So how does all of that relate to a social-deduction game in a box the size of a large sandwich?

If a group of individuals sat down to play a single game of ONUW, those people would think of the game as awkward, confusing and, honestly, unsatisfying. Those were my feelings after my first game. The app (which I will discuss later in depth) counted down for the vote, the seven of us pointed at who we wanted to die, a team won (I couldn’t tell you if it was the village or the werewolves) and we all let out a collective “Alright.”

I was puzzled. “Is that it?” I asked myself. “I’m really confused what just happened." We sat around in silence, someone would say something funny, it would get awkward again before the app would tell us the time is up. There has to be more to this. There’s no way this is the game that people rave so much about.

“Let’s play again,” I said after exiting my thoughts.

I awoke from the night of the second game and was hit with why this game can and does succeed.

This is a game built upon establishing information and developing a meta. The information comes through characters like the seer, (who look at person’s role), the masons, (who look at each other), and even the robber who can reveal whose card he stole.

But alongside that information a meta develops. The werewolves and the tanner (if in play) begin asking how that information can be used in their favor. They may be the ones that manipulate the information just slightly to hide their cover. You can use human senses to your advantage. For example you can point out a subtle movement of a tile card in relation to where it was on the table before everyone closed their eyes to where it is now to get the innocent to understand your entirely false case.

You want to chameleon just enough that your scent goes unnoticed for five minutes. Does the tanner want to look like a werewolf? Yes. Can the tanner look too much like a werewolf? Yes. Same goes for the minion, who is wanting to play the role of a little-too-obvious werewolf.

The information and deception is most produced in the people you are playing with, and this is where the meta is pushed the most. In the last games that we played, we introduced ONUW to a few of my girlfriend’s family, particularly her brother and his wife. Her brother, being a seasoned Werewolf player, picked it up quite well. But his wife did not. In her first game, it was quite obvious she was a werewolf due to the verbiage she used when describing her role, a detail that was caught by one of the villagers.

In Game 2, as the village announced what roles they were and what information they had seen in the night. All of the information lined up correctly, until we noticed our newcomer sitting nervous in her corner of the couch after all the village roles had been claimed.

“I’m really bad at this game,” she half-chuckled, half-whimpered out.

Both villagers and werewolves mentally exclaimed “We got ‘em now!” The village all but assured themselves that she was for sure a werewolf and that she would be dying when time ran out. The werewolves were in route for an easy win. She was a mere vanilla villager. They had laid a foundation full of fake claims that led to fingers pointing once she had provided that lack of confidence.

And this is why ONUW works so well. Unlike the classic big brother, Werewolf, ONUW gives you a mere 10 minutes to either collect info or stretch that collection into a picture that looks like a fun house mirror. This is one that requires manipulation of how people are thinking on the spot. Some are great at pinpointing the roles, so a werewolf must take advantage of it. It’s a genius way to make a social deduction game work in such little time.

How else does this game improve on Werewolf? Maybe the biggest improvement (thanks Technology!) is the use of the app instead of a moderator. A smartphone user downloads the “One Night” app, loads it up, picks the roles that will be used for that particular game and BAM! A narrator bellows “Everyone, close their eyes.” The voice, backed by the sounds of an animated haunted house movie, gives the commands a moderator would do, telling the werewolves to wake up and go back to sleep, the seer to look at a card(s) of his or her choice and so on.

While some enjoy leading a game of Werewolf, weaving stories of how each villager had their life stripped from them in the previous night, many people just want to participate in the actual game. The moderator has no hidden role, no choice in actions, and no say in votes. They just… well moderate, and lead the group through the experience. In the case of ONUW, that job is given to our good friend Technology, who has no preference or opinion if it wants to vote.