Top Games Like Clue to Play Next

If you are relatively new to the board gaming community, chances are you know what Clue is. Clue is a well-known and classic board game that has been marketed to the masses, like Monopoly or Guess Who. It is a great starting piece because it is easy to understand.

My friends and I got hooked on Clue during my early days of diving into the scene. We repeatedly played it for hours and hours on end. Eventually, though, our detective minds got tired of the same gameplay. Thankfully, we managed to find similar games to Clue that satiated our thirst for deduction and mystery.

Do you and your friends also want a taste of something new yet familiar to Clue? This piece aims to help those players who fit the same boat as us years ago. I have separated them into different categories; thus, if you like Clue based on a specific element, you can find the one you want!

My Top Picks at a Glance

All the entries listed here are fantastic experiences, and I suggest you try them all and see which fits your group best. However, if you do not have the luxury of doing so, my short list of top picks for each category will help you.

My Top Pick for Murder-Mystery Board Games like Clue

Deception: Murder in Hong Kong: If my friends and I want a board game with the same simplicity as Clue but with more depth and expression, we would choose Deception: Murder in Hong Kong. It eliminates the bad parts of Clue and expands on the good ones. In Clue, I would only interact with others by asking them about their cards, but in this game, we can have fun debates and conversations as the murderer tries to hide among us.

My Top Pick for Deduction Board Games like Clue

Cryptid: Cryptid is a refreshing entry to the deduction board games category because of its unique approach to the genre. We find it simple to learn, but it is ultimately up to your deduction powers to seize the victory. You can replay the game many times due to having different setups and difficulty settings. The game is not too short, but also not too long.

My Top Pick for Puzzle Board Games like Clue

Mansions of Madness: Mansions of Madness is incredibly innovative and a perfect example of adapting technology to board games. Our group initially had a rough time setting it up and getting invested, but once we started playing, we had the time of our lives. The app held our hands throughout the experience but not too much to spoil the fun. The possibilities of what you can do in this game make it my top pick for this category.

My Top Pick for Memory Board Games like Clue

Witness: What makes Witness my top pick is because of how it challenges the players to use what they learn and remember to solve the case. Paired with a whopping 64 cases to choose from with varying difficulty, you can expect to play this game for a long time. The order of whispering per round is also a neat spin on this mechanic.

Selection Criteria

In choosing the best ones similar to Clue, we are looking for the following:

Requires mental effort: We find Clue fun because of how it challenges our minds. It rewards players who can quickly think and deduce based on what they know. Thus, the games in this list must also accomplish the same sense of challenge and satisfaction.
Improves mechanics or elements: Despite the charm Clue has to offer, it has many flaws in its system. For example, our games tend to be too straightforward. We are looking for games that have similar elements to Clue but either improve on its foundation or remove the boring bits.
Encourages social interaction: When I played Clue with my friends, I always loved reading people’s facial expressions and minds. Social interaction is a big part of Clue’s gameplay, but it does not utilize it well. We are looking for something that, like Clue, pushes us to talk with the other players to achieve our goal.

While every entry in this list follows these guidelines, they differ from each other in terms of what they excel at. So, I divided this list based on four categories: murder mystery, deduction, puzzle, and memory.

While one game may be in one category, it does not automatically mean it does not fit in the other categories. For example, Deception: Murder in Hong Kong is a great murder-mystery game, but it also heavily relies on everyone’s deduction skills.

The Best Murder-Mystery Board Games like Clue

Deception: Murder in Hong Kong

Release date: 2014
of players: 4 to 12 players
Average play duration: 15 to 30 minutes
Age recommendation: 12 and above
Difficulty rating: 3/10

When I play Clue, I love the element of guessing who the killer is and what weapon they chose to enact the deed. It adds depth to the character and theme. Deception: Murder in Hong Kong expands on these elements, making it a stronger and more profound experience.

