Feeding the Maw: Managing a Live Narrative Game in Fallen London

I am Olivia would I work at fair better games as a writer and narrative designer editor and content manager and support and and to do everything I was recently acknowledged by a BAFTA scheme for my editing and writing work in video games and this is fair better games we're a london-based indie studio and our nearly 10 years old that's older the games in three right we are known for full in London Sun the sea and Sun the skies which we launched in January this year sunless sea and Sons guys are downloadable premium games we self-published them using a combination of Kickstarter and early access but I am going to focus on fall in London why fall in London is fairly unusual it's a ten year old free-to-play browser game that is still profitable it's also entirely built with narrative there is

no story gameplay devoid I'm here to explain how we adapted our free-to-play browser game to enable an increased reliable income stream for the company in the long term to explain how a monetized full London and the challenges we face in running it I'll need to explain its design in fall in London London has been dragged underground into a world where death isn't permanent cats can talk and ominous space bats or de facto rulers of the city it's a world of light horror and dark humor our players adopt characters who have come down from the surfaced London Underground there they live out their lives as a member of Victorian society engaging in romances crimes dangerous escapades and occasionally taking tea with devils fallen London is a universe in the capital you Marvel sense it is both the cornerstone of our business and

launchpad standalone sequels so how is it designed the game is very firmly interactive fiction all game players in the form of narrative choices equal weight is given to the choice to punch a thug or to the choice to gossip with your aunt probably ever plated fresh scones however fallen London is not branching narrative there is not one mostly linear plot that splits at key points to possibly rejoin later on instead the underlying world model is one of thousands of variables that we call qualities if I slip and mix up the two I'm talking about the same thing we can look these up from anywhere else in the game content is unlocked by combinations of variables each piece of content contains a choice and each choice in the game can change a variable the use of variables means that we can surprise players with callbacks decisions they have made an earlier

content in an entirely separate section of the game and the variables themselves are narrative tools this image is a crop from my own character these are all variables I'm dangerous and persuasive I'm a diplomat and a spy I'm also an agent of the devil's so how is the game played players explore the City of Fallen tanden there is content in every area of the map it all feeds into a sense of exploration so that players are not just exploring stories within a space they're exploring the space itself while players traverse the space of the game the game is mainly about their exploration of narrative content can be in the form of brief vignettes or storylines which are the closest analog to quests of varying length some content is served to the player in a randomized way via their card deck some is always

available until the player becomes ineligible for it here clicking on the card deck reveals four options for the player to dig into once I've chosen a card I'm presented with a snippet of narrative and a choice here's an example the player witnesses a scuffle in response do they assist the lady the revolutionary or do they assist the urchin who's doing a much worse pickpocketing than he thinks of course I'd assist the urchin because I'm not a monster the choice changes variables the player has become more persuasive they have another favor from the urchins they've been given a variable that triggers a clandestine rendezvous elsewhere in the game so variables underpin everything in the game and we track everything from the fairly traditional quality of wounds to inciting a cynic simian revenge so what you have with fallen London is a complex system interlocking stories and vignettes that track player behavior to

enable callbacks to almost any choice in the game so what is for London's place in fare betters business and why is it so important it is our only free-to-play game we primarily produce downloadable pre premium games sunless sea and sunless guys we spend years working on these games and until we launch we do not know how they will do at the same time our company does not want to have to crunch and we want to exist in the long term fall in London d risks our premium games it ensures that we have a reliable income stream that insulates us from the boom-and-bust nature of premium games so how did we set up fall in London in such a way that it would support the company well originally it had a more traditional free-to-play set up we have an in-game currency called fate once the player had bought fate for real world money it could be used for a variety of one-off purchases throughout

