Dulled Masterpiece Restorer (くすんだ名画の修復屋): how to play, tools and inspection

Dulled Masterpiece Restorer modes

• Commissions in six chapters: the main game. Pick a client's commission, restore one painting and hand it over. There are 33 commissions with a short scene around each chapter; each chapter brings new troubles, from a child's crayon, mould and a roof leak's tide line to old retouching gone dark, a torn canvas, a split panel and candle wax, and each restoration is rated from 1 to 5 stars at the inspection
• Japanese works: from chapter 2, hanging scrolls and folding screens on silk and paper arrive. They were never varnished, so you work without solvent, using water, glue and paper patches
• Large works: a triptych or folding screen that will not fit on the bench is restored a section at a time, in the same order of steps
• Atelier: paint freely on a new surface. You can also bring in a picture from a file, copy a model painting, or let your own picture age and then restore it
• Gallery: hang the pictures you painted or restored in frames on a wall. They stay on your own device
• Sharing: turn a picture into images or a video. If you save a picture to share, anyone with the link can try to restore it (this needs an account and your consent)
• Studio: spend coins on tool upgrades, learn techniques with experience, and collect hints in the Craftsman's Notebook
• Languages: play in Japanese, English, Chinese (Traditional) or Korean. The game starts in your browser's language, and you can switch on the title screen or from the menu

Basic rules of Dulled Masterpiece Restorer

• The paintings are damaged by dust, soot, yellowed varnish, lifting paint, losses and more. Some damage has to be dealt with before other damage, and doing it in the wrong order does more harm.
• The basic order for an oil painting is to brush off the dust, make a test patch in a corner, lay lifting paint down with the iron, then take off soot and tar with a swab of water and the yellowed varnish of the whole painting with a swab of solvent. After that you fill the losses with putty and level it, mix colours on the palette and paint only inside the losses, and finish with new varnish.
• Solvent that is too strong dissolves the paint as well as the yellowed varnish. Judge the strength from the test patch and from how dirty the swab is, and change to a new swab when it stops working.
• Retouching mends the loss. Right around its edge you may blend a little over the original, in the same colour, but never let paint spread out onto the original picture. You mix the colour from tube paints on the palette until it matches what is around the loss.
• While you work, no number shows how much has been restored. Under ultraviolet light, old varnish left behind glows, and "Step back" lets you check from a little distance whether your repairs show.
• When you hand a painting over, four things are inspected: cleaning, retouching, repairs and finish. You get 1 to 5 stars, a short comment and coins, and the points also rise or fall with whether the client's wishes were met.

How to play on Asobi Lounge

• On a computer, click a tool at the bottom of the screen or press a number key to pick it, then drag over the painting. On a phone or tablet, tap a tool and swipe with your finger. Spread two fingers (or use the wheel) to move closer to the painting. Once close, move two fingers to look elsewhere; on a computer, hold the right button (or the wheel) and drag, or use the arrow keys.
• The first commission comes with a guide that leads you through the steps one at a time. You can end it at any time with "Skip", and play it again from the menu.
• The palette opens when you pick the paint brush. Tap a tube or drag it onto the palette to squeeze out paint, mix with the knife, then choose "Load brush" to pick the colour up. The loupe lets you compare the colour on the brush with the area around the loss.
• For fine work, move close and use the steady-hand setting, which makes the brush tip waver less. When you use a fine brush on a phone, it paints a little above your finger, and a ring marks the tip.
• The menu lets you reread the commission, open the notebook, start again, make cracks less prominent or change the language. To stop halfway, choose "Save and quit": the work in progress stays in this browser, and "Continue" on the title or the commission list takes you back to it. "Quit without saving" means starting that commission again. If you close the page, the work up to a little before is kept too. The sound is switched with the button at the top of the screen.
• When you think the work is done, check it under ultraviolet light and with "Step back", then hand it over. The result screen lets you compare it with the painting as it came in.

