The game of Spyfall is designed by Alexandr Ushan and published by Hobby World. It is a social deduction party game and its target audience is teenagers and adults. It was originally created in 2014 as a card game for 3-8 players, but is now commonly played using the Spyfall.app website or similar online platforms, where players still play face-to-face.
At a high level, Spyfall is similar to the current iteration of our game, Ladybug, because it is a social deduction game. In both games, everyone has some specific information or knowledge and the purpose of the game is to figure out what information the other players have. For instance, in Spyfall, every player but the spy is given a location. Through asking questions, the spy needs to determine what location the players are talking about and the rest of the players need to figure out who does not know the location. On the other hand, in ladybug, players are randomly assigned to one of two teams, given the code word for their team, and through asking questions, each player needs to determine who is on their team (and knows their code word) and who is on the other team. Additionally, both games include an added layer of each player needing to not be too obvious about what information they have, as revealing their information benefits their opponent. In both Spyfall and Ladybug, players do not know who is on their “team” and who is their enemy, so it almost because a psychological game of needing to understand your opponents and how they think, where a big part of the game is also asking the right questions that can bring you clarity about the other players without revealing too much about what you know.
One clever design choice of Spyfall is the use of open-ended, indirect questioning, which creates space for creativity and deception but can also lead to confusion or stalling, especially with newer players. Unlike games like Werewolf, Mafia, or The Resistance, where roles dictate actions, Spyfall relies purely on conversational nuance, making it more accessible but also potentially less structured – this makes each player’s gameplay more tied to their personality and way of thinking rather than assigning them a role to play. In contrast, one flaw is the game’s reliance on players’ improvisational ability – players who are shy or confident or less familiar with the locations can be easily outed or left out of the fun, potentially causing them to be less willing to play in the future. For example, when I was playing with my friends, my friend Brent genuinely asked, “What the heck is a ‘Corporate Party’?” when trying to make sense of the location (see list of locations in image, we were confused about a few of them). Since the location of the round was Airplane, his confusion not only revealed that he was the spy, since he did not know the right location, but also disrupted the flow of the game as others broke character to clarify what the location meant. This moment highlighted how unfamiliarity with the location list can disadvantage newer players and reduce the immersive tension that makes the game fun. A suggested improvement could be a visual reference card or thematic prompts with subtle hints for each location to help less experienced players participate more confidently. Additionally, the game could offer example questions to help newcomers better role-play and stay engaged without giving themselves away.
In another round of Spyfall, a different design flaw emerged, one that speaks to how player dynamics can skew the game’s balance. My friends focused all their questioning on one player they thought was acting suspiciously, asking increasingly specific and intense questions, only to find out that person was not the spy at all. As a result, we ran out of time and barely questioned the actual spy, who got away unnoticed. After the reveal, my friend shook her head and said, “We were so locked in on the wrong guy, [the spy] didn’t even have to try.” This moment showed how the open structure of questioning, while offering freedom, can backfire if players don’t self-regulate the conversation. While the loose format is a bold and creative design choice that encourages organic dialogue and helps the spy in a game where they are at a disadvantage, it also leaves the game vulnerable to tunnel vision and uneven participation. A possible improvement could be incorporating a soft structure, for example, a turn-based questioning order or a reminder to rotate focus, so that everyone gets at least one question. This would preserve the game’s social nature while ensuring the spy cannot hide in silence.
Spyfall’s design also reveals key insights when examined through the MDA framework. The mechanics – assigning a secret role to one player (the spy) and giving a shared location to the rest – set the foundation for emergent dynamics, like indirect questioning, suspicion, and bluffing. These dynamics create the aesthetic experience of social tension, playfulness, and strategic deception. However, as seen in our round where all questions were directed at one non-spy, the lack of structure in the questioning mechanic allowed a tunnel vision dynamic to form, where the spy went unnoticed. This points to a mismatch between the mechanic’s intention and its real-world execution, where incorporating a light structure,such as turn-taking or enforced question rotation, could better support the aesthetic goal of mutual interrogation and keep the game from collapsing into groupthink. From a relationship-building perspective, Spyfall encourages disclosure and perception of shared norms, but only when players feel comfortable enough to contribute. As my friend Brent’s confusion over “Corporate Party” showed, unfamiliar players risk feeling isolated or judged, which weakens the social loop. Games, as we learned from the Friendship Building video, act as “tools for serendipity” and friendship formation – but only when players feel empowered to participate. Adding visual or thematic prompts could soften that onboarding friction and ensure every player has a chance to join the conversation on equal footing.
Like Spyfall, Ladybug thrives on indirect communication and hidden knowledge, but its design makes a few different trade-offs that shift the game’s dynamic and player experience. Using the MDA framework, Ladybug’s mechanics – team assignment via card color, secret word prompts per team, and open-ended discussion – generate the dynamic of alignment detection: players subtly probe others to identify teammates based on how they respond to a shared (but unspoken) concept. The aesthetic is one of intimate deception and intuitive social reasoning. Compared to Spyfall, Ladybug introduces a softer loop: instead of a binary spy vs. team setup, all players are equally engaged in a mutual guessing game, which can reduce performance anxiety and encourage more equitable participation. This ties directly to themes around friendship formation through structured serendipity: the act of chatting through shared ambiguity fosters an emergent sense of connection and play. The cumulative scoring system also supports repeat interactions, which helps players refine their social reads across rounds. However, one potential drawback is that quieter players may still struggle to assert themselves in unmoderated conversation. Drawing from the Spyfall critique, Ladybug could also benefit from a light conversational structure – perhaps requiring each player to ask at least one question or respond once per round – to ensure that participation is evenly distributed and that each player has the opportunity to build their “friendship levels” through shared risk, playful guessing, and conversational reciprocity.
