Our games are fully scripted. This makes them solveable, and much more enjoyable than the “choose the murderer on the night” kind – however it does create issues if your party plans change suddenly!
Because all of the characters in our games are fully integrated once they’ve been written in – they aren’t simply “plug and play”. If they’re “in”, they’re in. And if they’re “out”, they’re out.
However – don’t despair if your party plans go awry – as we are there to help! And we’ve helped numerous customers over the years with flexing parties – so just reach out and we can help.
Firstly – if you KNOW before hand your party is likely to flex… then if you reach out before you buy we can help from the word go!
1) We can email you the invitations for the largest size you need before you buy one. (free) That way you can sort the invitations out and then buy the game size you need nearer the time. You will just need to ensure you invite people in the right order, so that you can easily switch between the games. As if you end up with the wrong mix of characters, it becomes a custom split and will cost you more.
2) You can buy the highest number you think you’ll need and we can email over the lower numbered games if you find you need them, (free). If you think it’ll be very last minute, we can email a couple of sizes to you after ordering so you can switch easily.
3) We can write in some optional characters for you that are still fully integrated, but we’ll need to know who you’re playing and decide which characters are going to be optional. It’s easier to chat about this on the phone as it’s not simple to do and takes time. We do need to charge £35-55 for this depending on the game and which characters, and whether they come out as a “block” (easier) or will be “either/or” which is harder.
If you’ve already placed the order, and it’s a digital or printed pack – you can just email us and we can send you the lower numbered game free of charge so you can print out different character booklets for the smaller number of guests you have.
If you don’t want to reprint the booklets at your side – you can manually adjust most of our games so long as you have more than 6 guests.
This is how to do it…
Firstly find the booklets of the last character(s) in your invitation list. These are always the more “optional”.
If you are just removing one, check that the one you leave behind doesn’t speak AFTER the person you plan to remove. If they do, you will need to write over the top of their introduction and concluding statements so that they now speak after the person who is still IN the game (the person mentioned in the booklet you have removed).
Now pull apart the booklet of the character you plan to remove and set aside the pages with the questions and answers.
Cut the questions out. Taking care to keep them in different piles for rounds 1, 2 and 3.
Now go through the other guests booklets finding the questions they would have asked the character you removed. Staple or stick one of your “cut up” questions over the top of any questions you find. Making sure you put the right question in the right round!!
As host, any time your missing guest is supposed to speak in the shared dialogue at the start of the rounds, just read in their lines.
The extra will still be mentioned on the voice recording, but game play should work.
If you don’t want to go through the process of sticking the questions over the top of the questions for your missing guests in the other players booklets, you can instead tell the guests there were 2 other characters who are now not playing. Cut up the questions and place them on the table in 3 pots, for rounds 1 2 and 3. As a guest finds they have a question for a missing character they simply pull a replacement question out of the pot in the centre of the table (just make sure they take it from the right round!).
If it’s so last minute you don’t have time to contact us, or do any amends, then why not try one of the following suggestions (all of which have been done by customers over the years):
- have a person play two roles
- use a puppet for the extra guests
- invite a last minute “friend” – everyone loves a party and few will turn you down. (And it’s a great way to get to know new people.)
- buy a game one less than you need and as host you take the role of the inspector.
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Our Office
Red Herring Games Ltd
7-9 Alexandra Road
Grimsby
North East Lincolnshire
DN31 1RD
United Kingdom
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UK +44 (0) 1472 348909
USA 866-6878-650
games@red-herring-games.co.uk