Scooby-Doo! is a franchise that you could mention to anybody from any era and probably get a different response as to what that name means to them. If you ask my Grandad about Scooby-Doo!, he’ll tell you all about the original series, Scooby-Doo! Where Are You? If you ask somebody over the age of thirty about Scooby-Doo!, they’ll likely wax poetically about an era of repeats and weird side tangents such as The 13 Ghosts of Scooby-Doo! If you ask somebody my age about Scooby-Doo!, you’ll hear about the modern reimaginings of What’s New, Scooby-Doo? and Scooby-Doo! Mystery Incorporated. If you ask a special brand of sicko about Scooby-Doo!, they’ll tell you all about the bizarre comic series Scooby Apocalypse.
That love transcends just animation, though. There are multiple different live-action adaptations of the gang, several other comics that aren’t about the end of the world, and so many different video games that have cropped up over the years, not all of which are good, but a select few of which are quite great.
While the main era of Scooby-Doo! video games that I want to discuss is the PS2 games, it feels pertinent to discuss several older games first, to understand truly where we came from to get to the point where I can truly believe that the Scooby Doo! PS2 games are some of the best-licensed games of all time.
Cyber Attack
First up on the docket is Scooby-Doo and the Cyber Chase, more specifically the PS1 version of the game from 2001 developed by Art Co LTD. “A tie-in video game for a straight-to-DVD Scooby-Doo! movie? That can’t be a good sign,” I hear you say. And frankly, you’re not wrong. It’s not a good game, not by any stretch of the imagination, but compared directly to what came next? It’s a fascinating insight into where we were before the PS2 games came around.
Scooby-Doo and the Cyber Chase is a Crash Bandicoot game. I mean this in a very literal sense: it’s a platformer using the exact same ideas that made Crash Bandicoot popular, down to copying the camera that is so close it might as well be shoved up Scooby’s prostate. It also looks at Crash Bandicoot 2: Cortex Strikes Back and cribs the ‘warp gate’ hub world while ending each zone with a boss related to that zone. Oh, and at one point in the game, you have to cross a bridge with panels that will fall if you linger on them for too long while enemies attack you, in other words, an almost exact replica of the infamous level from the 1996 Naughty Dog platformer. You get to play as Shaggy for certain levels, but the gameplay differences are non-existent, so you might as well spend the entire game as Scooby himself.
It’s not a good game. The combination of both a bad camera and poor level design makes it more of a chore to play than anything else, and the very small pool of enemies makes any very brief combat encounters you might have, which are cartoon cream pie-based, dull and repetitive. There’s only so many times you can cream pie a samurai, you know? (If you’re reading this sentence, know I have the coolest editor in the world).
Editor’s note: I’m leaving in “cream pie a samurai” as an SEO play because I’m chasing that Assassin’s Creed energy not because I’m cool.
Still, you can very much see DNA that would later be passed along to later games in the franchise where platforming is a primary focus throughout the game with gatekeeping bosses.
Scooby-Doo and the Cyber Chase was released on October 4, 2001. Seven months later, on May 20, 2002, the next generation of Scooby-Doo! games was released in the form of Scooby-Doo! Night Of 100 Frights, developed by Heavy Iron Studios and released for the PS2.
A Night To Be Remembered
Interestingly, the game wasn’t originally planned to be released on the PlayStation 2, but rather on its predecessor. Indeed, a prototype exists online of the version of the game that was originally developed for the PS1. Said prototype contains some extremely interesting differences, with the available levels notably being entirely on-rails and consisting of you simply moving Scooby and Shaggy from side to side to avoid obstacles. In the final game, there are no on-rails segments to speak of, and several of the environments featured in the prototype do not appear to be present in the final game.
Later tech demos would represent the final product much more closely, with a January 2001 prototype build showing Scooby running around an open-zone environment collecting boxes of Scooby Snacks, something that is very much a part of the final game.
The PlayStation 2 version of Scooby-Doo! Night Of 100 Frights is, without any semblance of irony, a great video game. The level of quality on display here is evident from the very first sequence of the game, which is a pitch-perfect recreation of the classic Scooby-Doo, Where Are You? opening titles using in-game models. You’re then thrust into the story of the game, which is the same structure as every other Scooby-Doo! story. A mystery is afoot, it’s up to the gang to solve it, and in a perfect way of replicating the act of the gang “splitting up and looking for clues”, the entire gang sans Scooby are kidnapped by classic enemies from the series.
