To start with you need three characters.
- murder victim
- murderer
- investigator(s)
First you need the murder victim. And with this character, by default, you need the murderer. Unless your denouement shows it was all an accident or suicide.
And the third character you need is the person (or persons) searching for the murderer.
You’ll need to keep your audience guessing
The Murder Mystery should be solvable…….but only at the end.
It’s great to guess ‘who done it’, but you don’t want to make it too easy. You also don’t want to make it so hard that no-one knows what’s going on and hasn’t the faintest idea who did it.
Throw in a few secrets and plot twists. Keep people on their toes until the conclusion.
Everything must be explained at the conclusion
Yes this is really important.
Everything should be explained at the end. There is satisfaction of finding out the answer, whether you got the right answer or not.
There will have been secrets withheld by the author, but at the end, all must be explained.
Fancy a murder mystery evening?
Visit ITM Games to get your next Murder Mystery Party Game or join City Adventurers and take part in a mystery event.