About Who Did It?
A mystery social deduction party game for 4-10 players on Web and Android.
Who Did It? is a multiplayer mystery party game where players receive secret roles, investigate AI-generated crime stories, analyze clues, discuss their theories, and vote to discover the criminals hiding among them.
The game is designed for friends, families, classrooms, and online communities who enjoy deduction, debate, hidden roles, and dramatic mystery stories. Every session is unique thanks to AI-powered story generation and a wide variety of crime categories.
What Makes the Game Different?
Who Did It? focuses on social deduction and discussion rather than mechanical gameplay. Clues are carefully designed to create suspicion and open multiple interpretations. Each clue points toward the truth, but not in a direct or obvious way.
Innocent players may still look suspicious because of their profession, relationship to the case, or a personal secret revealed during the game. Criminals must blend in, deflect suspicion, and survive the discussion without being exposed. This creates a rich social experience where every player contributes to the story.
Game Features
- AI-Generated Mysteries: Using the Google Gemini API, the game generates a unique crime story, characters, and clues every time you play. No two games are ever the same.
- 13 Crime Categories: Choose from Murder, Theft, Kidnapping, Forgery, Espionage, Closed Space, Scientific, Artistic, Corporate, Family, Unusual, and Temporal crimes, or leave it random.
- 2-4 Clues Per Game: Clues are distributed across five categories: material evidence, witness observations, documents and records, circumstantial facts, and relationship traces.
- 40+ Offline Stories: When AI is not available, the game uses pre-written offline stories that rotate to prevent repetition.
- Criminal Balance System: The number of criminals scales with player count — 1 criminal for 4-6 players, 2 for 7-8, and 3 for 9-10.
- Built-in Discussion Timer: Keep the game moving with configurable discussion and voting timers.
- Vote History: Track how every player voted in each round to analyze patterns and catch inconsistencies.
- Bilingual Support: Fully translated into Arabic (Modern Standard Arabic) and English with automatic RTL layout support.
Classic Mode
In Classic Mode, all players use a single device. The phone or computer is passed between players so each person can view their assigned character privately. After the story and clues are revealed, the group discusses the case and votes together.
- Best for local groups sitting together in the same room.
- No account or internet connection is required for offline stories.
- Simple setup — enter player names and start the mystery immediately.
Investigation Unit Mode
Investigation Unit is a cooperative 2-4 player game mode where each player takes on a unique role — Detective, Doctor, Evidence Technician, or Tech Analyst. Unlike Classic Mode where players compete against each other, in Investigation Unit you work together to solve a single case. Each role receives exclusive information, and the team must share their findings to reconstruct what really happened.
- 2-4 players with specialized roles and unique information.
- Cooperative gameplay — all players win or lose together.
- Play pass-and-play on one device or online via Room Mode.
- AI-generated and offline case files with multiple solution paths.
- Final accusation phase where the team presents their case.
Room Mode
In Room Mode, one player creates a virtual room and others join using a 6-digit room code. Each player uses their own device. The host starts the game, and every player receives their role on their own screen privately.
- Works across Web browsers and Android devices — players can join from different platforms.
- Players can join from any device using the same room code.
- Ideal for online groups, Discord communities, and mixed-device play.
- Room data is temporary and expires automatically after 4 hours of inactivity.
AI Story Generation
Who Did It? uses Google Gemini AI to generate mystery stories when a player provides their own Gemini API key in the game settings. The API key is stored locally on the user's device using browser local storage and is never sent to any server other than Google's Gemini API.
The AI generates complete crime scenarios including the criminal's identity, backstory, motive, execution method, and four different clue categories. Each clue is written to have two possible interpretations — one misleading and one that points toward the truth. The AI also generates a full Modus Operandi story that explains how the crime was committed, weaving all clues into a cohesive narrative.
If no API key is provided, or if the AI service is unavailable, the game uses pre-written offline stories that come built into the app. This ensures the game is always playable without requiring any account, payment, or internet connection.
Cross-Platform Play
The web version and Android version share the same Firebase Realtime Database backend and room system. Web players can create rooms that Android players can join, and vice versa. This means a group of friends can play together even if some are on a computer and others are on a phone.
The Android version is built with Capacitor 8 and distributed separately. Both versions support the same game modes, features, and AI story generation.
Privacy-Focused Design
The game does not require users to create an account, provide an email address, or share any personal information to play. Room data is stored temporarily in Firebase Realtime Database and is used only to operate active games. Room data expires automatically after 4 hours of inactivity.
Player names, votes, roles, and game state are stored while a room is active and are deleted when the room expires. The Gemini API key, if provided, is stored only on the user's local device and is never transmitted to any server other than Google's Gemini API.
Development
Who Did It? is developed by an independent developer. The game was originally prototyped in Google AI Studio and published as a web application using Vite and React 19. The Android version is built using Capacitor 8 with Tailwind CSS for styling and Firebase for backend services.
The game uses several third-party services: Firebase for hosting and real-time database, Google Gemini AI for story generation (optional, user provides their own API key), Google AdSense for web advertising, and RevenueCat for in-app purchases on Android.
Who Can Play?
The game is suitable for players aged 13 and up who enjoy mystery, social deduction, party games, investigation stories, and group discussion. The best experience comes from players who enjoy talking, defending themselves, listening carefully to clues, and reading other players' behavior.
Who Did It? is ideal for game nights, classroom activities, youth group events, Discord server game sessions, family gatherings, and team-building exercises. The game can be played in 15-30 minutes per session depending on the number of players and discussion time.