These classic enemies in question are as follows: the Black Knight (from the very first Scooby-Doo, Where Are You! episode, “What A Night For A Knight”), the Ghost of Redbeard (from Scooby-Doo, Where Are You! Episode 14, “Go Away Ghost Ship’) and The Green Ghost (from Scooby-Doo, Where Are You! Episode 16, “A Night Of Fright Is No Delight”). Scooby will also encounter other, more standard enemies throughout the game, all of which are based on classic villains from the series such as the Creeper, the Space Kook, the Ghost Diver, and the Tar Monster. All of these baddies appear to be under the thumb of a new villain, Mastermind, who is voiced by the incomparable Tim Curry. Curry also appeared in the 1999 release Scooby-Doo! And the Witch’s Ghost and Scooby-Doo! And the Goblin King.
As you’re exploring a series of locations that wouldn’t be out of place in a classic episode of the show, you’re also given “inventions” that allow you to explore more and more of the game. Collect them all to access every part of the game and save your friends.
It’s really quite fun. Sure, it’s basically baby’s first Metroidvania, but as that it works really well, and never talks down to you. It could have easily been a game that holds your hand the entire time, but instead, you’re given the new item, given a brief tutorial on how the new item works and then it’s up to you to remember where exactly you need this item to access. It’s just really cool that the game trusts its players, who will likely to be children, to understand what’s going on in any given situation.
Oh, and as a capper, the game ends with an incredible remix of the original Scooby-Doo, Where Are You! Theme that wouldn’t really be out of place in an early 2000s Las Vegas nightclub. It’s just a really great experience and one that sadly would remain the greatest example of what a Scooby-Doo! game could be to this day.
Mystery Gear Solid
Metal Gear Solid launched in 1998 and is lauded industry-wide as being one of the greatest and most important games ever made. The game is an action-adventure title with a predominant focus on stealth that sees players cast as a soldier named Solid Snake, who has a variety of gadgets at his disposal It launched the career of Hideo Kojima, somebody who now is one of the most widely recognizable video game developers ever.
In stark contrast, Scooby-Doo! Mystery Mayhem, a stealth adventure game, launched in 2004. It’s a barely-remembered licensed movie game that casts the player as famous Scoob and his pal Shaggy. Across five levels you’ll be tasked with playing as both of the characters, with some levels only allowing for one of the two, and it’s up to you to guide them to avoid enemies and monsters who you’re fundamentally useless against until you charge up a book named ‘The Tome of Doom’ that can capture ghosts. What this boils down to is an action-adventure title with a predominant focus on stealth. In the modern era, the title has been mostly forgotten about, and reading about it here has likely reawakened a hidden memory for many of you.
Scooby-Doo! Mystery Mayhem is a painfully dull game. It is mechanically sound but entirely forgettable. One of the few interesting things about the game is that this is the only time you’ll be playing as anybody other than Scooby-Doo. Scooby-Doo! Unmasked takes the same approach as Scooby-Doo! Night of 100 Frights, allowing you to play as Scooby with a variety of upgrades. Perhaps because of this, both of the playable characters in Scooby-Doo! Mystery Mayhem feel undercooked. Each has its own abilities that the other does not possess, with Shaggy able to interact with various items that Scooby can’t, and Scooby able to crawl underneath tiny spaces.
It’s a shame that the level design is so flat across the board because the developer of the game, Behaviour Interactive, is responsible for the brilliant Dead By Daylight. Perhaps a combination of low experience and license constraints doomed Unmasked.
FLASH! AH-AH! SCOOBY DOO OF THE UNIVERSE!
Oh boy, it’s time for Scooby-Doo! Flash games.
First off, playing the flash-based Scooby-Doo! games might be more trouble than it’s even worth. You have to download Flashpoint, an emulator that archives many old Flash games, but that doesn’t have absolutely everything, so you have to pray that it actually has the game that you want to play. Luckily, the game (or games?) I want to discuss today was available.
Over a period of time in the early 2000s, Warner Bros released a few episodic Scooby-Doo! point-and-click adventure games. These very much have the feel of a cheap Flash game, but there’s a few really interesting points to discuss looking at them that could be taken into the future of the Scooby-Doo! franchise.