During the setup, all players are given roles; one plays the role of the forensic scientist who acts as the game master. I suggest giving this role to the talkative one in our group to make the atmosphere lively. Another plays the role of the killer, and the rest are investigators.

Everyone receives four Means cards and four Clue cards; the killer secretly chooses one for each category from their set. During the game, the GM lays out six clues. One is the cause of death, another is the location of the crime, and the rest are randomized elements.

Why are they important? When I play as the GM, I try to connect these events to the killer’s chosen means and clues. For example, if the killer chose a sock as their clue, I can mark Quentin Tarantino’s house as a possible location.

Mystery of the Abbey

Release date: 1995
of players: 3 to 6 players
Average play duration: 1 to 2 hours
Age recommendation: 10 and above
Difficulty rating: 4/10

Mystery of the Abbey is like Clue, but instead of colorful investigators, my friends and I roleplay as monks. Honesty is a core concept in both games, and this interaction is a fun mechanic; Mystery of the Abbey incorporates the idea with more freedom and creativity.

You have 24 suspects to choose from, which sounds like a lot, until you find out they only differ in order, title, their length of beard, weight, facial hair, and if they are wearing a hood. The last one might seem weird, but these monks may be insecure about their baldness, so we will let it slide.

Like in Clue, you shuffle the suspect cards and hide one as the killer. During the game, you can visit various locations, and some of them have special effects. When you end up in a room with someone else, you can ask them anything considering the answer is not a suspect name.

They can choose to answer or not, and if they do, they must do it honestly, which can be the perfect opportunity to learn if your girlfriend is cheating on you or not (damn you, Claire!).

Mysterium

Release date: 2015
of players: 2 to 7 players
Average play duration: 45 minutes to 1 hour
Age recommendation: 10 and above
Difficulty rating: 4/10

Sure, I can solve a murder through investigation and deduction, but why not ask the ghost myself? Mysterium has the same energy, but one player plays as the ghost while the others play as psychics.

Each psychic has three categories they must deduce in the following order: a culprit, location, and weapon. Only the ghost knows them, and they will give hints to each psychic using vision cards. They contain cryptic images, and it is up to the ghost to connect them to the psychic’s answer.

For example, if my mate James’ culprit is an influencer wearing a Supreme hat, I can give him a vision card depicting a man without a tongue, since the culprit lost his taste.

Everyone loses if they have not finished all their categories within seven rounds. Otherwise, the ghost chooses a psychic’s group of categories as the final suspect. The ghost will reveal three vision cards connected to them, and the psychics must vote for a group. If the vote is correct, everyone wins!

Blood on the Clocktower

Release date: 2022
of players: 5 to 10 players
Average play duration: 1 to 2 hours
Age recommendation: 15 and above
Difficulty rating: 6/10

Werewolf is a classic game similar to Clue that I suggest you play with your friends. I find it especially fun with many people, though not so much if you are the game master. Eventually, keeping track of who the harlot is sleeping with gets hard.

Blood on the Clocktower, a relatively new piece, reinvents the wheels of this game. Everyone has a unique role, and there are two teams: the good and bad sides. The good side consists of the townsfolks while the other consists of the demons and minions.

One player must play as the storyteller, and I suggest giving this role to either the most organized or creatively descriptive, since I have not met anyone having both traits. The game has two phases: a day and a night phase. At night, most players perform an action based on their role.

During the day, players vote to eliminate someone. Unlike Werewolf, dead players can still talk, cooperate, and even vote.

The Best Deduction Board Games like Clue

Scotland Yard

Release date: 1983
of players: 3 to 6 players
Average play duration: 30 to 45 minutes
Age recommendation: 8 and above
Difficulty rating: 4/10

Scotland Yard is an 80s board game that still holds quite well in the modern landscape. I have talked about this piece in another article I wrote, i.e., my guide for the best 1980s board games, so I suggest you check it out for a more detailed description.

