There have been more than a dozen different video games based on the board game Clue over the years. And Clue: Murder by Death is designed to give players its own unique take on the 1930s-style murder mystery.
The English Lord Anderson has been found dead in his massive 166-room mansion. The estate is composed of a chapel, a theater, libraries, gardens, studies, guest rooms, secret passageways and more—each location dotted with scattered notes, tools, weapons and special items. And this sprawling manor is also populated by many servants and nine guests who’ll need to be interrogated as potential suspects in the heinous crime.
Lord Anderson was well aware of Scotland Yard’s tendency to mess up investigations of this ilk. Fortunately, he left word with his butler that if anything dire might befall him, the first person to call would be you: Detective John Smith.
But why did the well-respected lord believe that something foul was afoot? What secrets was he holding? Who was he afraid of? Answers to those questions may be hard to come by. Because by the time you arrive at the scene, you’ll have but a mere two hours of real time to find the clues you seek. After that, the inspector from Scotland Yard will show up, and the investigation will be his and his alone.
At the beginning of your inquiry, you can call upon two of the gathered suspects to help you navigate the expansive manse. Will you choose the trusted butler, Mr. Benson, or maybe the seasoned explorer, David Living? Perhaps the best choice is that mysterious, certainly-not-a-vampire, Mr. D. He seems to have a nose to smell out blood.
There are other choices to make as well. While you can interview and keep notes on anyone you encounter, you can only hold three items at any given time. Should you keep that flashlight handy or lay it aside for other useful items, such as a rope or a bookshelf-jimmying crowbar? Each choice could help you get past a path-blocking obstacle or send you backtracking through a string of rooms for an item you left behind.
In fact, it might be a good idea to keep a pen and paper handy as you play. The game gives you a map of the mansion’s large floor plan, but each of the rooms are left blank and the map doesn’t tell you what or who may be in them.
The clock is ticking. So begin the hunt.
Clue: Murder by Death is a single-player game with no online or multiplayer options.
You’re the detective attempting to catch a killer and keep innocent people safe. And even though the game is all about a murder, the colorful, cartoony, toy-like avatars dial back any sense of danger or scariness. There’s no violence or fighting.
In addition, this is not a mystery that gamers will likely solve in their first two hours of play. It will require repeated playthroughs before enough evidence is gathered to close this case. So young mystery lovers can enjoy a much larger puzzle while keeping their playthroughs limited to shorter, more manageable chunks of time.
Despite this game’s E-rating, there are a few bits of negative content in the mystery mix. There are weapons everywhere. We see some light instances of blood. (One character has a “curious stash of bottled blood.”) We spot bodies under sheets. A cartoony ghost appears. One woman admits she got pregnant from an illicit affair with a married man. And there’s a printed-out use of the s-word. (All dialogue is written and not spoken.) There is also some evidence of drinking.
Clue: Murder by Death is a game that some will enjoy as mystery-solving gold. Others might find it a little slow. Parents should note, however, that there’s more mature content here than they might expect with a typical E-rated game.
After spending more than two decades touring, directing, writing and producing for Christian theater and radio (most recently for Adventures in Odyssey, which he still contributes to), Bob joined the Plugged In staff to help us focus more heavily on video games. He is also one of our primary movie reviewers.
