Kosmos Masters of Crime: Incognito | Mystery Board Game

So impressed, made me want to leave a review. finished it in one sitting in just under 2hrs but was an enjoyable 2hrs. Didn't anticipate this was this good so I'm glad I picked it up. Will now buy the rest of them

Masters of Crime: Rapture is an incredibly engaging and immersive game that really pulls you into the story. From the start, it feels like you’re part of a real investigation, piecing together clues, analyzing evidence, and making decisions that actually impact how the story unfolds. The Caribbean setting adds a unique atmosphere, and the mystery keeps you hooked the entire time. What really sets this game apart is how it blends traditional gameplay with real-world elements like websites, maps, and phone numbers. It makes the experience feel modern and interactive in a way that’s different from typical board games. The puzzles are clever and satisfying, and working through them as a group makes it even more fun. The fact that there are multiple outcomes adds great replay value, and every decision feels meaningful. Whether you’re playing with friends or family, it creates a memorable and collaborative experience. Overall, this is a fantastic choice for anyone who enjoys mystery, storytelling, and interactive games. Highly recommended!

Where to even begin with this bold and clever escape-room-in-a-box? In "Rapture", you are a cartel leader on the island of Cubaidos trying to get ahead of the local police in investigating some shady circumstances that could impact your "business." For those new to the genre: not everything is as it seems, and REVISITING past clues and materials will open new forks you may have missed along the path. For those that enjoy true crime documentaries/podcasts (which my partner and I are suckers for), this game was a lot of fun to theorize, speculate, and unravel in. My partner and I slowly ramped up interest as the game progressed, and we appreciated how rewarding the game was for attention to detail. What was very impressive to an escape room enthusiast like myself was the game's ending and the potential replayability of the game. If you DO want multiple playthroughs of the game, I recommend being careful with opening the sealed envelopes, and use pencil and eraser when making notes (we were ballsy enough to do everything through pen, Sharpies, and pencil). However, for most players, once you get through the story, that may be enough that a second playthrough is not as attractive. (Of course, this sentiment may be different depending on personal preference) For the cost of the product, there was a lot of bang for our buck! Highly recommend getting it, especially when it's half-off. This game had us diving into getting Vendetta and Shadows, and we'll be inviting my partner's nephews for the next game we play!

If you like murder mysteries, this one might be for you. It was definitely better than Hunt A Killer and a lot less expensive. Both HAK's I've done had cute little props, but were absolutely no challenge to solve. Just a bunch of wasted time when you could have figured out the important stuff at the beginning. Rapture, however, was a slow build. Important information was spaced out well. Several possible suspects and motives were given, as well as some red herrings. The materials were nice enough. The online stuff wasn't the best, but serviceable with some small mistakes. (There's a song connected to this game that was well done. I kinda liked it better than a lot of stuff popular artists put out.) There's a "chose your own adventure" aspect to the game that was unique. There were also a few puzzles you had to figure out to get more clues. They weren't difficult. They weren't boring, but also not super fun. On the whole, this was a good option for a beginner to mystery solving games. I'm just realizing that I enjoy escape room games better than murder mystery ones. But if you like these sorts and aren't looking for something too challenging while still providing an actual mystery to solve, I'd recommend Rapture.

Players are asked to cooperatively plan a heist of a museum, steal two paintings and make their getaway through the city of Amsterdam. They are given all required information, but have to supplement it with their own research to come up with a plan. The game is driven by cards that provide text and images to set the scene and ask questions or to make decisions. Based on those decisions some cards are kept, others are discarded. A scoring mechanism gives the players an idea of how smart a decision was in the context of the game's objective (remember: you are criminals.). The neatest part is the second part of the game, when the actual heist is executed. Again, based on decisions made, cards kept or found the heist AND the subsequent getaway goes a certain way... At the end add up all the points you got and get a score. The game can be reset fully, so others can have a go too.

