|5 min. read|

I’ve created two murder mysteries in the last two years, designed in an escape room style. I chose this format because a successful murder mystery requires everyone to be fully engaged and committed to their roles. In my past experiences, that wasn’t always the case, leading to a less enjoyable time. At one party, some guests were uncomfortable acting, which hindered solving the mystery.

So instead, I decided to write my own murder mystery in an escape room style where a team of people is working towards the same goal, identifying who the perpetrator is. 

Here are the steps I take to creating a successful murder mystery:

1. Pick a theme

There are a few options for how to pick your theme, you could make it around a holiday or event/time frame like Halloween, Christmas, or New Year’s. You could also pick a universe or fandom like SpongeBob SquarePants, Marvel, or Nintendo.  Regardless of what topic you pick, make sure it is a topic you are comfortable with and know a lot about. This will allow you to get creative when you are writing the story line. 

2. Create the story and pick your characters/ suspects

 I typically create a storyline with 6-8 active characters at a specific location like a Haunted Mansion or the North Pole Toy Shop. Developing less characters than this may make the villain obvious and developing more than this can lead to too much. If you want to develop more than that you can have supporting characters that are not a part of the suspect line up, but compliment the story by narrating or assisting the team to complete challenges.

When imagining the location, think of it as a chance to set the tone and vibe for the game to really get your players in the murder mystery spirit!

From there you can start writing the who, what, when, where, and how.

3. Pick and Design the crime scene

Once you have developed your characters and the location at which the murder mystery takes place the next step is to define the crime scene. You will want to be super descriptive about what is at the crime scene and include evidence that places at least 2-3 characters at the scene of the crime. There are two ways to place suspects at the scene of the crime, using information from their character profiles that would place them there OR having evidence provided to the participants as they solve challenges or puzzles that gradually make a character look guilty. You could also present evidence that makes a character not look guilty to help your game players narrow down the killer.

Typically, I write my murder mysteries so that everyone looks guilty/ has a motive in the beginning, then provide the participants with the crime scene after they have successfully completed a challenge or puzzle that is about half way through the game. 

4. Create the player profiles 

 I encourage you to get very creative at this point in the game. This is where I hide information that should help the team solve the mystery. I do this by peppering information like the characters’ idols, birthday, middle name, habits, pet peeves, relation to other characters, favorite snack/food, or anything really. The options are endless here so go wild!

5. Picking the Killer 

I typically write the entire story, develop the characters and their profiles and then pick the murder after. From there I will then create challenges that lead to one of the characters and sprinkle that information throughout the player’s profile and/or introduction.

6. Create the challenges

After making my first murder mystery, I was not sure how I would make another because I felt like I had used all the possible challenges up.

That was not the case!

After some googling, I was able to make an entirely new game, while only reusing one style of puzzle from my first murder mystery. Below is a list of the possible challenges you could include in your murder mystery:

• Caesar Cipher
• Maze that spells a word 
• Where’s Waldo 
• Riddles that create a code 
• Create your own Wordle 
• Create your own connections
• Math equations 
• DIY Invisible Ink (will need to provide a black light)

When creating challenges, I find it is easiest to integrate the challenge with your game, for example. I did a Christmas themed murder mystery and gave the challenge pictured below and had random Christmas themed images taped up around the room. As you can see all of the pictures below have one thing in common, snow. So out of all the images taped around the room, there was a snowflake so that when the team figured that out they looked under the paper and were given their next piece of information.

7. Create a powerpoint to match your theme

After all that hard work, now comes the fun part, making a theme powerpoint presentation for your game. I typically use Slide Carnival to find a set of slides that will fit my theme if it is a popular one like Christmas or Halloween. From there I let my imagination take over and try to make the slides as festive as possible. This will really keep the spirit going during your murder mystery so be sure to invest time in this part. 

8. Print out all necessary materials 

Lastly, and hopefully the easiest part is to print out the necessary materials like the suspect profile, games, puzzles, room decor, etc. You will have the best gauge of what you think the players would benefit from having in front of them, but typically I print out the suspect profiles as they are packed with information that they need to review and annotate. 

If you decide to create your own murder mystery from scratch, love would love to know you come up with and how it goes!