Murder Mystery

This blog covers the creation of our Murder Mystery game, working alongside Jacob Bellingham, we started work on 11/02/2024 and had until May 15th to finish it.

The project is to create a murder mystery game set on a train that is hurtling through space. The year is 40xx and the space travel industry has had some major reforms, space trains are no longer making money, everyone wants to go on space cruises, or use instant teleportation, the middle ground is now deemed as pointless or old fashioned. Due to this, the space train industry has moved on, and the final train is having it's last trip across the system. Because it is the final voyage, the head of the company, son of the man who invented luxury space train travel, is joining everyone for the journey. However, he is murdered while on the train, and you must solve the mystery before you arrive at your final destination.

You have 1 hour to complete the game, fail and you arrive at the station and the perpetrator escapes. There are multiple endings as any one of the suspects can be fingered as the killer. But will you solve the mystery correctly?

Character descriptions

The following are written descriptions of the characters involved in the game.

Player (Unseen) (Murderer)
Player makes their own name, the player icon is of a shadowed character, unseen face, detective hat, anonymous. The player is secretly the murderer, it is only revealed in the final secret ending.

Staff Bot
Name varies on job application. Very rigid, unyielding, must function by the book/code, is only somewhat helpful. Each outfit has different persona. Bar staff sad, janitor happy, etc.

Sir Leon (Victim)
Stuffy and posh, well dressed, son of the man who started this company he is only here because he hast to be. He is responsible for the company leaving behind the trains and moving on to more modern modes of transportation.

Katty [PussyCat]
The singer who is only available to talk to between her performances in the bar. She is a femme fetal, black coded, Luisiana accent. She has worked several years on the train service and is now losing her job and the limelight, she wishes for revenge.

Maggie
The extremely aggressive scottish poodle who is a red herring, you hear about them and everyone talks them up to be dangerous, then you meet them and they are a 4ft tall poodle. They wish death upon everyone. Her father died of heartbreak after losing his job as the train conductor and as such Maggie hates Leon and his family for killing her father.

Brie
Young female mouse who is a stowaway on the train, she is a thief who’s identity stays a mystery throughout the gamne, her motives are unknown, unless accused at the end of the game, where the police will identify her as a world famous thief, probably after money or jewels on the train/Sir Leon.

Orlando
The Possem who is a famous actor, his ability to give theatrical deaths on screen has mesmerised and scared many fans. Towards the end of the time limit, he will fake his own death, making the player think the killer has struck again, but he can be accused anyway, where he will then stand up and reveal he faked his death. Sir Leon has been blackmailing him for quite some time, Orlando was only invited as a way to keep him under Sir Leons thumb. Maybe he finally decided to end the blackmailing… Forcefully.

Hootington
The well known butler of Sir Leon, he travels everywhere with his master, but he is an absolute moron, he calls himself Hootington thinking it makes him look important, but nobody is fooled. His real name is Barry. He has been a servent for all of his life and has never been appreciated, perhaps years of neglect finally got to him.