Why We Do Not Use AI to Write Our Murder Mystery Games
We are frequently asked, “Who writes your murder mystery games?”. While usually this question comes from a curious passerby at a con, a fan, or a fellow creative interested in the process, in today’s creative landscape, that question can also allude to a deeper question:
“Did AI write this?”
As a women-owned small business, we have always strived to be transparent, inclusive, and accountable to our community of creatives, first-time hosts, and geeks and gamers. As we expand our murder mystery game business, we wanted to take a moment and share with you why writing our own games is so important to us, and also to assure you that every Foulplay murder mystery game is lovingly (and sometimes panicky as we try to hit deadlines) crafted by yours truly, and assert that we will continue to do so.
AI is changing the world as we know it, and it is difficult to avoid AI entirely in the world we live in today. We think it’s important for people and companies to be clear on when their creative products are created by AI. In your life as you pick up a book, admire a piece of art, or open up one of our murder mystery games, we want you to have all the facts in choosing your products and to make informed decisions about the companies and artists you want to support.
It’s worth pointing out that we are not commenting about the overall use of AI or stating what we think people may or may not do with AI or LLMs; these can certainly be tools that help small businesses like ours build capacity, delegate work that would otherwise bog us down, and market products more effectively. We are specifically addressing this AI conversation from a creative standpoint on why our company does not use AI to write our games, specifically.
You won't find any of Foulplay’s games written by AI, and here’s why:
We value authentic, original murder mystery games
The first and most important one that informs all other values on this list is that we started Foulplay Games because we wanted to write our own stories and share them with others. We wrote our very first (and very ambitious) murder mystery game 15 years ago–a political thriller game called Murder She Vote. But before we wrote our first game, we played a lot of games from other companies. Some of the games had a variety of mechanical issues, ranging from limited player capacity and gendered character ratio requirements to having more problematic content like sexual harassment, domestic violence, oblique racism, and even incest. We also played games with repetitive outcomes and themes, where similar storylines blended together, or the murder just wasn’t possible to solve with the information given. For example, the typical 1920s game usually involved the death of a mob boss and a cast of characters without strong connections to the other players.
To be clear, not every game company had overtly problematic or unoriginal content in their games, and playing these games did spark our love of mix and mingle murder mysteries. But these experiences served as inspiration to start our own company. We wondered why there weren’t games set in space on a rural planet or something more historical and immersive within its time period than just “an 80s’ game”. We also wanted to subvert the tropes by including multi-dimensional characters and exploring interesting scenarios–for instance, what would happen if the mob boss didn’t die as planned?
If we used AI to write these stories, it would pull from already-written murder mystery games and reinforce the same problems we wanted to avoid in the first place. We wanted inclusive, gender-neutral characters, themes that went beyond the typical speakeasy or Hollywood party (No shade! We do have our own spins on these themes!), and to move beyond corny characters and predictable tropes.
We owe our hosts quality murder mystery games and hosting materials
AI does not always put out quality work, both creatively and practically. It can't think through what a first-time host needs to feel supported and confident in planning out their murder mystery party. AI, at this point anyway, cannot mimic the subtle but important element of the human part of writing. When it comes to telling stories, AI can’t create intricate plot points, or portray the feelings and motives of a character the way a person can. Additionally, we have been playing and hosting murder mystery games for over a decade and can use those experiences to shape and craft stories in a way that better supports other hosts.
Writing our own games connects us to the player and host experience
We know all of our games and stories inside and out because we wrote each and every word. If we have another tool to do that, then we would be more disconnected from our stories and lose the reasoning behind our choices to structure the game and theme in a particular way. If we didn’t write our own stories, it would hinder our ability to help answer any questions, make adjustments based on your feedback as a player and host, and feel attached to the story in general. Each game would become just a product, not an experience that we imagined and look forward to seeing how others will play it out!
Writing our own games is a personal creative outlet
Foulplay in general is a creative outlet for us! We have full time jobs outside of Foulplay, so this is an opportunity to tell stories and take a break from our day jobs. AI has been shown to decrease critical thinking and creativity; we believe creativity is a muscle and it is important to use it and work it out just like any other muscle in your body! By continuing to write our own games, we are pushing ourselves and our creativity to new levels, always striving for original stories and ways to try new ideas.
We hope not using AI will set us apart competitively
We know that some companies have likely used AI to write their murder mystery games or will use it in the future. Additionally, it is likely that new companies will continue to pop up and will turn to AI to write their party themes. Realistically, it will be hard for us to maintain a competitive advantage when it comes to sheer quantity with the speed that AI can create new murder mystery games.
However, in a future world with hundreds of AI written murder mystery games on the market, we will continue to create our games first-hand, from concept, to drafts, to final product. We hope that when customers are choosing their first party game, the originality of our games and content will be a differentiating factor for them in a field of similar content and storylines. We value quality over quantity, and we know our players and hosts do as well.
Our Final Thoughts
AI is changing rapidly and we don't know what the landscape will look like in one, five, or even ten years. But for now, we wanted to talk about the rising AI trend and how it impacts our decisions as small business owners. Writing games and original content is the second-best part of Foulplay Games–the first is watching you all act out the stories we create! So thank you for making this possible for us to use our creative muscles, and we promise to keep doing that for you.
Kristen and Maddy
Foulplay Games
