University has been a little underserved of late, existing mostly to contain the laboratory. We're going to give it a little bit of a spruce-up in line with our current design sensibilities. It's never too late to go back to school!
• Daughters and Deliveries: The Duchess is a demanding patron, and her sisters are so very numerous. Deepen your knowledge of this ancient family in future expansions to the 'Deliveries' activity.
• Who Knows What Else: We have to keep a few secrets in reserve; it's nice to surprise you, every so often. There remains at least one hidden trinket released in the past few months that nobody has found yet!
  

Fruits of the Zee

The yearly Mutton Island festival will return once again, with its celebration of the zee and those who rule over it. We expect Fruits of the Zee to run for two weeks in mid-September.

Like past festivals, this event is free to all players. Go wreck-diving in the shoals around Mutton Island. Retrieve strange treasures from the bottom of the Unterzee. Meet the King-in-Coral who presides over the festivities. Try not to drown.

More details about the Fruits of the Zee festival will come this summer.

Hallowmas

In the weeks around Halloween, the Feast of Masks will return to Fallen London. Select a mask! Attend secretive balls around the city. Speak with the Fool’s Apostate, and trade your Menaces for seasonal rewards. Collect confessions from London’s sinners, trade them with your friends, and confer with the Attendants to transform and upgrade your companions.

…and more!

That takes us through to November, when we'll be gearing up for Christmas. Sitting here sweating in my office, the cold sounds excellent; check back in a few months to see if I've changed my tune and begin the next roadmap by complaining about the chill. The winter roadmap will have more details about the end of the year, and our plans for Fallen London going into 2027. Thank you, as always, for staying with us.