MORPHO, or M.O.R.P.H.O. as it's represented on the box, is a hidden role social deduction party game from ICE Makes that's notionally for 3-9 players, tho' it's very much at its best with 7-9 players as with fewer players you have to double up on roles (ID cards). The setting is a dystopian future, somewhat reminiscent of the Big Brother world envisaged by George Orwell in 1984.
Players all start with the roles hidden but, unlike for example Blood on the Clocktower (Pandemonium Institute), the roles used in MORPHO and the number of players with each role is shared information: the game in fact comes with a shadow set of markers that you can lay out face up to mirror the cards used in the game as an aide-mémoire. As you might expect, your win condition varies according to the role you've drawn, or rather the role you end up with because one action open to a player is to swap roles with the unallocated face-down ID card in the middle. The other action open to players is to look at the ID card of another player; except that you're not allowed to check either of the ID cards immediately adjacent to you.
If your ID is as the Leader, Technician or a Bodyguard, you want MORPHO to win. The Leader's win condition is for the Killers to all be eliminated or for the Mission to succeed (activation triggered in one round and Technician identified in the next). The Killers win by eliminating the Leader or if the Mission is activated and fails. A Deserter wins if they can escape without being intercepted.
From the second round onwards, you have the option of using one of the active abilities on your ID card. The Leader can, for example, reveal themselves and take the action of activating the Mission. A Killer can reveal and attempt to eliminate another character; the target can be a face-down ID card. They succeed in eliminating their target unless it is guarded (has a Bodyguard adjacent to it). A Bodyguard has to reveal at this point and the Killer is eliminated for making a failed assassination attempt. As an alternative action Killers can place out a block which has the effect of treating ID cards as not adjacent.
Players score points if their team's wins (usually 2 or 3 points, depending on the ID card that won the round) but only if they survived the round without being eliminated. The intention is that you should play multiple rounds until a player amasses a total of 10 points. The game comes with an ample supply of plastic counters so you can keep track of your scores.
And there's more. MORPHO comes with seven special ID cards that you can draw on if you want to play in 'expert' mode. You can play as the Spy, Extremist, Invester or Mercenary, or in an 'alien' role as Cyborg, Psionics or Parasite; the aliens are tougher to play and if you have an alien ID you're not allowed to swap it with the unallocated card in the centre but if you win you'll net 4 or 5 points. Not all the roles are suitable for inclusion at all player counts but the idea is that you pick those IDs to potentially include and shuffle them in with a Deserter card to draw just one for adding to the deck for the round. Other than the player who is dealt that ID card, players won't know at the start which character is in the mix... The expert roles certainly shake up the dynamics of the game.
With MORPHO, designer Jeffrey CCH has managed to find a novel take on the otherwise now well-trodden path of hidden role games to give us a game that feels like the dystopian child of Werewolf (Bezier Games) and Love Letter (AEG). The game plays in around 20 minutes, so makes an ideal games night filler.