Someone plays as Mr. X, an on-the-run fugitive, and it is the rest of the players’ job to catch him. I love playing as Mr. X when we play with our group because I love the thrill of being chased.

The game consists of a board that represents the map of Central London marked with various locations and routes connecting them, although I think the Philippines would have been a better representation because of how confusing the public transport system is.

Throughout the game, players relocated positions through the connected routes by paying the corresponding route’s ticket. Mr. X will discretely move his location by writing it down in his logbook and covering it with his spent ticket.

Everyone can see the tickets Mr. X used to try triangulate his position. I say try, because when I play with my friends, they seem to move about with no strategy in mind.

Letters from Whitechapel

Release date: 2011
of players: 2 to 6 players
Average play duration: 1 to 2 hours
Age recommendation: 12 and above
Difficulty rating: 5/10

Jack the Ripper was a well-known serial killer in London who murdered prostitutes in 1888. No one ever uncovered his identity, so he could be anyone.

Letters from Whitechapel, a game mechanically similar to Scotland Yard, revolves around these events. Someone plays as Jack, while the others play as the police. Jack’s goal is to kill five women over four nights without being caught, while the police’s goal is to capture him.

Like my nights, each night is separated into two parts; the first part is of me playing video games and sucking at them while the second is of me crying myself to sleep for losing.

In Letters from Whitechapel, the first consists of nine phases where the police anticipate Jack to strike, while the second has three where the police try to find him. Jack marks his potential victims, but some are duds. The police have dud patrols too, which I hate when I play as Jack.

Cryptid

Release date: 2018
of players: 3 to 5 players
Average play duration: 45 minutes to 1 hour
Age recommendation: 10 and above
Difficulty rating: 4/10

The loch ness monster, yeti, and Dennis Rodman are some of the many legendary creatures that confuse and interest me. They are elusive beings, so you must have the power of deduction to locate them; this search is what Cryptid is all about, though Rodman might just be in North Korea again.

The game’s map consists of hexes with varying habitats, animal territories, and structures. At the start, each player receives similarly-colored cubes, discs, and a clue book about the creature’s possible location. Unlike my aunt’s conspiracy theories, the clue books are not from nameless wikis on the net.

Players take turns, and you can question or search on your turn. You can ask others about a potential location, and they can do the same to you.

Based on their clues, they place a disc if it is possible, or a cube if not. When you ask everyone about a hex and they all place discs, you discovered the creature!

Alchemists

Release date: 2014
of players: 2 to 4 players
Average play duration: 2 to 3 hours
Age recommendation: 13 and above
Difficulty rating: 8/10

Clue has a process of trial and error that I find challenging. Don’t you hate it when you have a suspicion, and your friend proves you wrong when they ask you? Alchemists, a game about creating potions, also has this element.

Alchemists is a game of experimentation and theory-crafting. You pick two ingredients and mix them to make a potion. Each ingredient has a unique elemental composition that determines the outcome, and it is your job to figure out what their composition is.

On your turn, you can gather ingredients, buy useful items for your quest, make potions, test them out, and even sell them.

By rigorously mixing ingredients, at some point, you will conclude what they are made of. Publish a theory for it, and if you get it right, you earn points! Guess wrong, and you will lose points instead.

The Best Puzzle Board Games like Clue

Chronicles of Crime

Release date: 2018
of players: 1 to 4 players
Average play duration: 1 to 2 hours
Age recommendation: 12 and above
Difficulty rating: 4/10

In Chronicles of Crime, you and your friends play as a police force police obsessed with QR codes since you need them to play. Technology has come a long way, to the point where my friends can use their phones while playing board games, and I cannot complain.

To play this game, you must have its app on your phone and select a case. The app will give you relevant information, but it is still your job to question people and investigate locations. Whenever you talk to someone, you must scan the QR code on their card using the app.

Sometimes, suspects, witnesses, and allies may point you to a location. To begin your investigation, you also scan the respective card’s QR code. I cannot imagine a policeman walking to a corpse, pulling out his phone, and scanning a nearby code for more info.

