Cluedo

It was the chap with the silly name, in the hotel near Windsor, with the 8ft piece of lead piping. Or it might have been the PR chap from Waddingtons, with the mobile phone, in the bar.

Today, at the Oakley Court Hotel near Windsor, Britain's first official Cluedo Convention is taking place to raise money for the charity Children With Leukemia. They began yesterday, with playlets, unusual identification parades and odd challenges as well as normal Cluedo games, all to determine who wins the first prize of a murder mystery trip on the Venice Simplon Orient Express.

Cluedo, for anyone who does not know it, is a board game of logical deduction. It starts with a man, Dr Black, having been murdered. Cards indicate who killed him, in what room, and with which weapon, are hidden in an envelope. The other cards are distributed among the players who may gain information by asking questions of each other in turn, while moving their pieces, according to dice throws, round a flat-plan of the mansion in which the murder took place.

Invented by Anthony Pratt, a Leeds solicitor's clerk, in 1946, Cluedo has now sold well over 100 million sets around the world. It has also inspired a film and a television series. The present event, however, is the first to offer bonus points to any entrant who shares a name with any of the Cluedo characters. My money's on Colonel Mustard.