the game it could also purchase certain improvements to the gameplay experience for a month but it didn't auto renew in a way it was like a proto subscription we called it exceptional friendship how can the player spend fate what are those one-off purchases the stories within fallen London are explore explored various series of choices each choice takes an action the game only allows a limited number of actions per day players can use fate to refresh their actions they can also use it to refresh the opportunity deck to play more of the randomized deck con and they can use fate to open fate lock choices sometimes these reactors result in items that are hard or impossible to get with free content sometimes they reveal unexplored law the player can also open fate lock storylines some storylines are simply not free here the golden-colored choice is fate locked it's part of a storyline about tracking

a serial killer Jack of Smiles if you take that choice for a while you the player will become that serial killer these fates monetization options are all still in the game the protis subscription though one-off monthly package is not before explaining what we turned it into I'll briefly clarify what it was the player could buy this monthly package for twenty fate which came to about four dollars this meant that the player would be no longer be exposed to adverts they would also get a second action candle and a higher total action pool meaning they'd be able to play more each day but we were missing a trick we decided to change the exceptional friendship into a rolling monthly subscription paid for with real world world currency in 2015 for a game that we played on mobile this was unusual we also raised the price it's now $7 a month what did we do to sell this to the players to make it seem that this was worthwhile we added a limited time

subscriber exclusive story each month we judged that we could increase the price because of the perceived high value of our stories these subscriber stories can be bought individually later for fate but for an equivalent cost higher than if the player had bought a subscription thus the subscriber stories continue to generate revenue beyond the initial subscription this is the art for an exceptional story from last year and little pandemonium which was very popular and quite horrific anyway it turns out our decisions implement monthly subscriptions was definitely the right one now a large minority of our monthly active users as subscribers and when combined with the fate paid aspects of the game fell better has a reliable income that both supports the development of full London and enables long term planning of other ventures it takes the risk out of our premium products by massively reducing our monthly burn and gives us a fan base we can point towards

our other work having a monthly subscriber story has benefits beyond the income the letters they let us experiment as they provide a consistent feedback loop with our audience they let us learn what players like so that we can create more of that kind of content for both the subscribers and the free game the subscription stories give us a regular opportunity to highlight different parts of the setting they enable us to add law to fill in gaps or to create new areas to later use for free contents they're very efficient and they drive engagement with free content players particularly like their choices having an impact on the free content of fallen London a subscriber story need only unlock one repeatable vignette in the free part of the game but that's enough it reminds the players of adventures their characters have been through and it respects the choices they've made in their stories by having free content reflect choices made and paid content players feel like the decisions they made matter and that they

last beyond subscriptions it feels fair so how do you manage such a game and keep it profitable there are three main areas to address the first is the sheer volume of writing in designing the base game needs free content to draw players in to make them feel that the game is worth investing in financially or emotionally but even though we have built up a huge amount of free content we have to keep adding more this ensures that full in London doesn't stagnate that it continues to feel like a thriving city to those who don't have a subscription that might get one and to those who have a subscription but need something to keep them engaged between each month's subscriber content we add very roughly 10,000 words of free content a year that does not include the content we write for our seasonals we also have law-based seasonal content to give the in-game world a sense of time passing well we use some of the content

we still add about 20,000 words of free seasonal content a year then we have the subscriber stories there another a hundred thousand words a year that's a lot of writing especially for a Content team of three people who at the same time in two years we're also making a premium game containing eight hundred thousand words that's a Content burden so how do we manage that under these kind of pressures it is easier to create stories within specific parameters than to go away and write a foreign london story so our subscription stories have themes three months dedicated to a particular aspect of foreign London life it makes breaking down the vast amount of law easier it also gives every three subscription stories in external arc so that while a player needn't play all three they're encouraged to do so we have built full in London as a deep living world instead of creating a set of stories we've created a setting for

stories the game or fall in London is the world in which all the stories are set this means that the world can be law rich and we can leave a lot of questions unanswered without making it feel that we're creating mysteries for mysteries sake or don't even know what's happening ourselves but when we come back to those areas and looking for inspiration to write it's already there in the layers of law we've already set up we don't treat story as linear plot our game is a place and players explore stories within that place this all means that repeatable content has a real world analog in the daily grind and that adds the life of the City of Fallen London it has to be well-written but because it serves a narrative world building and role-playing function it's possible to create content the players deliberately set out to complete many times rather than just view as filler and grind for example players can act as a temporary governor of Port cornelian many players actively seek to raise their successful

