Not out yet · testers first · iPhone
She's lovely. Until you're holding her.
Old Maid: Maid After Midnight is the grown-up Old Maid. The rules are the ones you know, dealt at a candlelit table in a gothic manor, against three guests who have been coming to this table for a very long time. The Maid is your hostess, and the card nobody wants. It's nearly midnight. It's always nearly midnight.
A game you already know, for a night in.
You, three guests and a candlelit table. It fits wherever you have a few quiet minutes:
- 🕯️A night inA hand or two before bed, with the lights down and a music box playing.
- 🃏Grew up on Old MaidThe rules you know, untouched. Everything around the table is new.
- 🎭Reading peopleRest a finger on a card and watch the guest's face. Some of them can't lie.
- 🐢Your own paceNo countdowns. Your draw waits for you.
The rules fit on a card.
Nothing about Old Maid has been changed. What's new is everything around the table.
Old Maid
- The deck is twenty pairs and one Maid. Everyone gets a hand.
- Pairs go to the middle, face up. Drag yours there.
- On your turn, drag one card, unseen, out of the fan the guest on your right holds out. If it makes a pair, drag the pair to the middle.
- Rest a finger on a card before you take it and watch the guest's face. Some of them can't lie. Some never stop.
- When a guest reaches for your cards, drag one up to tempt them. Keep a finger on your hand and they'll wait.
- Run out of cards and you're safe. Whoever holds the Maid at the end keeps her.
- Forty-one cards.Twenty pairs and the Maid.
- Four seats.You, and three guests the manor picks, a different three from last time.
- Fair guests.They never see your cards. They go by what you do: where you keep the Maid, and what you push up.
- Upright or sideways.The table lays itself out either way.
The rules above are the game's own How to play, word for word.
New to Old Maid? The Maid teaches it herself. Tap How to play, then Learn at the table, and she deals you a short hand and points at the card to take. A new player is offered the same at Take a seat.
Six guests, and none of them lies the same way.
Old Maid has one decision: which card to take. Here it's made by reading faces, and each guest gives away something different. Look at the year on each place card.
- The Governesssince 1887Gives nothing away. Her face is the same whatever she holds.
Don't read my face. It's rude.
- The Morticiansince 1921Can't lie. When your finger lands on the Maid, he flinches.
That's not a face. That's just my face.
- The Ventriloquistsince 1938Bluffs well. His dummy doesn't, when he isn't looking.
That wasn't me. That was him.
- The Starletsince 1954Overacts on every card, so her face tells you nothing at all.
Every card is a tragedy, darling.
- The Metalheadsince 1991Too nice to bluff. He looks apologetic just before you take the Maid.
Take your time, dude. No pressure.
- The Influencersince 2019Glances up from her phone when it matters.
My phone says it's been 11:58 for like five years.
Rest a finger. Read a face.
- Watch them.On your turn, touch a card in the fan the guest holds out and watch their face; slide along to try the others, then pull one down into your hand. It lands face down and turns over:
A pair.
,It's her.
, or just its name. The table waits until you move it on. - Tempt them.When a guest reaches for your cards, drag one up out of your hand. It rises with a bait tag, and you see how it went:
They took the bait.
orThey didn't bite.
- Mind their bait.A guest may push a card up for you, offered, with a word to sell it:
I'd take that one. Honestly.
The honest ones mostly mean it. From the rest it means nothing, or worse. - Feel it.While a guest's finger rests on the Maid in your hand, your phone gives a soft heartbeat. Only you feel it.
- The last two.When it comes down to you and one guest, the table says so:
The last two.
And when two cards are all that's left to take from:Two cards. One is her.
The guests remember. Hide the Maid in the same place every time and the sharper ones start to notice, from one evening to the next.
The house is awake.
The cuckoo clock on the wall keeps real time, chiming the quarters and calling the hour, and the moon in its dial rises toward midnight as the pairs go down. Candles dip, the rain starts, a shadow crosses the portrait over the fire, and a raven settles over the doorway where the Maid stands watching.
- She waits.
- She leans.
- Hush.
- She beckons.
- Lightning.
The Maid as the game draws her in her doorway, lit from behind by the hall. Later in the night her shadow slides along the wall on its own, and near the end it stops matching her.
None of it knows where her card is. The room stirs by the clock and by how far the hand has gone, never by which guest holds the Maid, so the house is never a tell. Only your own phone is.
- Tap a candle and it gutters
- Tap the raven and it's gone
- Ring the service bell: "You rang?"
- Tap the clock and it rings, then comes up close
- Tap the pile for the last card that went
No countdowns.
- Your draw waits for you. Take as long as you like. When a guest reaches for your cards, they wait while you rearrange yours or push one up; let go, and after a moment they choose. Settings says so:
When a guest reaches for your cards, keep a finger on your hand and they'll wait.
- Take your time with the cards. A card you draw is held up in the middle until you move it on, and every pair shows itself on the way to the pile.
- Your pace. Brisk, Evening or Leisurely; Evening to start. While the guests play, the » button hurries them along until it's your move.
- Sound is optional. Music, sound effects, haptics and captions each have their own switch. The music is The Maid's Waltz, a music box written for this game and played in code, and what people say appears as captions.
What you pay.
- Nothing you have paid for ever moves behind a new price.
What stays on your iPhone.
What the game keeps is kept on your iPhone: your settings, the last table's guests, what they've learned about how you hide the Maid, and a few small markers, such as which of the Maid's tips you've seen. You play against three computer guests on your own phone, and in this version the game has no internet connection and no link to other phones. There's no account, no server of ours, no analytics and no advertising. The details are in the privacy policy below.
Old Maid: Maid After Midnight is still being made. It runs on its maker's phone today, it's coming to testers soon, and it isn't on the App Store yet. It's made for iPhone, upright or sideways; there is no iPad or Mac version. In this version every table is you and three computer guests, what people say is shown as captions rather than spoken, and some of the pictures are stand-ins while the finished art is made.
Old Maid: Maid After Midnight — Support
Old Maid at a haunted manor, a few minutes before midnight.
Most of the game explains itself once the cards are dealt, and the Maid has a tip or two the first time something happens. New to Old Maid? She'll teach you herself: tap How to play on the title screen, then Learn at the table. This page answers what people ask. Anything else, write to us using the form below.
Or just write to us.
There is one person behind this shop, and he reads everything that comes through this form. Three kinds of message are all welcome, and they all arrive in the same place:
- Something is wrong with the game. Say what was happening at the table, what you tapped, and what you expected instead. Upright or sideways helps too.
- A guest did something odd. Tell us who, and what they did.
- You want software built. Not only iPhone apps. If the thing you use every day at work is worse than it should be, describe it and you will get a real answer about whether it is worth building. Quotes are free and the first reply is a person.
Your name, your email address and your message are emailed to the shop. They are used to answer you and nothing else. The full account is in the privacy policy below.
