“A View to a Murder” is a Murdoku case from the Zoo category: a board of 7×7, 6 suspects and one victim. Read the clues, work out where everybody was standing, and name the suspect who was left alone with the body.
The Board
The floor plan as the case hands it to you: 7×7, rated Medium, with 5 rooms. Every person — 7 in all — takes a row and a column of their own.
C1
C2
C3
C4
C5
C6
C7
R1
H
M
L
Mo
R2
L
M
Mo
M
R3
L
R4
T
P
T
P
R5
P
P
R6
Pa
W
Pe
R7
Pa
Pe
W
Floor plan of “A View to a Murder”. Letters mark the objects; the key is below.
Rooms
Monkey House — 9 tiles: Monkey, Mud puddle
Predator House — 12 tiles: Haystack, Mud puddle, Lion
Penguin Pool (outdoors) — 8 tiles: Water lily, Penguin
Aviary (outdoors) — 6 tiles: Parrot
Picnic Meadow (outdoors) — 14 tiles: Tree, Park bench
Objects on the board
P Park bench (can be stood on)
L Lion (blocks the tile)
M Mud puddle (can be stood on)
Mo Monkey (blocks the tile)
Pa Parrot (blocks the tile)
Pe Penguin (blocks the tile)
T Tree (blocks the tile)
W Water lily (can be stood on)
H Haystack (blocks the tile)
The Suspects and Their Clues
Each suspect comes with what the witnesses remember. Read them all before placing anyone — a clue about one person is very often what pins down another.
Anna — a woman with brown hair
She was beside a haystack
Bella — a woman with white hair
She was west of every tree, in the same room
Cyrus — a man with blond hair and glasses
He was not in row 7 and he was in a corner
Dalia — a woman with blond hair
She was south-east of every park bench, in a different room and In her room there was a man
Elsa — a woman with brown hair and glasses
She was beside a park bench and she was west of every suspect who had blond hair
Freya — a woman with red hair
She was in the same row as a monkey, in the same room
The victim, Vesna, is a woman. Nothing else about them is known, and no clue depends on it.
How Hard It Really Is
Deduction steps from the first clue to the verdict
Before anything else, count where each suspect could be if you only read their own clues:
Anna: 2 possible tiles
Bella: 2 possible tiles
Cyrus: 13 possible tiles
Dalia: 2 possible tiles
Elsa: 7 possible tiles
Freya: 4 possible tiles
The first deductions after that, in the order the solver finds them:
Elsa is west of someone with a matching trait – impossible cells removed.
Anna & Freya: only rows 1, 2 possible – blocked for others.
Bella & Elsa: only rows 4, 5 possible – blocked for others.
That is as far as this page goes. From here on it is yours — the in-game hint giver explains each next step if you get stuck, without giving the answer away.
This case has exactly one solution, and it can be reached by forward deduction alone — no guessing.