Cluedo (), known as Clue in North America, is a murder mystery game for three to six players (depending on editions) that was devised in 1943 by British board game designer Anthony E. Pratt. The game was first manufactured by Waddingtons in the United Kingdom in 1949. Since then, it has been relaunched and updated several times, and it is currently owned and published by the American game and toy company Hasbro.
The object of the game is to determine who murdered the game's victim, where the crime took place, and which weapon was used. Each player assumes the role of one of the six suspects and attempts to deduce the correct answer by strategically moving around a game board representing the rooms of a mansion and collecting clues about the circumstances of the murder from the other players.
Numerous games, books, a film, television series, and theatre adaptations have been released as part of the Cluedo franchise. Several spinoffs have been released, featuring various extra characters, weapons, rooms, or different gameplay. The original game is marketed as the "Classic Detective Game", and the various spinoffs are all distinguished by different slogans.
In 2008, Cluedo: Discover the Secrets was created (with changes to the board, gameplay, and characters) as a modern spin-off, but was criticised in the media and by fans of the original game. Cluedo: The Classic Mystery Game was then introduced in 2012, returning to Pratt's classic formula but also adding several variations.
History Holed up in his home in Birmingham, England, during air raids on the city during World War II, Anthony E. Pratt, an English musician and factory worker, recalled the murder mystery games played by some of his clients at private music soirees as well as the detective fiction popular at the time, most notably Agatha Christie. In 1944, Pratt applied for a patent of his invention of a murder/mystery-themed game, originally named Murder.L. A. Petrosjan, V. V. Mazalov (2002). "Game Theory and Applications, Volume 8". p. 26. Nova Publishers
Pratt's daughter, Marcia Lewis also credits their neighbour, Geoffrey Bull, the creator of the board game Buccaneer, with planting the idea to make a board game in her father's head. Bull also provided an introduction to Waddingtons. Pratt and his wife, Elva Pratt (1913–1990), who had helped design the game, presented it to Waddingtons' executive Norman Watson, who immediately purchased it and provided its trademark name of Cluedo (a play on "clue" and "ludo", the Latin word for "I play", as used for the name of "Ludo", a popular board game based on Pachisi). The design of the house in the game is reputed to be based on what was the Tudor Close Hotel in Rottingdean, Brighton and Hove, with early editions of the game being titled "Murder at Tudor Close".
Although the patent was granted in 1947, postwar shortages postponed the game's official United Kingdom launch until 1949. It was simultaneously licensed to Parker Brothers in the United States for publication, where it was renamed Clue, as the name "Ludo" was not widely known there, Pachisi-style games having been published under other names and brands, so the play on words would not have been generally understood.
Pratt sold the international rights for in 1953, but continued to receive UK royalties until the patent expired in 1967.
There were several differences between the original game concept and the one initially published in 1949. In particular, Pratt's original design calls for ten characters, one of whom was to be designated the victim by random drawing prior to the start of the game. These ten included the eliminated Mr. Brown, Mr. Gold, Miss Grey, and Mrs. Silver. The characters of Nurse White and Colonel Yellow were renamed Mrs. White and Colonel Mustard for the actual release. The game allowed for play of up to eight remaining characters, providing for nine suspects in total. Originally there were eleven rooms, including the eliminated gun room and cellar. In addition, there were nine weapons, including the unused bomb, syringe, shillelagh (walking stick/cudgel), fireplace poker, and the later used axe and poison. Some of these unused weapons and characters appeared later in spin-off versions of the game.
Some gameplay aspects were different as well. Notably, the remaining playing cards were distributed into the rooms to be retrieved, rather than dealt directly to the players. Players also had to land on another player in order to make suggestions about that player's character through the use of special tokens, and once exhausted, a player could no longer make suggestions. There were other minor differences, all of which were later updated by the game's initial release and remain essentially unchanged in the standard Classic Detective Game editions of the game.
The methodology used in the early versions of Cluedo is remarkably similar to a traditional, if little known, American card game: the king of hearts has five sons. at www.thegamesjournal.com. Retrieved 11 February 2019. However, Pratt himself said his inspiration was a murder mystery parlour game he used to play with friends in which youngsters "would congregate in each other's homes for parties at weekends. We'd play a stupid game called Murder, where guests crept up on each other in corridors and the victim would shriek and fall on the floor".How One British Soldier Turned a Parlor Game into Clue by Mary Pilon at mentalfloss.com. Retrieved 12 Feb 2019 The country house mystery was a popular subgenre of "cosy" English detective fiction in the 1920s and 1930s; stories were set in a residence of the gentry isolated by circumstances such as a snowstorm with the suspects gathered for a weekend house party.
