The world of Fallen London is one of the rare jewels of modern fantasy. It’s weird, whacky, and filled to the brim with absurdities, and yet it displays horror and dread when needed. It’s a strange place where occult truths and academic sciences mix without effort or trouble because ghosts and gods are real. And often quite malicious. The undead are miserable and need a break. All that wrapped in sudo-victorian aesthetics and mannerisms and smeared with steampunk as the main propellant of technology. Even if you can burn fossilized souls instead of mundane coal. While the world of Fallen London began its forays into entertainment as a popular browser-based game, some time ago it reached into more advanced gaming with SUNLESS SEAS in 2016. And then in 2019 followed with the game I’d like to present to you, dearest reader - the SUNLESS SKIES.
You’re a fortune bastard, or a cursed one, as you survive a rather catastrophic event under the tutelage of your old captain. The rickety locomotive, which, of course, is the main type of vessel crossing the strange skies of this grim, unusual realm. But now free of your bond and with an engine of your own the world is your unidentifiable mollusk to crack open! Become a daring adventurer. Or intrepid explorer. Or a shady cultist. Or a crime lord. Indeed, the options are the first major draw of the game - the narratives you can weave seem endless. Your beginnings and your very background can be as flexible as peculiar. An abandoned street urchin taken by the mysterious circus? A successful businessman who fell on grim times with a debt to pay? Connections with the many sects of some Sky Gods reaching with their tendrils into your future? All is possible, one way or the other. And your ambitions - be it fame, fortune, or solving a grand mystery - also can be achieved, or fumbled, in a great many ways.
SUNLESS SKIES might be a strange experience, at first glance, since it seems so… Mundane. Boring, even. All you do is fly with an unhurried pace from one port to another, often carrying some goods to earn a few pennies. Or a passenger who might share a little bit of a story if they seem amenable enough to talk. All that when trying to survive in the most basic way possible - your engine needs fuel and you and your crew need rations to stay afloat and going. The repetition might even be considered part of the horror itself, the gentle, grey dread of the mundane. Sure, from time to time the tension might rise, a pirate locomotive or some strange sky monster might force you out of a steady line of navigation in rapid desire to avoid an encounter. But otherwise, it’s sailing through the eerie skies with nary a thing to do, but ponder.
That might put some players off. The game can be a slow burner, but once it starts picking up it can sink its hooks under your skin and drag you into one of its countless stories. This is the risk and reward of a game constructed in such a way. You never know what can happen and when. Attempting spoilers might be a fool’s errand since there are so many big and small narratives the game can lay before you. Based on your decisions they can have very different outcomes, too. Instead let me share with you a singular experience I had that made me love this game and yearn to play more of it, for hours and hours on end.
During one unlucky encounter with a strong locomotive of a faction that I seemed to anger somehow with my very presence, I lost a crewman. My poor helmsman, if I recall, got blasted away from the vessel into the cold and unforgiving embrace of the void. A loss, to be sure, but such was the harsh reality of the job. Your end could come at any time, so I pushed that loss away. But then, sometime later, when I all forgot about the battle, during a more lulled drift between the cold tunnels of some icy realm, I heard a knock upon the doors from the outside. When I opened, it was none else but my lost crewmate. He complained of extreme cold and tiredness, drifted, blue of skin and pale of eyes, towards the engine room to warm himself by the boiler. Strange sense of dread filled the locomotive, as he radiated cold and sadness. I tried to convince him to realize that he was a bit on the dead side, but he wouldn’t listen. He got a bit miffed about my persistence and left into the frigid void leaving behind a cold presence and residue that I collected. For science. And I managed to get only a little insane because of this, which was a bonus.
This is SUNLESS SKIES in a nutshell. You never know when a sudden story, hiding under the surface, will unleash its gripping tentacles to take you in under the waters. Discover that the thin thread leads to a grander adventure, a great mystery. During your journeys, you will either witness or even be responsible for some peculiar events. Stare eye to eye with an ancient god. Wake the monsters of old. Witness a city crumble to an invasion of giant insects. Deal with the Devil to find power and fame. Join one of the countless clubs, societies, and secret organizations to further their agendas… or work against them. The game is packed to the brim with stories, but you need to put in a bit of legwork to unfold them. And a bit of curiosity on your end helps to dig them out and let them take you for a ride.
SUNLESS SKIES is also more accessible than its predecessor, as dying and losing to one of the many colorful tragedies that can befall you isn’t so severely punished. It can even be a blessing, a fortunate sweep of the sins of your past. Sure, you lose a piece of your battered craft, and that can be a big bummer, especially if it was one you worked your entire last life to get. But all the nasty things you accrued are gone too. The madness. The obligations. The debts. Now your inheritor can start anew with a bunch of experience and a better vessel to kick it off. You, the player, are free to either chase your previous captain's ambitions or follow a new line entirely, with new plans and goals in mind. Death is rarely an end so harsh you can’t climb out of it. And who knows - depending on the way you died, you might even encounter your old self in some way, as a ghost or undead filled with regrets. Stranger things happen in Fallen London.
And so, SUNLESS SKIES is a wholly unique experience. A gothic horror roleplay adventure with firm elements of survival, where the mundane, repetitive tasks might lack the joy and engagement to make for a thrilling experience. And yet they do because between each tedious run from port to port, you can always encounter something strange. Something peculiar. Find a clue or a lead to chase after. A crewmate of yours might had that nightmare that let them open up! A pet of yours turns out to be a vessel of the elder god! Sky pirates want to chase you for your cargo! It’s always something, and you’re never ready for it. It’s unforgiving. A bit tedious. A bit heavy in the text department.
But if you’re looking for a strange adventure, weird tales set in an unusual world with some little gameplay features to keep you from drifting away into the sparkling void of the cold heavens, this should be the title for you.
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