Why jubensha is NOT like the others - Part 2 (ft. social deception board games)
Sometimes when I describe jubensha, people say: “isn’t that just like X?” Jubensha does indeed share many components of existing entertainment mediums, but the unique combination of them create an entirely new experience. Let’s take a look at the ways jubensha is different from its closest cousins.
Murder mystery dinner party boxes or packages (click here for this part)
Social deception board games (this part!)
Escape rooms
Tabletop role playing games (example: Dungeons and Dragons)
Live action role play (LARP) or, specifically, parlour LARP
Mystery novels/movies
In this post, we’ll focus on the second bullet: Social deception board games
I’m a huge fan of social deception, and at first, this is what drew me to jubensha in the first place. I find that the overlap of jubensha lovers and social deception board game lovers is bigger than the overlap of jubensha and the other groups listed above. When I say social deception board games, I mean games such as Blood on the Clocktower, Werewolf, Mafia, Secret Hitler, and Deception: Murder in Hong Kong. It can also include video games like Among Us.
The two are similar in many ways, and in fact, I consider jubensha as a whole to be within the social deception genre. The board games I listed above and jubensha both require players lying about their secrets or secret identity, social interaction, and logical deduction to uncover the secrets that some players are hiding.
However, they are clearly not the same thing. Unlike murder mystery party boxes (which I compare to jubensha here), the differences are more obvious between jubensha and social deception board games. Here are the five key differences I’ve noted between the two.
Replayability. Social deception games are replayable. Never the same game twice, play until you get bored! Jubensha are one time play only.
Story. Because jubensha are one time play only, it allows for an author driven story, rather than a player driven one, if it has one at all. For example, games like Deception: Murder in Hong Kong have mechanics that encourage players to invent stories behind the clues. However, most social deception games present a theme but not a full narrative, and certainly not a cohesive one. Jubensha is more akin to a movie or novel in this respect.
Gameplay Mechanics. Social deception games have a much wider ranger of ways you can interact with its components and with other players. Each board game has a unique take on the social deception genre, whereas each jubensha roughly follows an expected pattern—read your script, receive clues, interrogate each other, and vote for the murderer. The creativity in jubensha doesn’t lie with the mechanics. In fact, some jubensha containing unique mechanics like mini-games are negatively perceived because players feel that they distract from what they’re here for—solving a mystery. Instead, the “wow” factor of jubensha is found in the story, characters, and logical puzzles.
Player Count. Not a surprising difference as jubensha is the only one among its peers that has a strict player count requirement. Board games are built for varying amounts of players since they’re not trying to tell a cohesive story.
Length of Game. Playing one round of a social deception game ranges from under ten minutes (One Night Werewolf) to two hours (a longer Blood on the Clocktower game). The time to play even a short jubensha is no less than two hours. More often, it’s a three hour commitment for even beginner games. For more advanced or immersive games, you’re looking at 5 hours, 10 hours, or perhaps a multi-day event. This means that anyone playing a jubensha needs to be in the right mindset for an extended period of time.
Role play is an honourable mention, but some social deception board games do encourage some level of role play, and some jubensha aren’t built for heavy role play. So in terms of role play, although jubensha typically has more, I don’t think the difference is strong enough for it to be added to the list.
Did I portray all the differences correctly? Which elements of social deception and jubensha make them appealing to the same kinds of people? Share your thoughts in the comments below!
Keep an eye out for the next part in this series where I’ll compare jubensha to escape rooms, TTRPGs, and more.
