How the App Works — Five Steps Through the Evening
The app is not an app in the usual sense. There is nothing to download, nothing to set up and no account to create. Every guest scans their QR code and their personal booklet opens in the browser. That was the installation.
1. Scan your own code
The introduction booklet has a page of player codes. The host prints it, cuts it up and puts each guest''s code at their seat. Everyone scans with their phone camera — their own booklet opens, and only their own.
2. Leave the page open
Allow cookies when asked. The data then stays on the device and the game keeps running even when the house has no signal — which, for an evening in the countryside, is the rule rather than the exception. Put the phone down by all means, but do not close the tab.
3. Wait to be let in
The booklet stays locked until the host starts the game by reading out the activation code. Only then do the role and the round one text appear. That is deliberate: it stops anyone reading aloud while the others are still arriving.
4. A new code after each course
After each course the host reads out the next round code. Only then do the new passage, the new secret and the new clue cards appear. Nothing happens without the code. That is the real purpose of the system — it prevents reading ahead, and it keeps the pace of the evening in the host''s hands.
5. The solution at the end
Once everyone has made their accusation, the host reads out the solution code. Only then does anyone find out who did it.
Paper and app together
Both work side by side. Anyone who dislikes phones, or has not brought one, gets their printed booklet — it contains the same thing. Six people at a table can scan while four turn pages.
Two things that save the evening
Never show anyone your screen. Your secret is sitting there in plain text. A glance over the shoulder ruins more than a whole course can repair.
Have everyone load their page before dinner. If the house has poor reception, that is the moment to find out — not halfway through round two. Once the page has loaded it needs no signal at all.
And if something does go wrong: reload the page and enter the code again. The data is stored on the device and survives a reload. Failing that, there is always the printed booklet.