''Town of Salem'' is an

online multiplayer A multiplayer video game is a video game in which more than one person can play in the same game environment at the same time, either locally on the same computing system ( couch co-op), on different computing systems via a local area network, or ...

game with social deduction and

strategy Strategy (from Greek στρατηγία ''stratēgia'', "art of troop leader; office of general, command, generalship") is a general plan to achieve one or more long-term or overall goals under conditions of uncertainty. In the sense of the " a ...

elements. It was developed and published by

indie game An indie game, short for independent video game, is a video game typically created by individuals or smaller development teams without the financial and technical support of a large game publisher, in contrast to most "AAA" (triple-A) games. ...

developer BlankMediaGames, and released on December 15, 2014. Early alpha and beta versions were browser-based and

free-to-play Free-to-play (F2P or FtP) video games are games that give players access to a significant portion of their content without paying or do not require paying to continue playing. Free-to-play is distinct from traditional commercial software, which ...

. On October 14, 2018, the game was released for iOS and

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mobile devices after a successful and long-supported

Kickstarter Kickstarter is an American public benefit corporation based in Brooklyn, New York, that maintains a global crowdfunding platform focused on creativity. The company's stated mission is to "help bring creative projects to life". As of July 2021, K ...

fundraiser. ''Town of Salem'' is reportedly the largest online version of the classic social deduction party game ''Werewolf'', with over 5 million registered users as of June 2017.

Gameplay

The game is inspired by the party games ''Werewolf'' and ''

Mafia "Mafia" is an informal term that is used to describe criminal organizations that bear a strong similarity to the original “Mafia”, the Sicilian Mafia and Italian Mafia. The central activity of such an organization would be the arbitration of ...

'', in which players are secretly assigned roles belonging to teams of an informed minority and uninformed majority. Both teams seek to eliminate the other for control of the town. The chief strategy of the game is to survive and accomplish win conditions. Players use a combination of role abilities, teamwork, communication, deduction and deception to facilitate their victory. In the base-game, there are three role alignments: town, mafia and neutral. Each player is randomly assigned a role, which determines their goal for the game. The mafia's goal is to kill all the townspeople, while the town's goal is to find and eliminate the mafia before they can do so. Neutral roles have their own unique goals which may or may not conflict with the town and mafia. A match consists of rounds that cycle between night and day. Most roles have a unique ability which they can use during the night, such as protecting another player or learning their identity. The evil players may kill during the night, and all players have the opportunity to write notes in their will. During the day, the wills of players that died the previous night are revealed. Then, players use what they have learned to accuse someone of being evil. If that player is found guilty, they are publicly lynched and their will is revealed. The game continues until one side achieves their win condition.

Development

BlankMediaGames LLC was founded in 2014 by Josh Brittain and Blake Burns. A

campaign began on February 14, 2014 to develop ''Town of Salem''. After thirty days, the fundraiser raised $17,190 with a goal of $15,000. The game was released that year, and reached 800,000 active monthly users by 2016. On September 13, 2014, the developers started a fundraiser for a Steam release, with a goal of $30,000. The fundraiser finished in 35 days, raising $114,197 from 7,506 backers. The Steam version was released on December 14. As of March 2020, nine game modes are available on the base-game The game is for groups of 7-15 players, and features 50 different roles (including ones from ''The Coven''

expansion pack An expansion pack, expansion set, supplement, or simply expansion is an addition to an existing role-playing game, tabletop game, video game or collectible card game. These add-ons usually add new game areas, weapons, objects, characters, or a ...

Ports

On March 31, 2016, another Kickstarter fundraiser began after the release of a

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beta version of the game. The fundraiser sought to support further development towards a finished mobile version. On September 28, 2018, after two years in development, a launch trailer for the mobile game was released on YouTube. The game, now using a Unity base code, was released free-to-play on the Apple App Store and

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on October 14. It featured an extensive overhaul of the UI to one that was more ergonomic, had more and improved animations, and better graphics. On April 2, 2019 BlankMediaGames announced development of a Unity version of the web browser and Steam games due to the discontinuation of

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in 2020. The opt-in beta version became available only on Steam on July 24. On October 28, 2019, the Steam Unity client was officially released. The formerly free-to-play Flash-based web version was still available for several months afterward. On May 28, 2020, the browser-based client was also updated to use the Unity engine.

''Town of Salem – The Card Game''

On April 15, 2016, fundraising began for a

card game A card game is any game using playing cards as the primary device with which the game is played, be they traditional or game-specific. Countless card games exist, including families of related games (such as poker). A small number of card g ...

version of ''Town of Salem''. It raised $389,005 from 9,551 backers in 30 days, surpassing its of goal of $10,000. The card game is more akin to the original ''Mafia'' party game, in which players close their eyes during nighttime and take turns using their abilities with the help of a human moderator.

''The Coven''

On May 16, 2017, the expansion pack ''The Coven'' was announced. The expansion added a new faction, the Coven, fifteen new roles, and three new game modes. Two roles from the expansion, the Ambusher and Hypnotist, were eventually added to Classic on October 20, 2020. The expansion pack released in June 2017 for $10, with a 50% discount for players who purchased the game through Steam.

Data breach

data breach A data breach is a security violation, in which sensitive, protected or confidential data is copied, transmitted, viewed, stolen or used by an individual unauthorized to do so. Other terms are unintentional information disclosure, data leak, info ...

that affected over 7.6 million players of ''Town of Salem'' was disclosed in an email to security firm DeHashed on December 28, 2018. The breach involved a compromise of the servers and access to a database which included 7,633,234 unique email addresses. The database also contained IP addresses, passwords and payment information. Some users who paid for premium features also reportedly had their billing information and data breached. Investigative reporter Brian Krebs linked the hackers to Apophis Squad, a gang who made bomb threats against thousands of schools and launched distributed

denial-of-service In computing, a denial-of-service attack (DoS attack) is a cyber-attack in which the perpetrator seeks to make a machine or network resource unavailable to its intended users by temporarily or indefinitely disrupting services of a host conn ...

(DDoS) attacks.

Reception

In 2020, ''

PC Gamer ''PC Gamer'' is a magazine and website founded in the United Kingdom in 1993 devoted to PC gaming and published monthly by Future plc. The magazine has several regional editions, with the UK and US editions becoming the best selling PC games m ...

'' named ''Town of Salem'' one of the best free-to-play browser games. They described it as difficult to explain, but easy to get the hang of. Matt Cox of ''

Rock, Paper, Shotgun ''Rock Paper Shotgun'' (also rendered ''Rock, Paper, Shotgun''; short ''RPS'') is a UK-based website for reporting on video games, primarily for PC. Originally launched on 13 July 2007 as an independent site, ''Rock Paper Shotgun'' was acquir ...

'' described the game as "an online hidden role game with no friends or eyeballs, and a whole load of bullshit." Cox went on to criticize the game for being too complicated, and said that the experience "feels empty" due to the lack of face-to-face interaction.

References

External links

* {{official site, https://www.blankmediagames.com 2014 video games Android (operating system) games IOS games MacOS games Multiplayer video games Social deduction video games Role-playing video games Salem witch trials in fiction Strategy video games Asymmetrical multiplayer video games Video games developed in the United States Video games set in Massachusetts Video games set in the 17th century Video games with expansion packs Windows games Video games about witchcraft