Suspects: Eternal Detective Claire Harper | Murder Mystery Game for Families | Detective Game | 1 to 6 Players | 60 Minutes

We played one of the cases with another couple. We do not play games much, and the other couple is very much into non-computer games. We all had a lot of fun playing the game. Our friends liked it enough that they recommended it to other game players. This first case took us about two hours to play, but now that we know the flow of the game, the next case should run noticeably less. The only complaint that we had was that when we got the final solution, we all said that we didn't know that solution was an option. As the instructions say, keep an open mind and consider all of the options.

An excellent game. Has 3 pretty good mysteries. The clue placement is superb. Recommended for mystery and game fans.

This game is a blast! It’s perfect for family game nights, offering just the right mix of challenge and fun. The mystery is engaging and keeps everyone involved. We loved playing as a team to solve the case. It’s a great way to spend an hour and is suitable for all ages.

"Suspects" is a series of games where you (and up to 5 friends) play together as the detective. The first game came out in 2021 and was called "Claire Harper Takes the Stage" (https://a.co/d/gVa1Tjy).That first game got really positive reviews, so this follow up gives us more adventures with Claire Harper.I found this game really easy to pick up and start playing, with simple rules and quick setup. The box contains 3 mystery stories. Each story provides a few large artifacts (usually a map and a family tree or other representation of the people involved), a deck of cards that represent all the places you might explore, the interviews you might have with a character, and the clues you might discover along the way. Finally, there's an envelope containing the solution to the mystery.To begin, someone reads the backstory to the crime, which is well written and interesting. There's also a checklist of questions you'll be expected to answer by the end of the mystery. For example, you probably need to know who committed the murder, but maybe also what their motivation was, where the crime took place, or any number of other details that a detective would need to prove their case.With that in mind, you begin working through the large artifacts and the deck, hunting for clues, inconsistencies in someone's story, facts that don't add up, any little detail that might help you (Claire) to determine what really happened.There's no timer, so you can explore and think at your own pace. However, after you've been through 30 of the cards, you stop and give your best answers to all the required questions (who, where, why, etc.). You can then keep playing, learning more and possibly revising your deductions. After you've been through 45 cards, you can change any answers you already gave. Finally, after you've been through all the evidence, you can change your deductions one last time.You score based on how early in the game you came to correct conclusions. For example, if you answered "Who" within the first 30 cards, that's worth 5 points. But if you only answered "Where" correctly after 45 cards, that's only worth 4 points. Correct answers are only worth 3 points if you've been through all the evidence. If you get any deductions wrong, those are worth 0 points. You add up your score, and the game congratulates you based on how well you did.Because there's no time pressure, the whole game feels fun and low stress. It actually feels a bit like reading a mystery novel and guessing about the facts of the crime as you read through the detectives process! Unlike some other mystery games, it feels fun and relaxing all the way through.You might have noticed that this game is described as "in the style of Agatha Christie". At first I thought that might just be a shameless ploy to get her fans to buy the game, but I think they actually did a pretty good job of capturing some Christie-style distinctive elements. For example, all the crimes take place in a single location, with a limited cast of characters. All the evidence you need is on site. The story, characters, and the details of how the murderer committed the crime are intriguing. It's certainly not a knock-off of Christie, or a shallow copy of her stories, but it has a similar vibe.I should also mention that the art in this game is fantastic! Emile Denis deserves a lot of credit for fleshing out a beautiful, detailed world, full of unique characters.Overall, this game does a lot of things right! It's very accessible for both gamers and non-gamers. It appeals to fans of Agatha Christie's style. It's fun and engaging, not scary or stressful. The mysteries themselves are satisfying and rational, not bizarre or unsolvable.The one knock against it is that there's little to no replay value in this game, once you've played all 3 mysteries. To its credit, it's priced at about $10 per mystery, which is very fair for 90 minutes of fun! But you should plan to pass this on to another mystery fan when you're done with it.

Back again to the mystery world of "Suspects" and the sleuth Claire Harper.She's going "eternal" here, in a lovely green box; Hatchette's English edition of the French mystery card game.This is pretty much just like the first volume “orange box” in term of contents: a rulebook, some large cards, and three separate decks of individual mystery/story cards. The rulebook is barely four pages, but it’s easy to read. The large cardboard cards are all part of the three different cases that come in the game. The artwork and overall production values continue to be fantasticLike the original “orange box” Suspects, when you solve the mysteries, you are done with them forever. It’s kind of like watching a TV show mystery: you can watch the mystery again, but you already know the solution so it maybe less fun. Luckily, you can fully reset the three mysteries and give them to someone else! Unlike a few other mystery games of this type, no cards are destroyed in play, no scratch-offs, no peel-aways that would render the whole thing unplayable a second time for someone else..Gameplay:The mystery is all in the cards!As you play, more and more cards come out which give a clearer and clearer picture of the mystery! The tension here is that your score is based on how many cards you look at, so the fewer cards that are revealed, the better your score! Honestly, in all my three games, we generally ignored the score and concentrated on solving the mystery .. because that’s the fun part!The thre mysteries:Shakespeare’s Tears (Mystery 1) - Young Harper and murder in a finishing schoolOver the course of an hour and a half, we lived in the world of the S. Elizabeth school and became embroiled in a murder there! Time slipped away as we became immersed in the game play!I really felt like I had just become directly involved in one of my fav BBC Murder Mysteries! There was a clear arc, there was exploration, there was thought, there was deduction … there was fun! My group had an absolute blast playing the first mystery, setting things up for what was to come.Dead on Arrival (Mystery 2)Interestingly, Dead on Arrival did not go nearly as well. Everyone was still involved as we played, but there was a significant amount of bookkeeping that could be described as tedious. There was more back-and-forthing, cross-referencing, and needed note-taking. Perhaps this is actually more realistic of working through a murder case, but the energy of the first mystery was lagging.In the end, everyone had fun, but the "homework" aspect in this Mystery was more than I’ve seen in other mysteries, so that detracted a little from the game.The Mystery of the Lady of the Lake (Mystery 3)Cooperative play in the final mystery went over like gang-busters! As a group of 4, we had so much fun following clues, conjecturing solutions, and playing the game! We honed in on different alibis and why they worked or failed! This was a truly engaging cooperative play! My only complaint was that I think you needed a lot more cards revealed to really get the mystery than previous mysteries: I am not sure you could even hope to get the whole thing and still get a perfect score.Thoughts:Ignore the scoring system for the most part: just enjoy the mystery. The scoring system gives you a way to keep track of how far you are, but mysteries 2 and 3 both felt like there’s no way you could get a perfect score. Don’t obsess on the score: enjoy the mystery!One thing to note is that the mystery is constrained by the cards: you can only follow where the cards lead you. Some “purists” might think this makes the Suspects mysteries more “on rails”, as you can only follow where the rails (the cards) lead you. Both the strength and weakness of Suspects is that the mystery is constrained to a 90 – 120 minute adventure.Why watch a mystery when you can play it? Suspects 2 continues the great narrative adventures of the first game, while rounding out the world, and the character of Claire Harper! I'm eager for the next installment.