Clue Murder Mystery

Type: Active
Age: Middle school
Optimal size: 20+
Estimated cost: $51 - $100
Planning time: 5+ hours
Frequency: One-time

Learning outcomes

Display an ability to communicate with others ● Connect and collaborate with others ● Show empathy and respect differences ● Engage in personal expression

Instructions

The Game

The object of our party was for the teens to solve the murder by guessing who did it, where, and with what-just like the game.

To obtain clues to solve the murder, we had staff in character of the original suspects-Miss Scarlet; Professor Plum; Col. Mustard; Mr. Green; Mrs. White; and Mr. Peacock.  Of course we had more women than men so we had to change some of the genders of the original characters. Each suspect wore their appropriate colors and each suspect had a backstory. Please see the script for their backstories. Feel free to use it; simply make a copy first and make changes.  The suspects circulated the party and engaged with teens in character.  They also told teens their motives during the party.

In addition to the characters, teens had to go to each of the rooms mention below to solve a puzzle. I’ll explain later in the puzzle section.  Each completed puzzle provided a clue.

The Organization

We wanted to stay as true to the game as possible. We designated five rooms in our library as the rooms in the game. Our genealogy room became the library; our lobby became the hall; our youth study room became the study; our makerspace became the billiards room; one of our meeting rooms become the conservatory; and our biggest meeting room became the dining room.  There were three rooms in the Clue game that we did not use in our game.

We had five tables for the five suspects except Miss White. Since she is a maid, she did not get a table. We used black table cloths and color coded table settings only because we had a bunch of black table cloths and I wanted to save money by using them up.

We made copies of the original Clue game notebook and set them at each place setting. Teens used the back to take notes.

The Puzzles

We had five escape room type puzzles because teens like puzzles. As stated above, each puzzle led to a clue. Teams took their Clue notebook, a pencil, and each team was given a room order. Since suspect to room ratio is about the same. One suspect sat in each room to hand teens the first clue and to reset the room between teens.

Teens had ten minutes to solve the puzzles in each room. (The suspect was the time keeper). After their ten minutes were up, regardless if they solved the puzzle or not, they were escorted back to the dining room.  When all groups were back in the dining room, we waited a couple of minutes for the suspects to reset the rooms and then we let the teams go to their next room. Each team had a room order which can be found in the Google folder above.

1. The Library (As stated above we used our genealogy room because it looks like a little library-tons of shelved reference books.) You can section off a portion of your youth or adult department and call it the library so that teens know what section to look through books.
   1. I made this decoder for the first clue. The clue was a call number.  The suspect gave the teams the decoder as soon as they entered the room.
   2. Once they found the first book, that clue sheet contained call numbers for all the books. There were five clue sheets and each sheet contained one letter. Once they found all the clue sheets, they had to unscramble it to spell MURAL. This was a clue for where the murder took place. Our murder room has a huge mural on the wall. You of course will have to change
   3. Once they unscrambled MURAL correctly, they were told by the suspect that they solved the puzzle and they teens were escorted back to the dining room.
   4. Additional information. All the books were green and the clue cards were green. All of this was meant to point to Miss Green as the murderer.
2. The Hall (Our lobby houses our book sale books so we used that to our advantage.)
   1. We found a hollowed out book that happened to Sleeping Beauty. Inside that book, was a UV light.
   2. The suspect gave them the following clue-Maleficent wanted her dead. Teens were tasked with finding Sleeping Beauty to find the UV light.
   3. Before the party, I used an invisible ink pen to write a phone number on individual sheets of paper. I taped the papers to the wall in order.
   4. Once the teens found the UV light, they discovered it was a phone number. (make sure to put parentheses and a dash so that teens know it’s a phone number.) They called the number and Miss White gave them the next clue-“You can’t bring a knife to a gunfight.” (This was a clue for the murder weapon-the knife.)
   5. Once they figured it out, the suspect escorted them back to the dining room.
3. The Study
   1. Before the party, I used clear plastic drinking glasses to write clues on the bottom of the glasses. There were six glasses. The clue was LORD. One letter was placed under each cup. I also had a combination lock and each cup had one number of the combo lock-27, 32, 01.
      1. When the teens entered the room, their table contained a locked box with a hasp lock closed with zip ties. On top of the box was a pair of scissors that was locked the a word lock and a combo lock. There was also six cups filled with soda.
         1. The suspect asked them to sit and have some soda. She then began to talk to them in character. The teens eventually noticed the letters and numbers on the cup and began to unscramble the letters to open the work lock and use the numbers to open the combo lock. They used the scissors the cut the zip ties and inside the lock box was the word DARK.
            1. This clue also points to Miss Green because she loves Harry Potter and their clue is DARK LORD.
         2. After they found the word DARK, they were told they solved to puzzle and was escorted back to the dining room.
4. Conservatory
   1. Upon entering, teens given this clue decoder. It led them to our MURAL which contains our state bird-the cardinal (I live in Illinois.) Next to the bird was a three digit code. They used that code to open the lock box which contained their next clue-Not the revolver or the candlestick.
      1. You will have to create your own clue using this decoder. (FYI, this decoder is used in the graphic novel, Paper Girls.)
   2. The point was for the teens to see the MURAL and put the two and two together to figure out the murder took place in that room.
   3. After they found the clue, they were told they solved to puzzle and was escorted back to the dining room.
5. Billiards RoomWe have a Merge Cube and Diffuse is a fun game.  The first teen to get to level
   four allowed the entire team to get their next clue-Not MissScarlett or Mr. Peacock.
   1. If you don’t have a Merge Cube, you’ll have to find another puzzle for this room.

At the end of the puzzle/theater portion, we put the guessing envelope on each table. Inside the envelope, we put the room cards, the suspect cards and the weapon card in the envelope. The pictures on the suspect cards were of our staff actors. At the end of the puzzle/theater portion, teams reconvened, made their guesses, and put their guesses in their envelopes.

After everyone make their guesses, we led all the teens and suspects to the room where the murder took place. We have the killer reenact the murder. The teens did not know this was going to happen, which was great!

Murder Mysteries are really cheap to host because you use supplies you already own. You don’t need Breakout EDU to create one; I purchased all my locks from Amazon which is better because you can reset Amazon locks.

Evaluation

• As always, no one made a correct guess but we’ve found that they don’t care; the just like the show. They like the over acting and drama-a fake fight scene is always a crowd pleaser.
• If you are working with teen actors. we found that it's easiest to give them the script several weeks before the event and to then have a dress rehearsal two hours before the actual party. It's difficult to get all the teens to set a time and date to meet but they all seem to be available the day of the event. 
• We also ask for volunteers among staff to be actors and they are always happy to help.
• Even though we schedule to program down to the second, we always run fast. We've found that teens are totally content with sitting and socializing; they don't need to have every minute planned.

Other resources

Budget:$130/40 teens (90% of the budget was food. The only thing we purchased that was not food was the place setting.)

Here is the Google Drive folder of all the files. Some were created in Publisher so that you can edit them.  You’ll need MS Publisher to open them.