terms as governor as high as they can playing the content over and over to some it's a score to boast about but for others it is part of their characters career there are several periods in the year when we release free content often with monetize aspects these are our seasonal events that I mentioned before they are inspired by real-world holidays but given our own full and London spin for example in December we have an advent calendar and some content revolving around mr. sacks who is an eldritch approximation of Santa Claus mr. sacks visits every day of the twelve days of Christmas demanding different presents from the player he's both exceedingly popular and fun to write it's also vital to use a number of freelancers we have benefited from seeking out those with different venit backgrounds and experiences - the in-house team by doing so we can not only appeal to a range of audiences and players who might not

otherwise be interested in our work but we regularly Rhian spire the in-house content team freelance stories refresh and enrich our law and world in a way that has benefits far beyond the writers individual story if the fare better team had to write for ten years on the same game without the creative refreshment diverse freelancers bring it would be extremely difficult to maintain the excitement mystery and joy we try to pass on to our players the next challenge is that of converting players to the subscription you need an enticing free game to whet player's appetites for the stories only available via subscription the free game gives players stories that suggest mysteries that get them invested in particular characters such as the captivating princess here who is Queen Victoria's most unsettling daughter or there are groups you could get involved with such as the revolutionaries who seek to turn out stars and plunge the world into eternal night as you do

subscription stories offer deep deeper insight into law or more time with popular characters of groups they also offer a space for a bendable storyline they are never driven by randomized cars cards and so can be explored and completed in one long play session and because all our stories involve choices there are many routes through the narratives often with significantly different consequences players gather to talk about the options discover what they had to leave on scene and in doing so spread the excitement and nonsubscribers who can be lured in our narratives tempt players to buy stories but it is the trust we've built with them that makes many willing to commit to subscriptions rather than one-off story purchases we earned the players trust in several ways narrative ly we like to leave law-based mysteries and puzzles in the game but we reveal enough that the players know that there are answers and that we aren't just hand waving something complex away

and we do write stories eventually confirm or disprove their hypotheses they know that when it comes to our writing we'll play fair subscribers are aware of the type of narrative and write the shape of the story they will experience so even if a subscriber first one month subscribe a story to another they do not receive an unpleasant surprise that could drive them to go through the unsubscription process we also have a fairly unusual audience one that rejects the gap show gambling mechanics you sometimes see in free-to-play and so we just don't use them the vast majority of fall in London is free it's possible to have a good narrative experience without ever buying fate we never fete lot mechanically optimal choices or force a player to pay fate to avoid permanent failure our audience seems to appreciate this general approach and as a result are generous in supportive where possible we make the players choices meaningful ones this means that as well

as them having emotional significance at the point of making they can resonate beyond the story itself decisions have permanence the time and energy the player invest in making those choices does not dissipate the moment they move on we respect their investment and try to recognize it if the players trust your intentions in design and appreciate the writing you're selling they will buy a narrative subscription the final challenge gaining and maintaining fans however good your writing is you have to look after the technical side of the game for London has been around for ten years and websites have not always been pretty we recently revamped the site and added a significant number of quality of life improvements we also optimized it for mobile so the players have more opportunities to play and a more streamlined experience this is on top of day-to-day maintenance and performance

upgrades it's important to tell the players that we're still there listening to them 10 years later and even when simultaneously working on other games in a role-playing game you want to leave as much space for role-playing as possible we start from the very moment of character creation when we offer the player character agenda choice or to opt out of it entirely but the opt-out fits the setting they aren't forced out of genres take it our design factors in roleplay if there is a repeatable piece of content for pacing it will make narrative and role-playing sense to repeat it we try not to assume why the player made the narrative choice that they did and we avoid suggesting the player characters emotions if one player wants to swoon at the chrystine of a crime and another gloat in the gory details of it that's absolutely fine we all now out and seen the crime and let them do the rest of the work so in our design and in our writing we

