Christmas with the Gildmores - a murdererous advent detective kit

In 2025, I decided to treat myself to a murder-themed advent detective kit that brings new clues to an ongoing murder case each day. I’ve not done any of these before, and with no particular selection process in mind, I chose Christmas with the Gildmores.

Christmas with the gilmores

Christmas with the Gildmores is a 24-day-long investigation into first a disappearance and then a murder of a member of the spectacularly dysfunctional Gildmore family.

Each day, new clues arrive - witness statements, photographs, phone records, police reports, video footage, and more.
Then, after you’ve opened the last clue, you can put everything together and work out who the murderer is.

ADvent Detective Kit: in the box

Christmas with the Gildmores comes in a sturdy box sealed with evidence tape. Inside is a (pretty funny) newspaper that provides background on the suspects, along with 24 envelopes of evidence.

As well as the envelopes, there are sometimes short videos of news broadcasts to watch, or WhatsApp-like messages between suspects.

Speaking of the suspects, there are six – but I’m not going to name them here to avoid spoiling it for anyone else.

Did we solve it?

We did! We didn’t quite work out the motives of all the suspects, but we did identify the murderer. (There was quite a bit of flipping back and forth through the evidence to work it out, which was oddly satisfying.)

What I liked

Sense of humour: I enjoyed the sense of humour that’s woven throughout the game, particularly in the newspaper (The Daily Retreiver). It made me smile, and occasionally even chuckle.

Quality of the materials: I appreciated the quality of the puzzle. The authors are real police officers, which gives elements like the witness statement a sense of authenticity. Plus there are menus, receipts, orders and other documents. There is even a fortune cookie at one point!

Solving codes: I enjoyed solving the codes. They aren’t hugely complicated, but they did need a little thought.

Solving the mystery: And I enjoyed solving the mystery!

What was less effective

Videos: Christmas with the Gildmores includes about a dozen videos. Some of them are fine (mostly the WhatsApp conversations). However, the acted videos can be a little painful to watch sometimes. I know I couldn’t do any better, but that’s why I don’t make videos.

Skipping days: To be honest, I’m not sure the one-clue-per-day (arguably one-piece-of-the-story) worked for me. I ended up skipping several days, and opening several envelopes all at once. I guess one of their cold case kits might have been a better choice for me, although I didn’t know that until I tried it.

Reuse: And because I plan to let other family members try this, keeping everything in the right envelope became annoying when going g back through evidence , trying to find the right piece of evidence. Okay, so that’s a me problem And not the kit’s fault.

Overall: Christmas at the Gildmores

While I enjoyed the Christmas with the Gildmores Advent detective kit, I think l would have preferred a cold case kit where all the clues appear at once.

Click here to visit the Cold Case Investigation Unit and see all their kits.