If it were an option, I would have given this 3.5 stars. We play a lot of the Exit and Unlock games, and I find the Exit games especially to be really well designed and fun to play. I was excited to play this one, but it was a little bit of a disappointment. The setup for this game is that you're planning a heist of an art museum. You have to assemble a crew, plan the heist and getaway, and then execute. Fine -- great setup! Where I was let down was in the quality of the puzzles. And I'm sort of struggling to describe this because they aren't really "puzzles" in the sense of an Exit game (there is one of that type in the whole game), but there is a lot of collateral that you have to read -- fake newspapers, fake websites, etc. -- and most of the "puzzles" are really just testing your attention to detail, because there might be an important fact in one of the newspaper articles that come with the game. For me, that kind of stuff -- testing reading comprehension -- is less fun for a lot of reasons, not the least of which is that if you're going through the motions of reading the collateral and the websites they direct you to, then the puzzles are really obvious. In fairness, the game designers thought of that. To fix this problem, the scoring mechanism is a little arbitrary in my mind. There are typically two or three answers to puzzle: a conservative right answer, a risky right answer, and a wrong answer. Sometimes there is no "wrong" answer. When you complete a puzzle correctly, you receive stars, and you are scored on the number of stars that you receive throughout. You can score a lot of stars: 50 or something like that. But, you can also get alarms. You get an alarms when you do something dangerous or risky. Alarms are bad, and if you get too many, you lose stars or maybe even lose the game. As little as a handful of alarms, like 3 or 4, will cause you to lose stars. So the incentive, very clearly, is don't do anything risky, because alarms are bad. The trick, though, is that sometimes, a risky decision will get you more stars than alarm bells will cause you to lose, so it's a net gain. The problem, in my mind, is that there is no way to know when to be risky and when not to be. It seems purely arbitrary. Without getting into spoilers, there were also a couple of puzzles that you just had to know certain external facts. Maybe there was a website that the game pointed you to, but none of the three of us who played the game noticed it, and we were questioning ourselves the whole time whether the game designers had just made a mistake, or whether it was part of a puzzle. Turns out, it was part of the puzzle, but it wasn't obvious, and it felt cheap to us. In sum, we thought that the puzzles were too easy, and there was too much just being walked through the game. The choices for the puzzles were mostly quite obvious, and if you pay attention to the materials that you're given, everything falls into place. We like the concept of the game -- there is a lot of potential here -- but the execution isn't the best. We bought a couple of the other Masters of Crime games when they were on sale and we haven't opened any of them up yet. We probably will at some point, but none of us are especially jazzed about it.

I bought Masters of Crime: Vendetta at a super low price, and honestly it exceeded every expectation I had. The overall presentation is great the box arrived in perfect condition with no dents or crushed corners, and the materials inside feel sturdy and well-made. It doesn’t have that cheap, flimsy vibe that some boxed items tend to have. This one actually feels premium for what it costs. The shipping was incredibly fast, way quicker than I expected. Everything came well protected and ready to use right out of the box. For the price I paid, this is absolutely worth it a thousand times. It turned out to be way more fun and much better quality than I assumed when I ordered it. If you catch it on sale, don’t hesitate. The value for money is excellent, the quality is solid, and it arrived in perfect shape. Easy 5 stars.

I love these games, they are very clever and elaborate. Buy all of them in the series, it gets easier after you’ve completed one and learn some of the tricks

This game is brilliant. Very interesting and fun. Kept us entertained for hours.

We have played quite a few murder mystery games - Unsolved Case Files, Hunt A Killer, Hidden Games, University Games, Medical Mysteries, Chronicles Of Crime and even several from the Exit series, and seriously this is probably one of the best, if not the best. Wasn't expecting much for the price but the materials are great quality, very well thought out and logical whilst not frustratingly difficult it is still satisfying. A smart phone is a must and some lateral thinking with the internet is required, but unlike other games that send you down rabbit holes of wild theories that go nowhere everything here is relevant and consistent in it's in world logic. The gameplay is really cool too, a bit like Chronicles Of Crime with its location based investigation but without the annoying QR code and turn limits, you can just settle into the world and not feel rushed. Also throws in a bit like of Choose Your Own adventure where you have critical decisions that can change how the story evolves. Great value for money for the amount of entertainment you can squeeze out of it, highly recommended.

GOOD PRODUCT

This is a great buy for groups of friends that enjoy escape rooms or murder mysteries. It's a one-time game, but also very easy to use scraps of paper instead of writing on the box contents, so you can pass it on to another group. We had a lot of fun. Only critique is the web-based component is a little clunky - a shame they haven't done QR codes or shorter URLs. We definitely plan to buy the other games in this series for future gatherings.

My partner and I bought this. Took 2 dates night but absolutely loved giving into this game and working through the clues. Loved that there was website and map interactions! Highly recommend. Very fun!