Only Murders in the Building: The Game is a cooperative, deduction game.

Title: Only Murders in the Building: The Game

Year Published: 2024

Designer: Aaron Donogh, Prospero Hall, David Iezzi

Publisher: Funko Games

Players: 2-4

Game Time: ~45 minutes

Set-up Time: ~5 minutes

Ages: 8+

Theme: The ‘Only Murders in the Building’ TV Show.

Mechanisms: Deduction, Tile Placement

How to win: Find out which apartment the killer lives in before their accomplice can hide too many clues.

Game Description

Your neighbour in the Arconia has been murdered, and its time to take matters into your own hands (and, perhaps, your own podcast). Help beloved amateur investigators Mabel, Charles, and Oliver in this sharp-witted game of sleuthing and suspense!

How to play Only Murders in the Building: The Game

Learn the rules for Only Murders in the Building: The Game.

Main Mechanisms

We have deduction obviously, you have to eliminate the clues to narrow down the correct apartment.

There is also tile laying as you have to build a route to connect the suspect to the various pieces of evidence.

USP

Obviously if you’re a fan of the TV show like me then having a game set in this world is a joy. I would not have bought a deduction game like this with a generic theme.

Theme

The theme is the TV show starring Martin Short, Steve Martin and Selena Gomez who host a true crime podcast together. While doing so they help to solve murders, but only those in the building.

In this game, the building, the Arconia, is as much of a character as the people in it as it should be.

Setup & Rulebook

Setup is fine. Lots to shuffle and put out but it’s all ok. The hardest part is putting the card into the plastic base without looking at it, and putting it in the right way up!

The rulebook is clear.

Components & Artwork

The components are really good for the price. The clure tiles are a nice plastic and the Arconia front is really cool and very useful.

The art is minimal but the graphic design is simple which helps with game play.

Ease of Teaching

The game is very easy to teach. There are only 16 action cards and almost all of them have 1 (or both) of the two different actions on them. (Move and Search)

While in one round you can’t communicate about your cards in hand, co-op plays always lends itself well to rules questions.

Similar Games

I would say Cluedo, but co-op. I can’t really think of any hobby game like it.

Only Murders in the Building: The Game Review

Positives

Very nice components, especially for the price.

Interesting co-op gameplay that encourages table-talk and planning but…

…the restricted communication during card playthe action phase stops one person dicating play.

A fun puzzle.

Negatives

Might get too easy with repeat plays. There are ways to make it harder but there will be a point when it’s so tight it comes down to luck of where clues spawn.

Only Murders in the Building: The Game Round-Up

A fun game set in the world of a very fun TV show.

Rating

I give it 7/10