Clue Master Detective

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Template:Cleanup-dateClue Master Detective is a crime fiction board game produced in 1988. Clue Master Detective is an update on Cluedo (Clue in North America).

It is, in a great many ways, superior to Clue, though the artwork of the suspects is in moderate debate. Furthermore, it is also much easier to play. Just as in the original Clue, the game is set in a mansion, this time named as Tudor Close. For the first time in a board game, we are told that the game takes place in England. This time, the board is divided into 13 different rooms. The players still stand for a suspect, currently visiting the now dead Mr. Boddy. The solution and the concept remains the same, but the gameplay is no longer quite so simple.

As with the original Clue, the game comes with: Instructions A game board, representing the location of the murder Ten colored game pieces, representing the suspects. Red for Miss Scarlet, Yellow for Col. Mustard, White for Mrs. White, Dark green for Mr. Green, Cadet blue for Mrs. Peacock, Purple for Plum, Light Orange for Miss Peach. The Pink piece belongs to Madame Rose, not Miss Peach. Monsieur Brunette is the brown piece, leaving Sergeant Grey as the grey token. Eight weapon pieces, representing possible weapons used. The poison and the horseshoe have been added as weapons. Cards, containing depictions of game elements (weapons, suspects or rooms) A parchment envelope labeled, "Case File: Confidential", to hold the solution in each game.

The suspects here include the classic six, with four additions.

• Miss Scarlet
• Colonel Mustard
• Mrs. White
• Mr. Green
• Mrs. Peacock
• Professor Plum

• Miss Peach; an American southern Belle who claims to be Boddy's long-lost stepniece, who, when pressed, decided on short notice to take a vacation in the country. Any country. Her favorite flower is deadly nightshade. She is not, as many assume, a pink character, but a pastel orange. Nearly every variation and update of Clue has included Miss Peach, leading many to believe she is the seventh guest, as it were. She starred in Clue FX as an innocent investigator of the murder of Mr. Meadow-Brooke, which means Mr. Green-Blue.

• Monsieur Brunette: An art and arms dealer who, in laters editions, would be badly replaced by Prince Azure, M. Brunette nearly made a killing in Paris, producing the missing arms of the Venus D'Milo. His business is in ruins now because Boddy has questioned some of the works of Monet Brunette has sold him. He is a man of many talents, many accents, and many passports. This is the only board game he appeared in.

• Madame Rose: Mr. Boddy's former secretary, Madame Rose prides herself on her gifted talents as a fortune-teller and a medium. The Clue vcr game suggested that she was his sister, but the board game states she is his secretary. It is possible that she might, in fact, be both. She resigned from his office and moved to Hungary to set up a shop as a seer, when, in a trance, she saw Mr. Boddy's death. She left her shop a few days later and took a very slow boat back to England, and when she got to Tudor Close, she discovered she was too late. Or was she . . . ? Like Brunette, Rose too shares the fate of being exiled from the Clue world, replaced by herbalist and, as one games suggests, spiritualist, Lady Lavender.

• Sergeant Grey: At last, a member of the police shows up to help us figure out who the killer is. But wait, he didn't know about the murder. He just stopped by to gain funds from Boddy for the Blackmail awareness program, which means he was blackmailing Boddy. Seeing things as either black or white, his approach to solving crime is unimaginative and straightforward. However, what's this? Sgt. Grey is listed as a suspect in the murder? That's right, our would-be savior of the game is just another cold-hearted murderer. The question is, which side of the law is he on? Of all the colors used in Clue, only with Grey have they had as much trouble deciding what should be done. This is Sgt. Grey's only appearance in the Clue board game world, but this is far from the only time the color is used. He is replaced by Lord Grey in Clue FX, as well as Mr. Slate-Grey in many Cluedo versions.

The rooms are now quite different as well, thirteen in all. Only twelve are murder locations.

• The Courtyard
• The Gazebo
• The Drawing room
• The Dining room
• The Kitchen
• The Carriage house
• The Trophy room
• The Conservatory
• The Studio
• The Cloak Room
• The Billiard Room
• The Library
• The Fountain

Furthermore, there are three secret passages instead of two.

• The Drawing room links to the Conservatory.
• The Library links to the Kitchen.
• The Courtyard has a private walk that links to the Cloak room.

The game is still best to play with three or four players, though it is now possible to play as ten. It is also somewhat easier to play as two, because of the increased amount of cards.

Just as in the original Clue, at the beginning of play, three cards—one Suspect, one Weapon, and one Room card—are chosen at random and put into a special envelope, so that no-one can see them. These cards represent the true facts of the case. The remainder of the cards are distributed among the players.

The aim is still to deduce the details of the murder—that is, the cards in the envelope. This is done by announcing suggestions to other players. An example of a suggestion is, "I suggest it was Mrs. White, in the Library, with the Rope." All elements contained in the suggestion are moved into the room in the suggestion (so Mrs. White and the Rope would be moved to the Library).

The other players must then disprove the suggestion, if they can. This is done in clockwise order around the board. A suggestion is disproved by showing a card containing one of the suggestion components to the player making the suggestion (for example, the Rope), as this proves that the card cannot be in the envelope. Showing the card to the suggesting player is done in secret so the other players may not see which card is being used to disprove the suggestion. Once a suggestion has been disproved, the player's turn ends and moves onto the next player. There is a new rule here, though, in which all cards relating to the situation must be viewed if held by three different players, so it might become instantly obvious to everyone that Madame Rose, the candlestick, and the Conservatory were all innocent of charge. The only way this process may be prevented is if one person is holding both cards, such as Madame Rose and the Conservatory, in which they must choose only one. Even so, you are still permitted only to make a suggestion when your piece is in a room, and the suggestion can only be for that room.

The ending of Clue is the same, being that once a player thinks he or she knows the solution, the player can make an accusation. The player checks the validity of the accusation by checking the cards in the envelope. If the player made an incorrect accusation, that player is out of the game (since the player now knows the correct solution) and the game continues with the remaining players. If the player made a correct accusation, the solution cards are shown to the other players and the game ends.

This time, though, the game is played by two dice instead of one, making movement along the board much, much swifter. It also helps that the rooms are spaced right next to each other, and that nearly all the rooms fuction in this manner. To increase the ease of play and the speed of movement, you are now permitted to walk into a room and then walk out of it, treating it as just another space you have moved. Even travel by means of a secret passage is allowed. Diagonal travel is still not permitted.

All characters now start in the Cloak room, so there is no more assigned placement of characters, and no more advantage to playing Miss Scarlet. The Cloak room has no card and it is not on the list of suspected rooms, meaning it has nothing to do with the crime.

Snoop spaces, notified by the squares which have a magnifying glass, allow you to read one card of your choice from any other player's hand. This is useful primarily at the beginning, but as the game ends, its helpfulness weakens as the chances raise astronomically that the card you will read will be a card you already have seen.

Alas, there is the loss of a good strategy to use: To keep a rival close to the truth from beating you to the correct room in the original Clue, you could suggest that suspect, even if you knew they were innocent, to whatever room you were in. This would effectively derail their trek by deflecting them into another room. You can still deflect suspects, but the travelling across the board is faster now, making a recovery easier.

Another good idea is to make suggestions, using one of your own cards. This forces other people to reveal information, but creating a question, keeping your rivals in the dark with an innocent suspect, room, or weapon by making them think it may be guilty. This strategy does not work very well now, as discovery is easier, unless you hold two cards of a suggestion.