 Players making accusations in a game of Mafia | |
| Genres | Social game |
|---|---|
| Related games | |
| Murder mystery game | |
A social deduction game is a game in which players attempt to uncover each other's hidden role or team allegiance. [1] Commonly, these games are played with teams, with one team being considered "good" and another being "bad". [2] During gameplay, players can use logic and deductive reasoning to try to deduce one another's roles, while other players can bluff to keep players from suspecting them.
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Examples of social deduction games include Mafia , in which only the mafia know who is mafia and what the mafia players' roles are; Bang! , in which only the sheriff's role is known to everyone; and Secret Hitler , in which only the fascists know who the fascists are, except for the player who plays as Hitler. [3] Other social deduction games include The Resistance , Deception: Murder in Hong Kong and Spyfall .
Social deduction games have been adapted to video games numerous times through mods or full games. One instances of such adaptations are custom maps for StarCraft: Brood War including Changeling and The Thing. [4] These custom maps inspired later Warcraft III custom maps including Mafia, Werewolf, Zerg Infestation, and another Changeling and The Thing. [5] Other notable examples include Garry's Mod "Trouble in Terrorist Town" game mode, [6] Town of Salem , StarCraft II 's Phantom Mode mod, [7] and Among Us .
One important element of strategy in some social deduction games is determining how long to stick to one's story in the light of information obtained from other players. [8] A Monte Carlo tree search has been suggested for making decisions in social deduction games. [9]