Marketing Cluedo was originally marketed as "The Great New Detective Game" upon its launch in 1949 in North America. A deal was quickly struck to license "The Great New Sherlock Holmes Game" from the Sir Arthur Conan Doyle estate. Advertising at the time suggested players would take on the guise of "Sherlock Holmes following the path of the criminal", but no depictions of Holmes appear in the advertising or on the box. From 1950 until the 1960s, the game was marketed as "The Great Detective Game", at which time it became the "Parker Brothers Detective Game".
With the launch of the US 1972 edition, a television commercial showed Holmes and Watson engaged in a particularly competitive game. Adjusting with the times, in 1979 US television commercials a detective, resembling a bumbling Inspector Clouseau from the popular Pink Panther film franchise, looks for clues. In 1986, the marketing slogan added "Classic Detective Game" which persists through the last 2002/2003 edition.
In the UK, Cluedo was marketed as "The Great Detective Game" from the mid-1950s until 2000, when it was rebranded as the "Classic Detective Game". However, in the mid-1950s Waddingtons also adopted a Sherlock Holmes-type detective to adorn their box covers for a brief time, though unlike in the US editions, there was no acknowledgement that the character was actually the famous detective. In the 1980s, as in the US, Sherlock Holmes also appeared in TV advertising of the time, along with other classic detectives such as Sam Spade.
Game Equipment The game consists of a board which shows the rooms, corridors, and secret passages of an English country house called Tudor Mansion (named Tudor Close, Tudor Hall, Arlington Grange, Boddy Manor or Boddy Mansion in some editions) in Hampshire, England, in 1926. The game box also includes several coloured playing pieces to represent characters, miniature murder weapon props, two six-sided dice, three sets of cards (describing the aforementioned rooms, characters, or weapons), Solution Cards and an envelope (or a mirror in some editions) to contain one card from each set of cards and a Detective's Notes pad on which are printed lists of rooms, weapons, and characters, so players can keep detailed notes during the game.
Characters
The murder victim in the game was known as Dr. Black in the UK edition and Mr. Boddy in North American versions. Updated editions of the game, released by Hasbro in 2023, refer to him as Boden "Boddy" Black Jr.
Player tokens are typically plastic pawns or figurines; the standard edition of the game has six suspects:
Miss Scarlett (the second "t" was dropped in North American versions after 1963 and added back in 2016), the stock femme fatale character; she is represented by a red token/figurine. Colonel Mustard, a retired military officer with a distinguished career; he is represented by a yellow token/figurine. Mrs. White, the chief domestic servant, typically the housekeeper or cook, updated as "Chef White" in the 2023 edition; she is represented by a white token/figurine. In the 2016 edition Mrs. White was replaced by Dr. Orchid, a young biologist and adopted daughter of the victim, represented by a pink token. Dr. Orchid was replaced by Chef White in the 2023 UK and North American editions. Reverend Green, the local clergyman, updated as Mayor Green in the 2023 edition; he is represented by a green token/figurine. Known as Mr. Green in North American editions, initially a middle-aged businessman with possible criminal connections turned into a young and handsome playboy. Mrs. Peacock, a stylish widowed socialite, updated as "Solicitor Peacock" in the 2023 edition; she is represented by a blue token/figurine. Professor Plum, an intelligent yet absent-minded academic; he is represented by a purple token/figurine.
Weapons The weapon icons are typically made of unfinished pewter (except the rope, which may be plastic or string); special editions have included gold-plated, brass-finished, and sterling silver versions. Early versions of the game included lead piping that was made from actual lead, and which was replaced with a steel version in later editions.
Candlestick Dagger (Knife in North American editions) Lead piping (Lead pipe in North American editions) Revolver (first depicted in the UK as a Dreyse M1907 semi-automatic pistol,Dreyse M1907 WORLD WAR II and in North America as a Colt M1911 pistol) Rope Spanner (Wrench in North American editions)
Rooms
There are nine rooms in the mansion where the murder can take place, laid out around the edge of the square game board. They consist of the hall, the lounge, the dining room, the kitchen, the ballroom, the conservatory, the billiard room, the library, and the study. Each of the four corner rooms contains a secret passage that leads to the room on the opposite diagonal corner of the map. The centre room (often referred to as the cellar or the stairs) is inaccessible to the players, but contains the solution envelope and is not otherwise used during gameplay. Each suspect token has a designated start space marked at the edge of the board. The corridor areas are marked out as square spaces through which the tokens move horizontally or vertically.
Rules At the beginning of the play, three cards—one suspect, one room, and one weapon—are chosen at random and put into a special envelope, so that no one can see them. These cards represent the solution. The remainder of the cards are distributed among the players.
Players are instructed to assume the token/suspect nearest them. In older versions, the play begins with Miss Scarlett and proceeds clockwise. In modern versions, all players roll the die/dice and the highest total starts the game, with play again proceeding clockwise. Players roll the die/dice and move along the board's corridor spaces, or into the rooms accordingly.