Costume Party Detective

A hidden-gem secret identity game with a fleet of adorable meeples that works for basically every gaming group-even children and elder relatives? Yes please.

Costume Party Detective is a delightfully simple hidden-identity game for 2-6 Players, aged 8 & up. The game puts players at a costume party where the costumes are so good, we can’t tell who anyone actually is! As the game progresses, more and more party guests are revealed until only one player is left. Can you use your detective skills to unmask your opponents before they discover you?

Setup

There aren’t many components: one game board, 20 character cards with 20 matching meeples, and one 6-sided colored die. To begin, all you need to do is set the board in the center of the table, randomly put 4 meeples in each of the rooms, shuffle the deck of cards, deal one to each player, and set the deck of remaining cards next to the board. Then it is time to party!

How To Play

The first, and arguably most important, thing players do is look at their card and secretly make a mental note of where their corresponding meeple is. Obviously, this needs to be done with the utmost stealth as you don’t want to indicate to the other players who you are.

Players turns are quick and easy. At the start of each player’s turn, they roll the game’s 6-sided die. Four of the sides are colors that match the colored rooms on the board and the other two are black. If the player rolls a color, they simply have to move a meeple either from the matching colored room to a connecting room or move a meeple from a connecting room to that colored room. Easy peasy.

If a black is rolled, then the player must make an important choice.

Option 1: flip a card from the deck and remove the revealed character from the game board. This option can only be done by each player three times. After that, they can only choose Option 2.

Option 2: choose a meeple from the same room that your meeple is in and remove them from the board. If the meeple chosen this way happens to be the character of another player, that player must reveal their card and they are out. An important note is that if you happen to be alone in a room, roll a black, and have to choose Option 2, you must eliminate yourself. Wah wah.

Play then proceeds clockwise until only one player remains. That player wins!

So, the strategy obviously comes from your choices of who to move and who to “kill.” (Sidenote: The lovely fellow who originally demo-ed this to me mentioned that originally it had a much more murdery theme, but it was reskinned to be more family-friendly. However, everyone I’ve played with has felt much more joy from shouting “I kill this one! Muahaha!” But I digress…)

At the start of the game, choices are breezy. As characters are eliminated and the rooms become more sparse, things get more complicated. Do you risk revealing your identity by constantly moving your meeple out of lonely rooms? Do you put yourself into the same room as the meeple you are fairly certain is your opponent and hope to roll black before they do?

Where It Shines

I adore games that are accessible for non-gamers, but still chewy enough for seasoned gamers to enjoy themselves. I have played this with my 7-year-old niece and with friends who live and breathe tabletop games and all have had a good time. It is quick to understand, with enough chance to keep the playing field even for all levels of gaming. The game is short enough to be an excellent palette cleanser on big game nights or to be a quick after dinner game when family is over.

Final Thoughts

Costume Party Detective isn’t a game that will challenge your mental prowess or let you display your cunning battle skills, but it is a game that you will remember playing. The tension created with the hide-and-seek mechanics leads to memory-making endings. Alternatively, if your meeple is randomly picked in the first round before you even get a chance to roll (which, yes, has happened to me) it can be memorable in a not-so fun way. All in all though, a game this accessible and fun for under 20 bucks is worth having in your collection.