Hobbies And Interests
Clue
The board game Clue can be fun for teens. Its simple, straightforward rules allow for ease of understanding: Someone has been murdered, and players must figure out the "who, where and with what" of the case. To play the game, shuffle the three stacks of cards--suspects, weapons and rooms--and choose one random card from each stack to place in the solution envelope. Next, every player chooses a pawn, and the first player rolls the dice. Whenever a player enters a room on the game board, he may guess the identity of the suspect, the weapon used and the room of the killing. The player to his left must provide him any of those cards he has, but only one card. If he has no cards to match the prediction, the next player must show any cards. Players continue to roll dice and move around the game board; the game ends when someone makes a guess and no one can prove it wrong.
Mafia
Another fun mystery game for teens is Mafia. In this game, one moderator passes out cards randomly. The deck should include two kings and one queen. Players who get the king cards are the Mafia, who choose people to "kill" every round. The player who gets the queen card is the detective, who makes guesses about the Mafia every round. The rest of the players receive number cards as townspeople. The game starts by everyone going to sleep; every single player must close her eyes. The moderator calls for the Mafia to look up; they then silently choose someone to kill. They go back to sleep, and the moderator calls for the detective. The detective silently motions who he thinks the Mafia is, and the moderator silently confirms or denies; the detective returns to sleep. Everyone wakes up, and the moderator informs the group who the Mafia has killed. Then the group discusses who might be the Mafia. When an accusation is made, another player must second it; the accused player must then defend herself. After defending herself, it is put to a vote, and the majority rules. If the majority votes against her being the Mafia, she stays, and discussion continues until someone is voted out. If the majority votes for her being the Mafia, she is out of the game. She reveals her card. Game play continues until the Mafia have eliminated all the players or until the Mafia are eliminated.
Wink
An easy mystery game to play is called simply Wink. In this game, players gather in a circle in a dimly lit room. Cards are distributed, with only one ace in the deck, and whoever gets the ace is "it." That person must try to wink at other people during game play, but he must do so discreetly in order to escape notice. Whenever someone is winked at, that person must "die" and let the group know he has been eliminated. Play continues until someone makes an accusation about who is "it," but game play ends for both the accuser and the accused if the accuser is wrong. When only two people remain, the person who is "it" wins.