Fact Detective: free fact-checking game, check the source

What is Fact Detective?

Skip answers way too fast, and sometimes he fills the gaps with things nobody said. Check his answer against the source, sentence by sentence, and catch what he made up.

Fact Detective is a fact-checking game. Skip answers questions way too fast and sometimes fills the gaps: a wrong number, an invented quote, a prize nobody won, a claim the study never made. Each case gives you the source and Skip's answer. Tap the sentence the source doesn't back up, or say that everything checks out.

There is no clock: checking takes time, and that's the point. Before you answer, say whether you're sure. Being sure doubles the points, but a sure mistake costs points.

The cases cover the kinds of slips that matter in everyday reading: a statistic rounded the wrong way, a date moved, a quote attributed to the wrong person, a correlation turned into a cause. Each case ends with the exact sentence in the source that settles it, so you see the evidence, not just the verdict.

At a glance

Category

Adventure

Difficulty

Medium

Play time

4–6 min

Price

Free, in your browser, sign-up optional

How to play

Read

A question, the source that answers it, and Skip's answer in three sentences.

Check

Tap the sentence the source doesn't back up, or say everything checks out.

Commit

I'm sure doubles the points, but a sure mistake costs points too.

Learn

Every case ends with the explanation. Check the evidence, never the style.

Scoring

A right answer scores 100, or 200 if you said you were sure. A wrong answer you were sure about costs 100 points.

Mistakes cost one of 3 lives.

What it trains

Fact-checking

Comparing an answer with its source.

Calibration

Knowing when you're really sure.

Careful reading

Catching the one detail that was made up.

Strategy and tips

Line by line

Compare each sentence with the source, one at a time, instead of reading for the general idea.

Numbers first

Times, prices and sizes are where slips hide: 6.1 is not 6.5.

Not in the source = unverified

A detail that sounds right but isn't in the source still counts as made up.

Watch the stretch

“Did better on a memory test” is not “gets better grades”. Claims can grow beyond the evidence.

Be honest about doubt

Use Best guess when unsure. The end screen shows how often you were right when sure.

Why play Fact Detective?

Checking claims against a source is the core of media literacy. Fact Detective trains careful reading, attention to detail and calibrated confidence, and it teaches to judge a text by its evidence, never by its style.

It also builds calibration, the habit of matching how sure you feel to how sure you should be. The end screen shows how often you were right when you said you were sure, a number most people find surprising the first time.

Frequently asked questions