FAQs

If you think you have the skills you need to act as our licensed provider within your region, taking responsibility for casting and running events booked through us and acquiring and running your own bookings please get in touch.

Franchise holders have their own operating patch and provide our evenings under license.

We have very strict operating guidelines to maintain quality, and provide our licensees with friendly support day to day, so we don’t take people on lightly. All approaches should be made initially via email.

We do supply scripts to many of our clients. These are available on a single use, single venue license. If your evening is “not for profit” (i.e. a private party or a fundraising event), then you should shop with us under a domestic license. If your event is to be a commercial event (e.g. a guest house with paying guests, a hotel or an Am Dram group who is being hired in to run an evening), then you should be shopping as a commercial customer. Please be honest with us, as we pay our authors a royalty fee and it’s important our authors are properly paid for the time and effort they have put into writing the game for your enjoyment.

We supply several different styles of murder mystery evening which means it’s hard to provide any “hard and fast” rules as to what an evening will entail.

However, just to give you an idea, if you have a fully cast event, then as guests you act as detectives. Your role is to watch, listen and interrogate. However, if you opt for a participative game then YOU are the suspects which means you have a bigger role to play in the evening and ONE of you will be the murderer!

After paying you should be directed immediately back to our site to a screen with the download links embedded on the page. Click these links to download your order to allow printing.

After clicking the links your computer should open up a file download box on your screen. When this happens click “save” and specify a folder you can find easily once it’s finished, e.g. My Documents, or the desktop. Sometimes computers will automatically save files into a “download” folder, every computer is slightly different, but if you get stuck, just use your file search option to locate them based on the file names.

After download open up the folder you specified and within it should be the game files you downloaded.

There are several reasons your order may not be complete when it arrives.

You may have ordered a mix of items, some of which are shipped from the supplier directly. e.g. Music CDs and Wine Charms are both shipped directly to you from the manufacturer.

Sometimes we split an order to take advantage of the best postage rate or service. This often happens if you order multiple kits, or several large accessories or gifts.

If the rest of your order fails to show up within a week please get in touch. Just occasionally we make a mistake or the postal services lose half an order.

PLEASE NOTE: We never break apart a full murder mystery game.

If you are missing a component of a murder mystery game then please contact us immediately.

We have no machines in the office who pack for us, everything is handled by real people, and if we haven’t had enough coffee one morning, we know mistakes can happen. If you find your order isn’t complete, you’re missing a booklet or a set of labels – just drop us a line and allow us to fix it!

If you found out about it too late to fix it before your party, and we aren’t immediately available to help via email or phone – then please order the downloadable version of your game and use the PDF copy for the missing booklet, or MP3 file for the missing CD. Contact us immediately and we will reimburse you for your order as it was our mistake!

If you would like some files in MSword rather than PDF to allow you to adjust designs, booklet titles, names or add a picture of your choice then please contact us after purchasing your game and request it. Please make sure you quote your order reference number so we can find which game you ordered, and we will forward you an MSword copy as soon as we can.

Sometimes it is easier if we adapt the booklets for you, so if you want a customisation to format then please get in touch and we’ll try and help.

All our dinner party game booklets print single sided for ease of use. If you would prefer a double sided copy then we can do this for you – please get in touch.

1. Print everything off!
2. Do one booklet at a time. Separate your booklet so that the cover is to one side.
3. Fold all your sheets in half so that the printed side is outermost.
4. Put the cover (the one with the picture on) to one side.
5. Gather all the other pages together in a bunch so that the folded edges are on the right and the open edges are on the left.
6. THIS NEXT STEP IS OPTIONAL (and just for the more pedantic of us).
   If you want to make the booklets look especially neat then use a pair of scissors, or a guillotine to cut approx ½ centimetre from each OPEN edge. Taking care to make sure that the amount taken from each page is identical.
7. Slot these folded pages inside the cover sheet so that the open edges are INSIDE the cover, in the middle where the fold is.
8. Close the booklet and staple twice, once at the top and once at the bottom of the folded edge. This should secure all the pages within the booklet together.
9. Then carry on and do the rest of the booklets!

Remember – if you want to personalise your party: make your own booklet covers. Information on how to do this is contained in the “Making the most of your theme” file which you downloaded.

If you are using a domestic printer – one which only prints on one side of A4 paper, you’ll probably find it easier to use the “single sided print” version. These assemble in a unique way… not easily explained in writing…so please watch the video below which will explain how that works!

When the booklets first print out, it may look a little odd, perhaps even out of order, but don’t worry – it does all come together into booklet format.

Rest assured, instructions are included in the game materials for how to assemble these booklets, however if you wanted to see exactly what is involved, and how they look after printing then please watch the video above, or read on.

If you are using a commercial printer – one which prints double sided, then you need to print the “double sided print” version.

Customers who aren’t familiar with print settings sometimes call us to tell us every second page is printing upside down. This isn’t a problem with the file, but rather with your printer settings.

When asking a printer to print double sided, you need to specify printing in LANDSCAPE and also how the paper turns. Every printer calls the page turn method something different. Some will say “book turn” some will call it “Left or Right side margin”, others will call it a “short side flip” turn. So you need to find out what your printer calls it and specify that.

In general, it’s not the “Booklet printing” setting. So that’s something to watch out for and ignore.

We do talk people through print methods regularly, so don’t feel an idiot if you have to phone up and have us talk you through your printer settings. We won’t laugh at you.

There are two different formats of booklets available to download. Both are printed differently.

In our murder mystery games for dinner parties we provide a voice recording for an inspector who leads you through the mystery game, providing an introduction, case updates, summary and conclusion.

These voice over MP3 files are exactly identical to the character booklet for the inspector which is also provided at no extra charge.

Using the voice over files on the night means you and your guests can all play a suspect. If you would prefer to facilitate the mystery yourself as the inspector then you can use the character booklet provided instead.

All our MP3 files are recorded professionally. When we adapt a game to order we cannot always amend these voice over files as we do not have a recording studio in our offices! However we have an arrangement with the people who do our recordings, and if you request an adaptation and still want the voice over part we can negotiate a one-off recording cost for you, charges will apply. One off recordings take time to create and we usually need at least a month’s notice to create one for you.

Yes they will. All the files are PDF or MP3 files. All of which should cause no problems for MAC users.

If you struggle to download them – just email us, often we can send them directly to your email address instead, and 9 times out of 10 that resolves the problem.

After paying you should be directed immediately back to our site to a screen with the download links embedded on the page. Click these links to download your order to allow printing.

After clicking the links your computer should open up a file download box on your screen. When this happens click “save” and specify a folder you can find easily once it’s finished, e.g. My Documents, or the desktop. Sometimes computers will automatically save files into a “download” folder, every computer is slightly different, but if you get stuck, just use your file search option to locate them based on the file names.

After download open up the folder you specified and within it should be the game files you downloaded.

We never advise giving guests their character booklets in advance of the party as just occasionally one will forget to bring it along and then the party turns into chaos!

However as our downloadable copies and our printed copies are formed from the same database you can usually fix a last minute hiccup like this by ordering the downloadable version of the same game. Your forgetful guest can then use that PDF copy instead of the original booklet on the evening (either by reading it from a tablet, or by printing it off).

If this happens to you – just email us after the party and explain what’s happened. In most cases we will reimburse the cost of the downloadable game. We reserve the right to refuse a refund if we can’t trace your original order and confirm that it WAS your game – so ensure you have your customer order number to quote.

It is possible to remove a character from your party, but not easy, and NOT if you need to go from 6 to 5 (as you might inadvertently remove the murderer!) If you have 8 or more guests, it’s often possible to adjust the games DIY.

Firstly find the booklets of the last character(s) in your invitation list. These are always the more “optional”.

If you are just removing one, check that the one you leave behind doesn’t speak AFTER the person you plan to remove. If they do, you will need to write over the top of their introduction and concluding statements so that they now speak after the person who is still IN the game (the person mentioned in the booklet you have removed).

Now pull apart the booklet of the character you plan to remove and set aside the pages with the questions and answers.

Cut the questions out. Taking care to keep them in different piles for rounds 1, 2 and 3.

Now go through the other guests booklets finding the questions they would have asked the character you removed. Staple or stick one of your “cut up” questions over the top of any questions you find. Making sure you put the right question in the right round!!

As host, any time your missing guest is supposed to speak in the shared dialogue at the start of the rounds, just read in their lines.

The extra will still be mentioned on the voice recording, but game play should work.

If you don’t want to go through the process of sticking the questions over the top of the questions for your missing guests in the other players booklets, you can instead tell the guests there were 2 other characters who are now not playing. Cut up the questions and place them on the table in 3 pots, for rounds 1 2 and 3. As a guest finds they have a question for a missing character they simply pull a replacement question out of the pot in the centre of the table (just make sure they take it from the right round!).

Why not try one of the following suggestions (all of which have been done by customers over the years):

• Have a person play two roles.
• Use a puppet for the extra guests.
• Invite a last minute “friend” – everyone loves a party and few will turn you down. And it’s a great way to get to know new people.
• Buy a game one less than you need and as host you take the role of the inspector.
• For numbers 8-20 you can sometimes remove a “spare” by tailoring the booklets of the remaining guests. This isn’t an easy undertaking, but it IS possible. (details below)

Yes. We can adjust a game by removing one character, and if we have notice, then we will try and accommodate any unusual requests too, e.g. three men and five women, six men and three women etc.

As a general rule we cannot reduce to a ratio of male : female below 3 : 3. And charges will apply.

Any requests for this should be made with at least two weeks advance notice, and you should check with us first before buying a game to ensure we are not too busy to meet your timescale.

When you make contact we will be able to tell you whether your request is possible, what the total price will be and take payment over the phone, or provide an invoice to you to pay at your convenience.

We regret that we are not always able to alter the voice recording speeches. Any alterations will be made to the inspector booklets, but the voice over will sometimes contain the additional omitted characters.

We can help as we’ve done this before.
However not all games will adapt to 5, but if you contact us we will see what we can do.

We understand how difficult it can be to organise a dinner party! Which is why, at no additional cost we will substitute your purchased game to one with a smaller number of players. However, please give us at least two working days to process a request!

If you ordered a custom printed kit – then we are happy to reprint your order, but unfortunately we will have to pass on to you the cost of reprinting your game. Standard “off the shelf” kits can be exchanged so long as the kit is returned to us undamaged.

If you expect you will lose just one couple, then give that couple (or yourselves) the last two optional characters on your game (you can check this by looking at a lower numbered game to see who is missed off). That way, if the couple can’t make it, everyone else can still come as the characters you originally asked them to be and we can easily swap the kit for you.

We can bespoke create “optional” guests with enough notice, fees will apply.