Family Home Mystery
From IFWiki
In the Family Home Mystery style of game, the player explores a family home - usually recently vacated, often a sprawling and isolated mansion - in order to uncover a mystery intertwined with the family's past. The story may focus principally on a single member of the family, a single generation or its whole history within the house. The player is often a distant relation to the family, or may even have lived there as a child, but is not generally very familiar.
The approach is often combined with Magician's Nephew, with which it shares many features.
Classic Examples
- Anchorhead (Michael Gentry; 1998; Z-code).
- Curses (Graham Nelson; 1994; Z-code).
- Savoir-Faire (Emily Short; 2002; Z-code).
- McMurphy's Mansion (David Martin; 1984; MSDOS executable).
Characteristics
- The home's previous owner is likely to have named the PC as the new owner (or executor) of the home.
- The house will often have abandonitis, or feature few and unresponsive NPCs, but the player will usually get a strong impression of the house's previous inhabitants.
- The game will usually - though by no means always - involve a single, static map and a great deal of searching around.
- Environment detail will often be high, and exhibit picturesque eccentricity.