Mystery Games Online: Detective Cases, Clues and Hidden Objects
Updated
Mystery games online are games built around a question that you answer by finding clues: who did it, what is out of place, or how to get through a locked door. In the browser they come as detective cases, hidden-object and spot-the-difference searches, and mystery rooms.
Types of mystery games
A mystery game gives you a question and hides the answer in small pieces. You look at a scene, notice what does not fit, collect the clue and use it. Some games tell the story in scenes, some ask you to search a picture and some lock you in a room, but the loop is the same: look, collect, connect.
| Type | What you do | Start with |
|---|---|---|
| Detective cases | Follow clues to a culprit or a solution | Find Out The Criminal |
| Hidden things | Find objects, differences or treasure | Spectral Seek |
| Mystery rooms | Crack codes and find items to open the doors | 100 Doors: Mystery Room Escape |
Detective cases
These put you in the detective's chair.
- Find Out The Criminal is a detective puzzle. Use your brain, look for the clues hidden everywhere, find the truth and work out who the criminal is. Use the mouse or tap.
- Horror School Detective Story casts you as a brave detective in a school full of scares and mysteries. The mysteries are layered, one behind another, and you choose the complexity of the scenario. Click or tap to play.
- Detective Scary Cases is a scary story full of mystery and sinister traps, with puzzles and riddles to solve along the way. Click or tap to play.
- Sins and Desires is a visual novel in the detective genre, with romance elements. As detective Felicia you travel to the village of West-Alben to uncover the mystery of an aristocrat's disappearance. The story has branching choices and a relationship system that affects the ending.
Two of these are horror stories. More of them are in scary games online.
Hidden objects, differences and treasure
Here the case is a picture or a board, and you search it for what is hidden.
- Spectral Seek is an object-finding game in a haunted mansion full of secrets and shadows. You search eerie rooms and forgotten halls for hidden objects, and the finds get trickier the deeper you go.
- Paws Off My Clues sends you through locations from sunny beaches to ancient ruins to hunt for hidden objects while cats go about their lives. Choose a level, scan the screen and finish it by finding every listed item.
- Mystery Campus Spotter is a find-the-difference game set on a college campus. Compare two nearly identical images and find the differences before time runs out. It has several difficulty levels, and you click to match.
- Detective Photo Difference Game asks you to find the differences between two photos, like a real detective. Use the mouse.
- TreasureBound is a turn-based treasure hunt on a hex grid. Every tile might hide gold or nothing, so you read the board and spend your shovels wisely. Adventure mode has solo levels with a set number of shovels, and Duel mode puts you against an opponent for three rounds. Click or tap a tile to dig.
How these searches work is explained in hidden object games.
Mystery rooms and escapes
In a mystery room the clues are the codes, keys and objects around you.
- 100 Doors: Mystery Room Escape asks you to crack secret codes, solve logic puzzles, find hidden objects and open all 100 doors. The rooms have mechanical gears, hidden keys, cryptic symbols and keypad codes. On a computer you click to interact, pick up items, enter keypad codes and open doors, and on a phone or tablet you tap, drag items into place and enter codes.
- Superstore Escape is a point-and-click room escape. A cowboy has lost the key to the room, and you click on objects to interact with them and solve the hidden puzzles to get out.
NEW
More rooms are in escape room games and in the escape collection.
Tips for mystery games
- Look at everything. Find Out The Criminal says the clues are hidden everywhere, so a quick glance can miss one.
- Write down codes, names and symbols as you see them. 100 Doors has keypad codes and cryptic symbols, and a note saves you from going back for one.
- In spot-the-difference games such as Mystery Campus Spotter, compare one part of the picture at a time, because the clock is running.
- In TreasureBound, count your shovels before every dig. Adventure levels start with a set number, and you have to uncover the treasures before they run out.
- If you are stuck in a room, go back to the objects you have already picked up and try each one on something new.
Mystery games FAQ
Are there mystery games online free, with no download?
Yes. They play free in the browser, with no install and no registration, on a phone, a tablet or a computer.
Are there detective games to play online?
Find Out The Criminal, Horror School Detective Story, Detective Scary Cases and Sins and Desires all put you in the role of a detective or an investigator. Mystery Campus Spotter and Detective Photo Difference Game borrow the idea for spot-the-difference searches.
Are there mystery escape games?
Yes. 100 Doors: Mystery Room Escape has 100 doors to open with codes, keys and hidden objects, and Superstore Escape is a point-and-click escape from a locked room.
Are there mystery games for two players?
TreasureBound has a Duel mode in which you face an opponent over three rounds, taking turns digging tiles. More games for two are in 2 player games.
More puzzles of every kind are in the puzzle games category.
