The latest Exceptional Story for Fallen London, "The Bloody Wallpaper" by Chandler Groover, is really good. This is Failbetter's 100th Exceptional Story1 and it feels like they pulled out some stops. The plot itself is super cool, with plenty of shout-outs for Lore Heads but also just some creepy imagery. What is sticking with me, though, is the mechanical cleverness.
Fallen London is made up almost entirely of Storylets, Qualities, and Opportunity Cards. Each Location has a set of Storylets with availability based on your Qualities, plus an Opportunity Deck from which you can draw random events. Most Locations, at least in the early game, use the same London Opportunity Deck with certain cards added or removed. Sometimes you get sent to an area where you do a simple repeated "carousel" with a small set of Opportunity Cards.
But "The Bloody Wallpaper" has a whole building you're navigating, all in one Location; switching floors adjusts a Quality that determines what Storylets are available, and most floors have just five qualifying Opportunity Cards, enough to fill your hand. The story also lets you navigate the space without spending your time-limited Actions. It feels like a little IF map-exploring puzzle thing that they managed to massage into a Fallen-London-shaped box. It's very cool, and the finale is a true delight that retroactively justifies the complexity of the exploration. Just real good shit.
-
Short monthly stories that come along with their premium membership.