How to play Night Shift Detective

Night Shift Detective is a free, realistic detective game you play in your browser. You're a new detective in the Major Crimes Division of the fictional Port Calder Police Department. Every case is generated fresh, every one can be solved, and you have to solve it the way real detectives do: with evidence that holds up in court.

Play now. There's nothing to download.

Two ways to play

• The daily case. One case a day, the same for everyone. No account needed. Finish it, compare your score on the leaderboard, and share your result. A harder weekly challenge runs Saturday to Friday.
• Career. Sign in with your email (no password; we send a code) and start a career. Work your way from detective to lieutenant across homicides, robberies, arsons, kidnappings, and more. Your career saves to your account and follows you to any device.

How a case works

1. Read the case file. You start with the 911 call and the scene. Nothing else is handed to you.
2. Establish when it happened. The medical examiner, the alarm logs, or the fire marshal set the time window. Every alibi is measured against it. At murder scenes you can estimate the time of death yourself from the body's temperature, stiffness, and lividity.
3. Process the scene. Collect evidence by the book (it takes longer, but it holds up) or quickly (faster, and the defense will attack it). File a property form for each item.
4. Find the people. You can only investigate people you know exist. Ask who was in the victim's life.
5. Send it to the lab and wait. DNA, prints, ballistics, and records take days. Each day you get a limited number of actions; working overtime wears you down.
6. Check every story. Statements are only someone's word. Camera footage, phone records, receipts, and witnesses confirm or break them. Some people lie to hide things that have nothing to do with the crime.
7. Get warrants. If a suspect refuses consent, write an affidavit. The judge reads only the evidence you attach.
8. Confront the lie. Pick the statement and the evidence that proves it false, then choose how to question them. Read them their rights, or what they say won't count.
9. Charge the right person. The DA wants the time of the crime, proof the suspect was there, and a strong case. Charging the wrong person is a mark on your record.
10. Go to court. The defense challenges every shortcut you took. Take the plea, or testify and face cross-examination.

Tips

• Camera footage gets overwritten after a few days. Canvass early.
• Your partner's advice never gives away anything you haven't found yourself, but it's always pointing somewhere useful.
• Clearing innocent people matters as much as catching the guilty one. At trial, the defense will ask whether you checked everyone else.
• Cutting corners (skipping Miranda, searching without a warrant, running your own lineups) gets results fast and gets Internal Affairs interested.
• The Glossary in the game explains every police and court term.

Common questions

Is it free? Yes. The game is free to play.

Does it work on my phone? Yes, on phones, tablets, and computers, in any modern browser.

Do I need an account? Only for career mode. The daily case and weekly challenge work without one.

Is it realistic? The procedure is modeled on real US policing and courts: warrants and probable cause, Miranda, chain of custody, suppression hearings, and plea deals. It's simplified for play, and everything in it is fictional.

Who is it for? Players 16 and older. The game deals with violent crime, though it isn't graphic.