strive to leave space for the player imagination we do the same with our law we build deep layers of law into the game revealing only hints at a time of those mystery is fully resolved in game a large number can only be fully understood when players have seen all of several pieces of content because of the size of the game and the many alternate choices this encourages players to share things that they've learned and debate hypotheses not only does this drive gameplay and maintain engagement but the discussions can draw in less dedicated players or even those who haven't yet played you've been looking forward to this slide our content creation can be very responsive this gives us the opportunity to react in-game to fan discussions outside the game it how we acquired a vignette about buying excessive numbers of weasels is accidentally purchasing 500 weasels an appropriate reason to contact fail better support Chris Gardner our

narrative director just happened to be browsing reddit at the time of this posted in a bout of whimsy he created a small amount of new content in response the rest of the thread was delighted and it's a good example of what we do to keep our fans engaged it made the players feel hot heard it fostered community it demonstrates how the content team can be responsive and it makes the content team gleeful because this is just really enjoyable content to write we put a great deal of effort into communicating clearly and directly with our fans any fan who reaches out to us with something constructive gets a personal response and feedback is always passed on to the relevant teams the devs themselves post in the forums we lay out business reasoning for decisions as clearly as we can we trust our players to be understanding and they seem to appreciate that trust and respond to it in a really positive way we take a similar approach when handling support

support is not hived off to a separate part of the business tickets are passed directly to the dev best place to fix the cause of the problem there is a direct contact between the player with an issue and the person best able to fix it not only does this result in a high satisfaction but it gives the players a chance to see a little the people behind the game to see that we're mostly human however horrific and it provides an opportunity for a developer whimsy this is an interaction between a player trying to acquire a lost Kickstarter steam key and less our senior QA specialist who's in the audience over there it might have taken her a little longer to respond in kind but it was a really nice recognition of the players original effort and sometimes doing this kind of thing can defuse negative player experiences so if they're quite angry and you respond in a way that shows you're a person it often makes things better and get a lot of praise when people originally have been quite rude so it all works our fans are absolutely engaged

and these are just a few examples of responses to a fan competition we ran I'm always impressed by what they do out of love for our work and I would totally wear that dress it's decorated with the correspondence which is the in-law language of the stars and it tends to have outcomes like greater effect on the reader so that's a dress with built in self defense so what should you take away from this by adding a narrative based monthly subscription to fall in London we made a reliable income stream that supports all the work of fare better games the benefits of having a game like fall in London extend further than just its own success it supports the company so that any premium products we make a dearest we do not have to rely them on beyond them being a wild success it serves as a narrative test vet we can use subscription feedback to suffer what kinds of stories players wish to explore inform London and our other games it provides us with the universe in which to base our other games it inspires our

premium products and it has led to our Kickstarter success fallen London fans contributed to our Kickstarter and the publicity surrounding it this meant that in 2017 the Sun the sky's Kickstarter had over 10,000 backers was fully funded on Kickstarter in four hours and reached three hundred and seventy seven percent funding it was the third most funded video game Kickstarter that year there definitely is real value in subscription offerings and free-to-play games to make it work you need to figure out what works for you but if you're working with narratives build an iterative loop for the content in our case the subscription stories and after the fact engagement with the audience enables us to gauge the story's success and informs the content roadmap you need good free content to establish a reputation and support the subscription package free players still have a great deal of value especially if you also produce other games but your best stuff

should be for money there needs to be a reason to subscribe after all and finally respect your audience if you design and write appreciating the investment players making your products they'll be able to tell player trust is vital to long-term success so beforehand I just wanted to let you know that fell better is currently hiring we're looking for a senior gameplay programmer which can be fully remote which is fairly rare so go for it and we also need a producer that produced Sony to come to the London office at least two days a week so you'll probably have to be in the UK but if you're interested please go to our website thank you [Applause]