Do you place your trust in your husband, or do you dare face horrors to seek the truth?
Bluebeard's Bride is an investigatory horror tabletop game created by Marissa Kelly, Whitney "Strix" Beltran and Sarah Richardson and published by Magpie Games, based on the fairytale Bluebeard.
The players take on the role of the fragmented personalities of the Bride called "Sisters", each representing an aspect of her psyche - the Virgin, the Animus, the Mother, the Fatale, and the Witch. They control the Bride as they navigate Bluebeard's house, opening doors that explore and confront the darker aspects of Bluebeard, the Bride herself, the previous brides, and everyone around her.
As they explore each room with the keys in hand, the Sisters have to decide among themselves whether the clues and evidence they find raise or reduce their suspicions of Bluebeard.
Regardless of their opinions, the players ultimately have to answer the one important question:
Will you open the final door?
Bluebeard's Bride explores the examples:
- Big Fancy House: Bluebeard has a large, fancy house filled with rooms and servants and fantastical treasures - but there is dark secrets and hidden truths overshadowing the house that the Bride must uncover under the direction of the Sisters. Alternatively, Bluebeard can have a Big Fancy Castle (depending on the choices by the Groundskeeper), but the game remains the same.
- The Bluebeard: Who else?
- Body Horror: One of the possible types of horrors players can experience in the rooms, which is used to represent the topic of beauty standards and eating disorders.
- Cassandra Truth: In one possible Disloyal outcome, the Bride tries to warn the outside world of Bluebeard's true nature, but they don't believe her at all.
- Domestic Abuse: Depending on the room used, players may be able to delve into this horror as a possible truth centered on Bluebeard or the previous bride.
- Family-Unfriendly Death: Depending on the rooms used (and the descriptions the Game Master gives), there can be graphic descriptions of what transpires in the rooms and how one of the previous brides haunts the house.
- Forbidden Fruit: The forbidden final room, of course.
- Game Master: In Bluebeard's Bride, the game master is called the Groundskeeper.
- Honey Trap: The Fatale, as their face moves allows them to use their feminine wiles to manipulate the residents to get what they want.
- Imminent Danger Clue: The Groundskeeper can invoke this to increase the encroaching danger on the Bride, and the Sisters can use Take Stock to reevaluate the horror approaching them.
- The Ingenue: The Virgin, as their face moves allow them to use their innocence and beauty to handle given situations.
- I See Dead People: Depending on the object investigated, the Bride - and by extension, the Sisters - can have an encounter with the previous bride who haunts the room they are currently inside.
- Madonna-Whore Complex: One of the many subjects tackled in the game, pitting the Bride against horrors that stand as representations of a systemic society that torments her with this mentality.
- Magnetic Medium: One of the Witch's Face moves, The Medium, allows them to commune with the horrors of the room at the expense of suffering trauma.
- Multiple Endings: How the story of the game ends depends on where the Bride's loyalty stands with Bluebeard and whether she decides to open the final door or not - assuming she hasn't shattered too much before arriving at the final door.
- Disloyal Bride - The outcome if the Sisters collect primarily tokens of Disloyalty. The Bride either flees for her safety to start a new life elsewhere or attempts to alert the outside of Bluebeard's crimes.
- Faithful Bride - The outcome if the Sisters collect primarily tokens of Faithfulness. The Bride decides whether she enters the forbidden room or just looks through the keyhole.
- Shattered Bride - The outcome if the Sisters shatter before reaching the final door. The Bride becomes obsessed with either bettering herself for Bluebeard or desiring to make future brides better.
- Nice to the Waiter: Players with their chosen moves can do this to servants they interact with, which can be beneficial should the Bride be in a dangerous situation.
- Care for Someone, a Maiden move, lets the Bride ease the suffering of a servant or horror.
- The Dancer, the Fatale's Face move, lets the Bride Care for Someone at the cost of a piece of clothing.
- The Lily, the Virgin's Face move, lets the Bride Care for Someone without having to demonstrate sincerity.
- Of Corset Hurts: In the sewing room, one of the threats the Bride could face is a corset that, once removed from the mannequin, will try to lace itself on the Bride.
- Offing the Offspring: Depending on the room and horrors encountered, there may be clues to offspring murdered by Bluebeard along with their mother or offspring killed by their mother for their own gain.
- Rewarding Vandalism: The Brute, the Animus's Face move, lets the Bride break a mysterious object to garner more clues about its importance.
- Sanity Slippage: Should any of the Sisters take too much Trauma, it causes one of them to "shatter".
- Screw This, I'm Outta Here: The Bride can do this as a possible Disloyal ending if the Sisters decide she has to escape from Bluebeard.
- Split-Personality Team: Regardless of their disagreements, the Sisters have a shared goal: guide the Bride to seek answers and decide whether to place their trust in Bluebeard.
- Team Mom: The Mother, as their Face moves allow them to use their power to either benefit the Bride or enforce responsibility on herself or the troublemaking Sister.
- Tomboy: The Animus has Face moves that allow them to put more force into solving the current problem in the room and calling out the mistake of the Sister at fault.
- Trophy Room: One of the possible rooms the Bride can explore, and with possible threats to the Bride.
- Violence Really Is the Answer: One of the Ring moves a Sister can use, Dirty Yourself with Violence, allows the Bride to inflict trauma on someone else.
- Would Hurt a Child: Depending on the Groundskeeper and players' approach on the topic of motherhood, the horrors could hint to children of Bluebeard (or the bastard child) intentionally murdered or unwittingly meeting a tragic death.