What the tools do (oil paintings)

• Dust Brush: sweeps the surface dust off with a soft brush. If you wet the painting with dust still on it, the dust mixes with the soot and is harder to remove
• Water: a swab wet with water takes off soot and tar. A swab loses its grip as it takes up dirt, so change it once its tip is coloured
• Solvent: a swab of solvent dissolves yellowed varnish and wipes it away. There are weak, medium and strong settings; the stronger it is, the faster it works, but the more likely it is to dissolve paint too
• Iron: a warm iron laid on lifting paint presses it back down. Do this before you clean
• Putty: fill a loss, then use "Level" to make it flat. Putty left standing proud shows up at the inspection
• Paint and the palette: squeeze out the eight tube colours onto the palette, mix them with the knife, load the brush and paint the loss
• Varnish: at the end, apply new varnish thinly and evenly
• UV lamp and loupe: under ultraviolet light old varnish glows faintly, and putty and new paint look different. The loupe compares the colour on your brush with the colour around the loss
• Step back: look from a little distance to see whether your repairs stand out
• Gold Leaf and Clear: in later chapters, losses in a gold ground are mended with gold leaf, and varnish that has turned white and cloudy is cleared with solvent vapour

Japanese works (hanging scrolls and screens)

From chapter 2, hanging scrolls on silk and paper arrive. Japanese paintings have no varnish, and the glue that binds their colours dissolves in solvent, so the tools and the order differ from an oil painting's.

Powdering colour and lifting paint are fixed first, with a brush loaded with glue. Then you brush off the dust with a dry brush and stroke a water swab gently over the whole painting to soak up the dirt. If you go back and forth over the same spot too many times, a water stain appears.

• Glue: thin glue fixes colour that has turned to powder and paint that is lifting. Do it before you rub or wet anything
• Paper Fill: lay paper from behind over losses and insect holes, trim the edges that stick out, and tone the paper to the colours around it
• Flatten: mist creases, then press them flat under a weight. The longer you leave the weight on, the better they relax. If the lining is failing, replace it with new paper
• Solvent and varnish: not used on Japanese works. Solvent makes the colours bleed and fade
• Finish: aim for a surface that is flat, free of water stains and even

Large works, one section at a time

A work too big for the bench, such as a triptych or a folding screen, is restored in sections. Pick the section to move to from the map of sections in the corner of the screen, and work through them one at a time in the same order of steps.

• The inspection looks at each section, and the worst one pulls the points down
• If a section has hardly been touched, the result is capped at three stars

The inspection and the stars

When you hand a painting over, the client inspects it. Four things are looked at, each gets a mark and a short comment, and together they decide 1 to 5 stars. The stars bring coins and reputation.

While you work no number shows how much is done, so you check with your own eyes, under ultraviolet light and with "Step back". Clients in the later chapters look more closely, and the bar for each star is a little higher.

• Cleaning: whether the varnish, soot and dust came off evenly, and whether you took off too much
• Retouching: whether the losses are filled, whether the repairs blend in from a distance, and whether paint stayed off the original picture
• Repairs: whether lifting paint was laid down and whether the putty was levelled flat
• Finish: whether the new varnish went on evenly

A story in six chapters

The story begins on the morning you take the keys to the studio from the previous master, Mr. Kashiwagi. There is a short scene at the start and end of each chapter, and a commission arrives once you have finished the one before it and your reputation is high enough. Finish every commission in a chapter with 3 stars or more to earn that chapter's title and open the next. The commission list tells you what is still missing.

• Chapter 1, The Town Antique Shop: a dealer in the shopping street brings in dulled oil paintings. You clean them and mend small losses
• Chapter 2, The Old House’s Attic: hanging scrolls come out of the attic of an old house on the hill. You wash unvarnished silk and paper gently, with water alone
• Chapter 3, The Gallery Warehouse: landscapes that slept in a harbour gallery's warehouse, with large losses and paint an earlier owner laid over them
• Chapter 4, Church and Temple: a panel painting and a large oil painting from a church, and a folding screen from a mountain temple. Large works are restored a section at a time
• Chapter 5, The Museum Special Exhibition: masterpieces for a museum exhibition, where the curator's eye is as strict as it gets
• Chapter 6: the last chapter of the story, where everything you have learned is tested. What awaits you is left for you to find out

Clients and their wishes

There are 12 clients in all: an antique dealer, a baker, the head of an old family, a gallery owner, a priest, an abbot, a museum curator and more, and the same people return in later chapters with new paintings. Your apprentice Koharu helps in the studio.

