As Halloween is just around the corner I wanted to share some activities that will make your Halloween party much scarier. This is for those people craving for the thrill of solving a mystery. I’m sure we’ve all seen a lot of games that make us the detective to solve mysteries but isn’t everything better with a lot of people? Here are five mystery games that you can play as a group:
1. Killer’s Eye
It is a game of speed, strategy, and most of all… winking. It is the most simple of all the games in this list and exciting to play with a bigger crowd. You can use normal playing cards and assign each card with a role. No one is allowed to talk until the whole game has ended. There are three roles: the serial killer, the policeman, and the villagers.
There can only be one killer and policeman but a lot of villagers. Everyone is seated around the circle and the serial killer winks at one of the players. If that player is a villager, he drops his card and says “I’m dead”. If the serial killer winks to a policeman he will be caught and the village wins. If the policeman also sees the killer wink to another person he can still arrest the killer. The main goal of the serial killer is to kill everyone until only the policeman is left and the goal of the policeman is to find out who the killer is.
2. Mafia
Similar to Killer’s Eye we just use simple playing cards and assign roles. This is a little bit more complicated and consists of more roles. It has a creepier atmosphere and a much more thrilling feel. There are now 4 roles: the mafia, the nurse, the detective, and the villagers. One mafia, one nurse, one detective, and a whole lot of villagers but you will need one person to be the moderator. In this game everyone closes their eyes as a sign of them falling asleep. Every night the mafia chooses someone to kill, the detective chooses someone to investigate, and the nurse chooses someone to heal.
After that everyone wakes up and the moderator tells them what happened. In the morning everyone votes for who they think is the mafia, if the majority of the village votes for the same person, that person is lynched and reveals his role. If not, everyone goes to sleep again for a night of uncertainty. The goal of the mafia is to kill everyone until only one person is left, while the village has to successfully vote out the mafia.
3. Clue
Also known as Cluedo is a board game where all of you are invited to a millionaire’s party but the millionaire has died and one of you is the killer but even you don’t know it. There is also an app edition of the game but can only be played by one person. The game consists of three category cards: people, place, and weapon.
There will, of course, be several combinations on who killed the millionaire, where he killed him, and what did he use. The goal of the game is to find out the correct combination before the other players do.
4. One Night Ultimate Werewolf
This is a complicated but exciting game that you can play with 48 people! It is definitely thrilling to play it; along with the masculine voice telling you what to do and the creepy background music. It is very addictive and fun to play unless you’re a villager, then you just close your eyes for the whole night.
It originally consists of a board, cards, and tokens; however, you can download the app for free and use playing cards to assign roles and cardboard or whatever else you can think of for the tokens. It is somehow similar to Mafia where everyone is asleep and when your role is called by the voice you wake up and do your purpose. Once everyone’s role has been called the night ends and all of you vote for who you think the werewolves are.
5. Town of Salem
This is my personal favorite because there is no way of cheating in this game and you never know what’s going to happen. This is a browser game which makes it very convenient because there is no set up to be made. It is also available as an app on the Play Store and partially in iOS. There is also a playing card version that you can pre-order here. Just like One Night Ultimate Werewolf, there are so many roles that can be given to you that I cannot explain each one. So basically there are a lot of factions and different conditions for your team to win.
When you’re part of the town it’s easier to win because there are more of you than the bad guys. When you’re part of the mafia there can be 3-4 of you trying to eliminate everyone else. When you are given a solo role like a serial killer, a werewolf, or an arsonist, you are on your own. There are also roles where you can win with anyone even if you die, as long as you served your purpose. The game is focused on the play of words. Every morning you guys have a discussion on what your roles told you about the other villagers the night before, after that you vote for someone to put on trial. After their defense, you can either vote them guilty or innocent and they will be lynched or not. Try out the game here.
Photo credit: Alexander Mueller / Ben Alford / Eneas De Troya /Maxime Bonzi / Mark Kent / Nicolas Henderson
