I’m an absolute sucker for melancholy RPGs. Magical realism is one of my favorite genres, and any game that immerses you in a lore-rich world, teaching you about its history as you go, is an automatic winner in my book. That’s why I love pretty much everything Weather Factory puts out; the creators of the Fallen London universe and Cultist Simulator build detailed, gorgeous universes with hidden details to find around every corner.
Now that I’ve played a snippet of their upcoming deck-builder-meets-narrative-RPG game, Book of Hours, I can say that it looks set to continue the developer’s proud world-building tradition.
Book of Hours is a melancholy RPG that takes place in 1930s Wales. It’s a universe that runs parallel to our own, fraught with old gods and older magic all wrapped up in a forgotten library that it’s your duty to restore. The game rewards trial and error; each choice you make helps develop the melancholy world further as you restore books and documents, unlock new rooms of a magnificent estate, and develop your relationships with skittish townspeople.
The mysteries started immediately: I was washed ashore, playing as a main character trying desperately to remember who they are and what they are doing waterlogged on a beach. I was presented with several different cards to choose between, each one representing a different aspect of my personality, allowing me to decide how my character moved through life. I could have opted for my heart or my mind, but I’m a sucker for charisma builds in any game. I selected the card representing my voice, which allows you to call for help until someone comes to the rescue.
I chose to focus on my character’s passions as her primary motivation, and before long, I made it to an old friend’s house, a morose midwife who was once royalty adjacent and now is the go-to fixer for this small town. She helped me dry myself — and my journal — out, welcoming me in as an old friend immediately.
I soon learned the purpose of my ill-fated boat ride: I was invited to be the new librarian of Hush House, a once-gorgeous estate burned out seven years prior and in desperate need of some TLC. The letter in my journal informed me that, excited as my new benefactors were to offer me the position, I’d have to handle the funding and reconstruction of the house myself. The locals may be able to help me with that monumental task, but there’s just one issue with that: they’re incredibly distrustful of outsiders.
This discovery launched me even further into the world; I found myself spending time with my old friend in a bid to gain her assistance. She gladly introduced me to the local blacksmith, who I paid to walk with me to the local pub. He sat with me for a while until the town’s denizens grew more comfortable with my presence. An uneasy truce was formed, and I began to press them for information about the history of the house. Before long, the townsfolk were helping me repair the bridge to Hush House, and even assisted in jimmying the backdoor to regain access to the monumental estate.
There the demo ended, but the spooky, haunting atmosphere had me begging for more. I want to know more about the war that left the townspeople so skittish around foreigners. I want to experiment with the mechanics hinted at in the trailer, such as restoring old manuscripts and unlocking their secrets. I want to meet the innocent reverend and his austere caretaker, only hinted at through the description of their home in town.
The mechanics involve cards that represent different aspects of your life: Not just your source of power, or your life’s focus, but also fleeting memories categorized by the feeling they evoke, your relationships with characters and their willingness to help you, and even new skills and desires you can utilize to further unlock new areas and conversations.
Each interaction with a new area, object, or person provides you with a new card for your collection, though many of them burn away at the start of the day-night cycle. I combined my soaked journal with the memories of a terrible storm to figure out what had happened to me. I was able to earn the midwife’s favor, then use it as an introduction to the local blacksmith; then, I purchased a day’s labor from my new acquaintance to repair the first room of the estate. Each choice leads naturally to the next, though it took me a few tries to get there sometimes.
More than anything, the true beauty of the game is the pure atmospheric bliss. The flat, patchwork backgrounds look like they were stitched together on the pages of a storybook; the sullen, almost droning music fully immerses you in your environment; the flavor text on the cards and the goals themselves leave you with more questions than answers in the most fulfilling way possible. The cove in which I awoke invoked the power of storms to leave lasting impressions on the landscape of the island, and I couldn’t help but wonder what had washed up there before I did. My journal, even after it’s been fully studied, hints at the other bits of knowledge that exist out there, and my character’s desperation to fill in the gaps.
I can already see myself getting lost in Book of Hours for, well, hours. It was everything I look for in a cozy game; I felt unhurried and no stress at all. I knew that I’d be able to unlock everything eventually, no matter how many attempts it took me to visit a new area or figure out how to dry out my journal. With so much more to learn and do, I’m counting down the days until Book of Hours’ release this June.
