It was thingy with the wotsit (Cluedo)

Member Name: dave27

Product:	Cluedo
Date:	10/11/01 (287 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Absorbing

Disadvantages: No one was ever called professor Plum

"You are one of the guests. Outside it's raining, inside the guests are making fun and dancing, not knowing the horrible murder taking place somewhere in the building. The victim is Dr.Black, the owner of the house. The butler discovers the body when he descends into the cellar to get some wine. The body was placed there to hide the real place of the murder. The guests decide to solve the crime by their own instead of going public with it. They know one of them is the murderer..."

People who play Cluedo speak a very different language from the rest of us: "It was Miss Scarlet with the candlestick in the library."

Eh? What the hell are you on about? Are you on drugs or something?

Well, calm down, calm down, help is at hand with the dave27 handy hints for cluedo cults. You see, the statement above is one of the key things about the game of Cluedo - a family board game which involves a number of players each trying to work out who of a set cast of ne'er do wells was the perpetrator of one of the most dastardly crimes known to man - the foul murder of our old chum, Dr Black in a rambling old house over the weekend.

You see, a whole posse of the most suspicious characters known to man have gathered at ye old mansion and one of the said company obviously had it in for the good doctor, for they have done him in, sent him to the great surgery in the sky, moved him in with the Norwegian Blues of the dark side - in short Dr Black is a stiff and you have to find which of these characters did for him, using what weapons and where the fell deed was done.

The cast of potential evildoers consists of:

Col. Mustard (Yellow)
Prof. Plum (Purple)
Rev. Green (Green)
Mrs. Peacock (Blue)
Miss Scarlett (Red)
Mrs. White (White)

The possible weapons are as follows:

Dagger - found in the lounge
Candlestick - found in the dining room
Revolver - found in th
e study
Rope - found in the ballroom
Lead Pining - found in the conservatory
Spanner - found in the kitchen

but sadly we're spared the twelve bore shotgun of Farmer Puce as he is away a-hunting in Somerset. The potential scenes of the crime is missing an en suite shower room.

At the start of the game three cards are hidden away each depicting one of the things to be identified, murderer, weapon and location, and the idea, by process of elimination, is for a player to determine what the appropriate combination is. Each player is given some of the other cards to start with (which he can immediately discount because they're not in the envelope). Each player wanders from room to room making guesses as to who did what with what in the room he's in. The player on his left shows him any of the three cards involved. If he can't the next player does so and so on, until it is established that the guess is accurate.

You can try some bluffing and misleading by making some false guesses, and the art is in establishing a decent set of tactics. For instance, you may make guesses each of which you expect to be incorrect to con your opponents into thinking they are in fact the right answers (if you see what I mean...)

It's a wonderful game of skill and strategy and can be very exciting when played with a room full of drunken skinheads, although they tend to find a less subtle way to identify the solution - either that or they will beat you until you are prepared to confess to anything.

Cluedo is one of the best family board games ever invented and is good for young and old alike.

RECOMMENDED

2 to 6 players

Summary: