The Mansion Murder

A murder mystery in a huge, dark mansion for one to six detectives. Someone has been killed by one of six suspects, with one of six weapons, in one of nine rooms. Explore twelve screens of floor plan, 52 rooms with stairways and secret passages that change from game to game, your lamp lighting each room as you walk in. Each turn allows 75 steps. The eighteen suspects, weapons and rooms not involved are clues hidden one to a room; walk in to find one, and it goes in your notebook. A suspect can be questioned in his or her own room, once per player, at a cost of 20 steps: an innocent one reveals a clue you have not found; the murderer saw nothing. Make an accusation: right and you have solved the case, wrong and you are out.

Controls: The stick walks. The right button opens the menu (notebook, question, accuse, end turn, end game); in menus the stick chooses and the left button picks. Either controller works.

ColecoVision version credited in the source to Claude (an AI made by Anthropic) for Amy Studio, in Amy, the language by Amy Bienvenu, 2026: a reimagined adaptation of the published rules. From Ahoy! No. 15, March 1985, page 14: original Commodore 64 program by Orson Scott Card. Printed as two programs, Mansion Display Setup and Mansion Game, as the game board of a column article; readers were left to program the mystery themselves. The murder, suspects, weapons, clues and questioning are new in this version. This is a modern homebrew adaptation, not a commercial Coleco release.