Dr. Annie Gray

There's two in particular often mentioned.

One is Highbury Hall in Birmingham.

And then the other one was Tudor Close Hotel in Sussex, which attracted film stars, the sort of upper echelons of society.

But my parents didn't mix in those circles, so the game was an amalgam of country houses that they'd seen or knew about.

Next to be introduced to the game are a cast of characters.

And they're not all the usual suspects.

In the original, there was Dr Black, Mr Brown, Mr Gold, Professor Plum, Miss Scarlet.

There was Colonel Yellow, who became Colonel Mustard.

Mrs White was originally Nurse White.

And in the American version, Reverend Green was just plain Mr Green because apparently it wasn't acceptable to have a member of the clergy mixed up in murder.

Whatever the identity of the killer, Antony provides them with a choice of weapons.

The original included an axe, a bottle of poison, a poker and a hypodermic syringe and a bomb.

That's right.

They did change that in the final version.

With the scene set for murder, Anthony and Elva must now make sure the game works.

Each player has to move around the mansion to work out the killer, the weapon and the room where the crime took place.

They tested it out with friends and family who were only too glad to come along in the evenings during the war because it meant they had an entertaining evening when they'd just otherwise be listening to the wireless and looking at four walls.

And one of those friends is a neighbour called Geoffrey Bull, who'd previously invented the game Buccaneer.

In 1943, he introduces Anthony to the manufacturer Waddingtons.

It was immediate interest.