A room with a clue

Players immersed in sleuthing scenarios make friends and come together to crack a mystery, Jiang Yijing reports.

Imagine someone told you that they had seen you last night after midnight, but you remembered clearly that you went to bed before 10 pm. You are shocked, scared, and helpless, eager to know what happened. Your diary might provide a clue, or photographs might help you understand what's going on. After digging and digging, an unexpected idea comes to you: Due to maltreatment during childhood, you suffer from schizophrenia. "Dumbstruck would be an understatement," says Chen Xi, a 26-year-old woman to whom this unsettling experience happened.

Now you might think that Chen may need time to digest this and calm down, but she is not worried because this all took place in a location-based detective game, or juben sha, in Chinese.