Each commission has the client's wishes. Examples are "no sign of the repairs from a distance", "paint the repairs in fine lines that show up close", "as close to the original colours as possible", "no harm to silk or paper" and "every section to the same standard". Whether the wishes are met moves the points up or down. A commission with an agreed time pays a little more if you keep to it, and the points do not fall if you run over.

Tool upgrades, techniques and the Craftsman's Notebook

Spend the coins you earn on "Tool Upgrades" to improve nine tools up to four levels. An upgraded tool is used from the next commission. The fourth levels cost more, something to work toward after the story.

Finishing commissions earns experience, and you learn four techniques in turn: Steady Hand, Well-Loaded Brush, Planning Ahead and Assessment. They make the steady-hand setting work better, make paint last longer on the brush, stretch the agreed time, and show how much damage a painting has before you take the commission.

What you notice while you work is added to the Craftsman's Notebook as pages. The notebook is divided into six parts: basic steps, tips, tools, dirt and damage, kinds of work, and what the inspection looks at. The Tips pages give the order of work and how to avoid mistakes, and the other pages give hints, not answers.

• Swabs: take up more dirt, so you change them less often
• Tool heads: widen what a tool wipes or paints in one pass
• Brush set: the finest line gets thinner, for small patterns
• UV lamp: a brighter light makes leftover varnish easier to spot
• Loupe: widens the area you compare
• Iron: lays lifting paint and joins tears faster
• Putty knife: fills and levels putty faster
• Gilder’s brush: lays leaf faster and tones it in finer steps
• Glue and paper: fixes colour, joins splits and lays paper faster

Painting in the atelier

The atelier is separate from the commissions: you paint freely on a new surface. Choose from four surfaces (linen canvas, paper, silk and panel) and a portrait, landscape or square shape.

You mix the paint from eight tube colours on the palette. After a night of drying, new paint no longer mixes with what is underneath, and you can build thin, see-through layers with "glaze", paint thinned with oil.

• Round, Flat, Fan, Fine and Liner brushes: from broad areas to the finest lines, and soft blending, grass and hair
• Knife: lays paint on thickly and levels it. An empty knife scrapes off wet paint
• Sponge: press it on for a texture of fine grains
• Sketch: draw lines in charcoal. The lines stay under the paint you put on top
• Bring in a picture: place a photo or a picture drawn in another app on a surface, then paint over it or age it

Letting a picture age 100 years, the gallery and copying

"Let It Age 100 Years" leaves your picture in a room for a long time. You choose the years (30, 100, 200 or 300), the room (hearth soot, damp, sunlight, and dry air with heat swings, each at none, a little or a lot) and whether it was varnished first. After watching the years count up, a line says what did the most harm.

The aged picture can then be restored with the same tools as a commission. Your own painting comes back damaged, and you bring it back toward how you painted it.

• Gallery: hang pictures you painted or restored in oak, gilt, black or white frames. It holds up to 40 works, which stay on this device only
• Copying: paint from a model, either a painting you restored or one from chapter 1. "Compare" looks at the light and dark layout, the colour and the tone, and gives stars and a short comment

Sharing a picture, and the rules

From "Share" you can share a picture you painted, aged or restored in one of two ways.

• Share without saving: images (the painting, the years passed, before and after restoration and so on) and a tall or square video are made on this device only. Nothing is sent to the server and no sign-in is needed
• Save it so others can restore it too: the picture and the conditions it was aged under are saved on the server and a link is made. Anyone who has the link can see and restore the picture without signing in. Saving needs you to sign in and agree to what it involves
• Pictures that are fine to share: choose only a picture you painted or one you are allowed to share. Do not choose photos of other people, other people's artwork, or characters from anime or games. The operator may delete pictures that do not follow the terms of use
• Names and words: your name is not shown and no title or message can be attached. You can report a picture you are concerned about with "Report this picture"
• Deleting: you can delete a shared picture at any time from "My shared pictures". The link then stops working. One account can share up to 10 pictures

