Thursday afternoon, Lee, Brian, Mel and I played a Mansion of Madness scenario called Gates of Silverwood.

The Gates of Silverwood Manor scenario begins with a phone call from Officer Tetsuo Mori, the policeman assigned to a number of disappearances occurring in the town. The missing people come from all walks of life, yet have one small thing in common: Each of the victims had stayed in the manor house shortly before they went missing. Officer Mori is suspicious about the place and has asked us to join him in investigating it.

Our arrival to the gated property is relatively uneventful, and the view from the outside doesn’t give us any particular misgivings, so we proceed up the winding drive in search of our contact. The front door of the home stood ajar, and Officer Mori was nowhere in sight, so we figured the best course of action is to begin the investigation of the house on our own, hoping we will find him inside or that he will catch up to you soon.

Our initial exploration of Silverwood Manor felt much the same as our past investigations. We begin in a room, filled with items to explore and doorways to peek through. As we continued our search for both Officer Mori and clues regarding the many disappearances, we began to lose track of where we’ve been and where each room can be located. The door that previously obscured a hallway may now conceal a mystery, the hallway having moved to an entirely different location in the house. 

When a tile moves, not only will a location we’ve visited be shrouded in darkness yet again, but the room that occupied the space before may have moved not just behind another door, but rooms away—rooms we’ll have to explore if we want to get to the moved tile, or rather, to get away from it. When a room moves to another space on the board, it will carry with it all figures, tokens, and cards, meaning we may also be transported within the mansion, forced to explore new areas to find our way back to our fellow investigators. 

After moving from room to room and the rooms moving, Mel couldn’t handle it and went mad and got beat up so bad she almost died. The worst part for Mel was she had to follow Brian’s orders during the latter part of the game. The game madness actually crossed over to real having to listen to Brian’s craziness. In the end, we also were lost in the endless movement of the rooms never to be heard from again… except for the screams of Brian being endlessly tortured by Mel as our rooms shifted within hearing distance.