Murder on the Language Express: Bringing Murder Mystery Party Games to Language Class

Abstract

This practice-based report argues that murder-mystery party games (MMPGs) offer a compelling, outcome-driven context for EFL speaking classrooms that aligns closely with Task-Based Language Teaching (TBLT). MMPG mechanics beautifully fulfill TBLT’s core task conditions: focus on meaning, gap-bridging communication, free deployment of linguistic resources, and a clearly defined nonlinguistic outcome. In the practice of two trials at a university in Japan, the author used off-the-shelf commercial scenarios in a small group (two and eight students; A2-B1), with scaffoldings such as structured speaking turns and character diaries. Observed benefits included high engagement, emergent linguistic patterns beyond prudence, and sustained negotiation of meaning. Challenges were also found for cognitive/linguistic load, group-size constraints for class, and content sensitivity around the murder theme. The paper concludes that, with careful scaffolding, MMPGs can constitute practical, classroom-friendly narrative tasks that stimulate authentic speaking while preserving game enjoyment, and they merit further exploration within game-based TBLT.