History Main / FairPlayWhodunnit

* ''StarTrekDeepSpaceNine'': [memory unavailable] asks Odo if he's worked out who the killer in the book was. He says "by the third page." Either he's just that good or the book's just that bad.

* IsaacAsimov deliberately wrote his ''BlackWidowers'' mystery stories in this fashion.

* All ''EncyclopediaBrown'' mysteries are deliberately like this... but some of the "solutions" are [[ConvictionByContradiction less plausible than others]].

*** Although when the solution to the epitaph was (possibly?) revealed [[spoiler:in Episode 7, it turns out that an English speaker would in all likelihood actually have an EASIER time solving it!]]

# No [[YellowPeril Chinaman]] must figure in the story.
** Note that this is not a case of racism, but rather a case of unsophisticated anti-racism, given the YellowPeril figures prevalent in dodgy crime fiction at the time. The modern American equivalent would probably be a Middle Eastern character or a ScaryBlackMan.

Done badly, this can lead to ConvictionByContradiction.

# No accident must ever help the detective, nor must he ever have [[IJustKnew an unaccountable intuition]] [[BatDeduction which proves to be right]].

** And of course special mention most go to the 2-part Season 6 closer/Season 7 opener Who Shot Mr. Burns? Even though the ending did seem to come out of the blue, the clues were indeed all there, with the mystery even being drummed up as a contest to see who could figure it out. In fact, the culprit was actually properly identified by a fan of the show, legitimately using the clues presented, in the summer between the two episodes.

# No hitherto undiscovered poisons may be used, nor any appliance which will need a long scientific explanation at the end.

** Note that this is not a case of racism, but rather a case of unsophisticated anti-racism, given the YellowPeril figures prevalent in dodgy crime fiction at the time. The modern American equivalent would probably be an Arab/Muslim or a ScaryBlackMan.

** Note that this is not a case of racism, but rather a case of unsophisticated anti-racism, given the YellowPeril figures prevalent in dodgy crime fiction at the time. The modern American equivalent would probably be Arab terrorists.

** Not only that, but said character actually talks at length on what separates a Fair Play Whodunnit from a Clueless Mystery, even specifically mentioning the problem with language, or specialized knowledge. Ryukishi07 is very, very Genre Savvy. An example he gives is the riddle. "Why do dragons sleep during the day? Because they fight knights!" Easy for an Anglophone, impossible for a Japanese speaker.

** A slight example: In ''The Many Deaths of the Batman'', Batman seemingly falls off a roof and into a river while chasing a crook, and his body is fished out of Gotham river. Observant readers will note that the first chase sequence clearly has the ''Eiffel Tower'' in the background. Sure enough, Batman's alive and well, just a bit damp.

* In Shirley Jackson's 'We Have Always Lived in the Castle', the answer to who killed the whole family of the two surviving sisters and uncle is fairly clearly stated.

* The ''ElleryQueen'' novels -- the first eight, which contain a nationality in the title, and the ninth, "Halfway House" -- were like this, and would actually have a point before the solution where the story would pause and the author would tell the reader that they now have all the facts required to solve the mystery. This ?Challenge to the Reader? was carried over to the ElleryQueen radio show and 1970s TV series, where Ellery would make a "Challenge to the Viewer" before the final ad break.

* The stories of John Dickson Carr (as well as his pseudonym Carter Dickson) always showed you all the clues. The only problem was usually that the murder was ''impossible'' to begin with, so you couldn't figure out ''how'', much less who. Carr even [[LampshadeHanging lampshaded the tar out of this]] in ''The Three Coffins'' when Dr. Fell stops in the middle of the novel to explain all the ways you can do a locked room mystery, because there was no point in pretending they weren't in such a novel. At the end of the chapter (yes, it's a full chapter of all the ways to pull one off) the other characters tell him that the two murders don't fit into ''any'' of his categories. [[spoiler: They're really wrong.]]

*** An they even talk about how ThePowerOfTrust and ThePowerOfLove are needed to make the reader solve a FairPlayWhodunnit

* {{Persona4}} arguably counts. The player is given all the information, and the culprit is someone they know. In the endgame, the player is given a list of all the characters (s)he has met so far, and a set of clues which should narrow it down to one person. They must then select the culprit correctly within three guesses, or be foisted off with a bad ending. Unfortunately, there's 80 hours of dungeon crawling between those vital clues and the event when it becomes crucial to remember them.

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# No accident must ever help the detective, nor must he ever have an unaccountable intuition which proves to be right.

** In ''TheBigFour'', Christie violates as many of these rules as she can, probably [[StealthParody on purpose]].

* AgathaChristie was especially devious about this. We find, for example, Alice receiving a letter from Bob (to whom she was engaged) dated June 17; three chapters later we hear that Alice had an operation on June 17. The careful reader may realize that Bob would have known about his fiances medical situation, and yet there was no reference to it at all in the letter -- which suggests several possible theories about the real nature of their relationship. In retrospect, an obvious clue... but you have to be a meticulous reader to catch it.

* ''MurderSheWrote'' actually had quite a few, given that the killers usually revealed themselves by saying something only the killer would know or assume.

* Played with in ''Deep Red''; an early scene actually shows the face of the murderer, but it's done so quickly - and before you know to look for it - that most people never catch on.