Halloween Murder Mystery Party

[Boo]

This year, in amoment of madness, I proposed to my work colleagues that they might like to come to my house for a murder mystery dinner party the weekend following Halloween.

I was pleasantly suprised by the degree of enthusiasm, and then slightly horrorfied to realise that there's only two weeks to prepare and I have no idea how a murder mystery dinner should work (I've just ordered a kit off of Amazon).

Do you guys have any insight? I'm a bit concerned that it may be necessary to 'play' a character and that this may feel a bit uncomfortable for some. Is it possible to play the experience as a game without the acting part?

Cheers
B

[NeverMore]

Hmmm... never done anything like this but it sure seems like a lot of fun.

Obviously you need to hurry and get an outline of the story to the people who are attending so they know how to play their parts. You may want to use a dummy as the victim so everyone can join in on the fun of trying to figure out who the killer is. Otherwise the person playing the victim would get bored.

I would think the hardest part of this whole thing is for the person who is playing the killer. They will have to be good at keeping the secret, maybe actively trying to keep the other players off their scent. Maybe pick the person with the best acting skills to be the killer?

The only other thing I can think of is that anyone who breaks character should be penalized. Don't suppose you have a dunk tank laying around?

[Andybev01]

Hmmm... never done anything like this but it sure seems like a lot of fun.

Obviously you need to hurry and get an outline of the story to the people who are attending so they know how to play their parts. You may want to use a dummy as the victim so everyone can join in on the fun of trying to figure out who the killer is. Otherwise the person playing the victim would get bored.

I would think the hardest part of this whole thing is for the person who is playing the killer. They will have to be good at keeping the secret, maybe actively trying to keep the other players off their scent. Maybe pick the person with the best acting skills to be the killer?

The only other thing I can think of is that anyone who breaks character should be penalized. Don't suppose you have a dunk tank laying around?

I would think that you would have a drunk tank somewhere.

[Demonic Duck]

I've never done one myself but I believe that is the general goal. You are given some sort of character in the beginning and are supposed to maintain that role the whole evening.