Collection essentials #175: Clue (SNES)

This is another childhood game of mine, another one my mom found secondhand for cheap at a yard sale, sometime in the ‘90s. 

You’re probably familiar with the board game Clue, which this game is obviously based on, about solving the mystery of who killed Mr. Boddy by visiting various rooms and slowly verifying which weapons, people and rooms were not involved in the crime until one player figures it out through process of elimination. You also may wonder how it works in video game form, since it’s a game that involves different players holding cards that they’re not supposed to show their opponents.

Well, the answer is that the video game works a little differently than the board game, something that I think works in the game’s favor because it makes it a little different and therefore worth a try, in my opinion. The basic setup of the game is the same, the players are still dealt a series of cards. Basically, to view your cards, you have to go in a special menu, and when you do, they’re all hidden by default; you have to hold down a button to reveal each card, before which you will presumably ask the other players in the room to look away or close their eyes.

But the process of picking a card to reveal each time another player makes a guess would be too tedious, so that’s where the game mixes things up. When you make a suggestion, instead of another player showing you a card that they’re holding, the game instead gives you a piece of information about either the person, weapon or room that you selected. Before the game you can pick between several difficulty levels, and the amount of information given in the clue depends on which one you picked. 

I dig the presentation in this version. When you’re moving around on the board there’s no music, but when a clue is revealed or accusation is made, then the tunes start playing, and you’ll find that each character has their own theme and each weapon has its own little jingle to give the game a little flair. The graphics are well-done, too, and I like how all the characters look.

I may not have put this game on the list if it wasn’t nostalgic for me, but I still hold that it’s a solid adaptation of the popular game nonetheless, and may still be worth checking out even today.