If you find interesting objects during the investigation, you can scan the QR codes on the object cards. Whenever you talk or investigate, time will advance, and how fast you finish will contribute to your score.

Sherlock Holmes Consulting Detective (Series)

Release date: 1982 to 2020
of players: 1 to 8 players
Average play duration: 1 to 2 hours
Age recommendation: 12 and above
Difficulty rating: 5/10

Sherlock Holmes is one, if not the most, iconic fictional detective in history, and I suspect Robert Downey Jr., Benedict Cumberbatch, and Henry Cavill as some of the main driving forces. Who else fell in love with Cavill’s acting in Enola Holmes?

In the Sherlock Holmes Consulting Detective games, everyone competes with Holmes to finish the cases in the most efficient way possible.

All of the cases differ in many elements but follow the same gameplay mechanic. You receive a lead, find a person of interest, get some information out of them, and visit different locations for investigation. It is similar to what I did after I discovered someone ate my lunch at work (I know it was you, Samantha).

The game challenges the player’s puzzle-solving intuition; talk to the wrong person or visit an unrelated location, and you might come to a dead-end. I mentioned the first game in the series, i.e., the Thames Murders and Other Cases, in my “Best 1980s Board Game Guide,” so check it out.

Mansions of Madness: Second Edition

Release date: 2016
of players: 1 to 5 players
Average play duration: 2 to 3 hours
Age recommendation: 12 and above
Difficulty rating: 5/10

Scooby Doo is one of my favorite childhood cartoon series. When I think about it, the gang are much like detectives; they investigate mysterious circumstances to explain their secrets.

Mansions of Madness has a similar vibe, but instead of fake ghosts, you are against Lovecraftian horrors. To play, you must have the game’s app on your phone and select a scenario. The app will guide you on how to set up your game, including the starting items, clues, spells, and locations.

Players take the role of investigators wandering in haunted mansions. My girlfriend thought it would be a scary experience since she is not a fan of the horror genre, but after a couple of hours in the game, she had a blast.

You can move and interact with objects to unravel the scenario’s mysteries. You may even encounter different kinds of puzzles you must solve to move forward, and they are the parts my brainiac friends love.

Unlike typical detective games, monsters can attack you. They can inflict physical or mental pain; you must survive the ordeals you may encounter and work together as a team to win.

Exit (Series)

Release date: 2016 to 2022
of players: 1 to 6 players
Average play duration: 1 to 2 hours
Age recommendation: 12 and above
Difficulty rating: 5/10

Escape rooms are exciting experiences that challenge your brain to think deeply. I only tried it once because it is such a niche hobby in our city, but my friends and I instantly fell in love. If you love racking your brain in Clue, you might love the Exit board game series.

The many Exit games vary in story and theme, but they have common elements. The box provides you with the vital components to create and solve the mysteries of each case. They also contain riddle, answer, and help cards.

It can feel intimidating. My friends and I would play jazz noir themes to add some appropriate ambiance, and I recommend you do the same to ease up the tension.

When you scan the game’s main booklet, you may find pictures of riddle cards; when you do, take the specific card and decipher it since it can give you clues on how to solve other puzzles. If you feel stuck, the help cards will clue you in.

I recommend starting with The Abandoned Cabin, Dead Man on the Orient Express, or The Pharaoh’s Tomb.

The Best Memory Board Games like Clue

Witness

Release date: 2014
of players: 4 players
Average play duration: 15 to 30 minutes
Age recommendation: 12 and above
Difficulty rating: 3/10

Another childhood classic of mine is The Adventures of Tintin, specifically Red Rackham’s Treasure, The Seven Crystal Balls, and The Prisoners of the Sun. Another classic cartoon, Blake and Mortimer, is an adult version of Tintin, and it is the subject of this board game called Witness.

