Today we have something a little bit different to tell you about and I would like to thank Emma at Damppebbles Blog Tours and After Dark, the makers of FOUL PLAY for inviting me to take part in the blog tour for this interesting new card game.
FOUL PLAY
The Murder Mystery Card Game
The Manor House Murder
A game for 2 – 5 players | Age 14 +
£8.95 + p&p
Facebook : @afterdarkmystery | Twitter : @afterdarkmurder | Instagram : @afterdarkmurder
Email : info@afterdarkmurder.co.uk
The Game
Welcome to Edwardian England. The Lord of the Manor is dead! The servants are our lead suspects and it’s up to you to unearth the evidence, seek out the suspects and catch the culprit in order to scupper the other sleuths, and win this game of murder!
History of Foul Play
What’s a Murder Mystery Events Company to do?
With a pandemic sweeping the nation and no sign of being able to perform their confounding criminal cabarets or incredible interactive investigations any time soon, they needed to come up with a plan, another way to provide mystery to the masses (and provide income to keep themselves afloat)!
Well, lockdown does strange things to people, especially actors who can’t go out and perform. So one fateful evening, Ben & Lee Cooper-Muir decided to come up with a whole new way to murder people. Keeping their cards close to their chests they plotted and schemed until Foul Play : The Murder Mystery Card Game was born. So, what to do next? This is where After Dark enters the picture. After all, Ben and Lee were two of the operators of the infamous murder mystery company. Maybe they could collaborate to bring the game to the masses. When Lockdown restrictions were eased a top-secret meeting was held with the other criminal masterminds behind After Dark, Helen Burrows, Sophie Webster & Tom Fisher and a pact was made. The game would be launched and licensed under the After Dark banner. In true After Dark style, the team burst into action and then began the beta testing, design updates, promotional planning, character changes, proofing, proofing and more proofing until finally all the kinks were ironed out, mysteries solved, and FOUL PLAY came to life!
My husband and I do enjoy card games and board games, particularly during 2020 since we’ve been stuck at home so much. So when I heard about the FOUL PLAY blog tour, I jumped at the chance to add another game to our collection.
My husband describes FOUL PLAY as a mix of Cluedo and Guess Who – two of my favourite childhood games.
Initially, we were a bit confused by the rules that came with the pack, however all becomes apparent after you start to work your way through a first game. The Foul Play website also provides some further instructions and useful FAQ’s.
The game has two possible versions – Good Cop and Bad Cop. We started by playing the Good Cop variation, which I would recommend whilst still learning the rules. We played through a couple of times, quickly learning the rules and the ‘actions’. Each game took us approximately 15-20 minutes.
We then moved on to playing the Bad Cop variation. Our first attempt was scuppered by the fact that you have to remove 12 of the evidence cards from the pack for the Good Cop variation and I forgot to add them back in when we started to play the Bad Cop version (oops!). Once we were able to properly give the Bad Cop variation a go, we we both agreed that this was our favourite version of the game. This version provides a longer and more tactical game play.
To get the most out of this game you really need to play it several times, until you learn the different cards/actions and get an understanding of the game. After a couple of games, I found that I started to think a bit differently and put more thought into my decisions. A good memory and a tactical mind will certainly prove helpful when playing FOUL PLAY. You have to remember what evidence you’ve seen, who holds what evidence and a range of suspect names and descriptions.
FOUL PLAY would make a great stocking filler or secret Santa gift. I’m sure we will be playing it again over the Christmas holidays, particularly when we have a few more family members to play against – I have a feeling it could get quite competitive!
Big thanks to After Dark for providing us with a great couple of hours entertainment on a wintery Friday night!
Check out the other stops on the blog tour and find out what my fellow book bloggers thought of this new game…
The Curious Ginger Cat 
Thanks for being part of the blog tour x
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You’re welcome, it was good fun 🙂 x
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