Tips for a good restoration

• Brush off the dust first, then make a test patch in the corner by the mark. Try the weakest solvent first, and settle on a strength once the varnish begins to thin. Once the soot is off, wipe the varnish off the whole painting at that strength.
• Change the swab when its tip is coloured. A dirty swab spreads dirt around.
• Lay lifting paint down with the iron before you clean. Rubbing it with a swab while it lifts makes it fall off and leave a loss.
• When you retouch, paint a little, then step back. A colour that matches up close can stand out from afar. Mix colours a little at a time and build up thin layers.
• With Japanese works, stroke a water swab gently over the whole painting and do not go back and forth over one spot. Never use solvent.
• Check under ultraviolet light and with "Step back" before you hand over. You cannot touch a painting again after that.
• If the stars are not rising, reread the comment on the result screen and the Tips in the Craftsman's Notebook. Tool upgrades and techniques make the work easier too.

Frequently asked questions

Can I play without signing in?

Yes. You can play commissions and the atelier right away from this page without signing in. Your progress (coins, reputation, upgrades, techniques, notebook) and your atelier works are saved in this browser. Signing in is needed only to save a picture on the server to share it and to see "My shared pictures".

Can I continue on another device?

Yes, if you sign in. Your studio progress is also saved to your account, so on another device signed in to the same account you continue where you left off. Atelier works and the gallery stay on the device where you painted them and are not saved to your account.

Are all the paintings original?

Most of the paintings are original works made for this game. Three more are images of masterpieces that museums publish for anyone to use. The dirt, cracks and losses are added by the game each time.

Why can't I use solvent on Japanese works?

Japanese paintings have no varnish, and solvent would dissolve the glue that holds their colours. Using it makes the colours bleed and fade, and the inspection takes points off. Too much water also leaves a water stain.

I can't get 3 stars and I can't move on.

A commission lets you move on when you finish it with 3 stars or more (the next commission or chapter also needs enough reputation). Use the comment on the result screen and the "What the inspection looks at" pages of the notebook as clues, and take the same commission again. Reputation rises only by the stars above your previous best.

What happens if I quit a commission halfway?

Choose "Save and quit" in the menu: the work in progress stays in this browser, and "Continue" on the title or the commission list takes you back to it (it does not carry over to another device or browser). If you close the page, the work up to a little before is kept too. "Quit without saving", or starting another commission, starts it again from the beginning. Coins and reputation grow only for commissions you hand over. A picture in the atelier can be kept in the gallery as a draft when you leave.

How long does one commission take?

There is generally no time limit, so you can take your time. The first commission takes about 15 to 30 minutes if you read the guide as you go, and large paintings in later chapters take longer. Only some commissions have an agreed time, and keeping to it pays a little more.

What happens in "Let It Age 100 Years"?

Your atelier picture is aged for the years and in the room you choose. You watch the dust settle, soot darken it, the varnish yellow, the colours fade, and mould and cracks appear. Afterwards you can restore it.

Where are the images and videos I share kept?

If you choose "Share without saving", the images and videos are made on this device only and nothing is sent to the server. Only if you choose "Save it so others can restore it too", and agree, are the picture and the conditions it was aged under saved on the server.

Can I delete a picture I shared?

Yes. You can delete it at any time from "My shared pictures". The link then stops working and the count of restorations is deleted too.

Can I play in languages other than Japanese?

Yes. You can also play in English, Chinese (Traditional) and Korean. The game starts in your browser's language, and you can change it on the title screen or from the menu while you work (changing it reloads the game).

The screen does not appear or the game does not run.

This game uses 3D drawing (WebGL). Update your browser and turn off power-saving mode, then open the page again. On a device that cannot draw it, an error screen appears.

Is Dulled Masterpiece Restorer free to play?

Yes, it costs nothing. You can play commissions and the atelier right away from this page without signing in. Your progress and your works are saved in this browser. Sign in with a Google account to also keep your studio progress in your account for other devices, and to save a picture on the server to share it.

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