Witness has four investigators working on one of up to 64 cases with varying difficulty. If you are noobs like us, you should start with the easy ones. The game spans four rounds, and in each round, players whisper clues in the order shown on the whisper tile.

I recommend playing this game somewhere a bit quiet; we once tried to do it in a crowded café, and we could not hear each other. Everyone has a unique clue that they must relay to other players, and they can only take notes after the fourth round.

Then, the players are presented with a series of questions they must individually answer on their sheets. After everyone is done, look at the answers in the answer book and score points based on how many you got right.

Coup

Release date: 2012
of players: 2 to 6 players
Average play duration: 15 to 30 minutes
Age recommendation: 10 and above
Difficulty rating: 3/10

Coups are hardly a fun topic to discuss, unless we are talking about the 2012 murder-mystery game. I have talked about this game in another article, i.e., the “Best Gateway Board Games Guide,” so I suggest reading it to give you a clearer picture of what it is.

In Coup, you take the role of a family head with connections to powerful people. Everyone’s goal is to be the last man standing using your influence. The cards represent the people you control, and they each have different uses.

What I love about this game is that you can bluff which cards you have. For example, my go-to strategy is to claim that I have a duke (a card that helps me gather gold), even if I have two captains.

However, your friends can do the same to you. So, I suggest that you look for social cues to tell if your friends are lying.

If you are out of cards, you are out of the game. Another good strategy I can recommend is to have an ambassador and look through the draw pile to narrow down your friends’ cards.

Survive: Escape from Atlantis!

Release date: 1982
of players: 2 to 4 players
Average play duration: 45 minutes to 1 hour
Age recommendation: 8 and above
Difficulty rating: 3/10

Another fantastic memory game that does not rely on the murder-mystery theme is Survive: Escape from Atlantis. Like Sherlock Holmes Consulting Detective, I featured this game in my “Best 1980s Board Games Guide.” Like Clue, you need to remember the elements of the game to ensure a victory.

The game’s story centers around a sinking island, and I theorize that the game takes place in 2025. At the start, every player places their meeples on the map, and each piece has a numbered value.

You have to remember which is which because getting a meeple to safety scores you a point equal to its value. I like to think of the numbers as their net worth since the world revolves around capitalism.

You need to misdirect the other players since they might sabotage your efforts to save your most-valued piece. The island gradually sinks as the game progresses, and many obstacles can hinder you like whales, sea serpents, and sharks. Also, keep an eye out on the other players’ meeples and sabotage their plan!

Frequently Asked Questions

Question: Which of the games like Clue are for adults?

Answer: Deception: Murder in Hong Kong is a game like Clue that leans more toward adults because of its mature theme. While Clue only dictates the weapon used, the forensic scientist in Deception: Murder in Hong Kong may point out the method, affected body parts, and more. It can get brutally descriptive!

Question: Which of the games like Clue are good for two players?

Answer: I recommend puzzle-centric games, namely the Chronicles of Crime and Sherlock Holmes Consulting Detective games. One player can be challenging, and three or more players can get too crowded, but two players working on a case perfectly fit.

Question: Which of the games like Clue are available online?

Answer: Someone made a website that emulates Deception: Murder in Hong Kong called Krimi, and I highly recommend you check it out. You can create a lobby for your friends to join and play. Other ones for Coup, called Chicken Koup, and Cryptid, on Play Cryptid, are also available online.

Conclusion

If you mention to someone who is not into board games that board games are your hobby, they will likely mention Clue. It is like Monopoly and Guess Who; it has earned its way to fame because of years and years of intense marketing.

Many veterans dunk on it because it taints the image of what modern board games have to offer, but it is hard to ignore that many people started getting into board games because of pieces like Clue. I played Clue back in the day with my friends and remembered the fun times we had.

With this guide, I hope I helped someone willing to dip their toes in the world of board games after playing Clue. I agree that it is incredibly entertaining with close friends and family, but there are games out there that have more to offer.