It’s worth it to note what a massive missed opportunity it is that Scooby-Doo! has had so few point-and-click adaptations. Feels like a hand in a glove, but alas.
The Scooby-Doo! flash games are really interesting point-and-click adventures that rely on you to solve puzzles using (very visible) objects on a map. You control both Scooby-Doo and Shaggy at the same time and move just by clicking your way around the map.
Every now and again you’re thrown into a vehicle section in which you need to avoid obstacles, but these are by far the least interesting part of the game. They don’t control well, they don’t feel as good to play as the point-and-click sections and they’re just a bit boring.
So, if that’s all there is to discuss gameplay-wise about the Flash games, why even bother bringing them up? Well, I think these games are worth considering as a potential future for the Scooby-Doo! franchise in games. Why NOT do a Scooby-Doo! game where you do have to solve a mystery using your wits and evidence that you’ve collected throughout the game? It feels like a no-brainer, yet it’s something that is shockingly missing from most titles in the franchise, including from the final game in our retrospective.
Scooby-Doo! Unmasked – The Odd Youngest Child
It’s rather clear even by just looking at Scooby-Doo! Unmasked that more inspiration was taken from Scooby-Doo! Night of 100 Frights than it was from Scooby-Doo! Mystery Mayhem. Even glancing at the box art tells you that much, as both feature similar color palettes and settings, whereas Mystery Mayhem is the only one of the three games to feature box art that is set indoors. What makes this even odder is that both Scooby-Doo! Unmasked and Scooby-Doo! Mystery Mayhem were developed by the same people, Artificial Mind and Movement (who would later become Behaviour Interactive). It’s a super interesting decision and one that clearly shows a preference for a certain gameplay style. The connection to Night of 100 Frights only becomes more and more apparent when you actually start playing the game.
Like Night of 100 Frights, Scooby-Doo! Unmasked is segmented into several levels that are split between different thematic areas. In order, these are Monstrous Fright and Magic, Chinatown, Rock ‘n’ Roller Coaster Land, Natural History Museum, and finally back to Monstrous Fright and Magic. Each area contains enemies that are unique to that area, several different collectibles that you can grab to increase your completion rating, and costumes that give Scooby a myriad of powers.
There’s the bat costume, which allows you to glide around and reach areas that you wouldn’t normally be able to reach. There’s the Kung Fu Costume, a costume that gives you access to a new fighting style and a super-powered punch that can break open walls and find hidden areas. There’s the Ninja costume, which gives you access to a Thunder Punch. Finally, there’s the Robin Hood costume, which allows you to shoot far away targets and access previously inaccessible areas, while also allowing you to take out enemies at a decent range.
If there’s one complaint to be had about the method of giving players power-ups via gaining a costume in each world, it’s that you don’t get an equal amount of time with each costume. You’ll barely use the Robin Hood costume as it’s the last one you get in your time with the game, and by the time you get it, there’s just not much you can do with it. There’s also nothing in previous levels that can be accessed by going back after grabbing the new costumes, which not only means that there’s a serious lack of replayability but also means that you’ll simply never really use half these costumes more than once.
One of the main villains of the piece, Winslow Stanton, is voiced by none other than Batman himself, Adam West, who sounds like he’s having the time of his life. As you may have already noticed, Scooby-Doo! has a lineage of getting established character actors (and sometimes just very very popular actors) in to play characters that go against their archetypal grain, and West serves as that for this game, doing a beautiful job of it too.
The biggest issue with Scooby-Doo! Unmasked is an issue that a lot of licensed games face: it feels like it was rushed. It’s an extremely short game, one that can be beaten fairly easily in two hours, and it’s one that doesn’t present any challenge at all, even to a child. That’s not to say that the game should give you a hard time playing it, but it should feel satisfying to overcome an obstacle, and instead, it just feels part and parcel of the game itself.
The hardest sections of the game are the boss fights which rely on using the power-ups that you’ve found in that specific section of the game (the final fight uses all of the power-ups in an extremely cool display of everything you’ve learned) and are frankly also the very best that the game has to offer. There’s something incredibly satisfying about watching Scooby-Doo karate kick a Dragon.
The Future Of The Doo
I think throughout this long (and sometimes baffling) retrospective it’s become apparent that Scooby-Doo! is a franchise with a lineage, and a big one at that. It’s an important franchise and one that deserves a game that understands that. The first instinct, after reading everything here, might be to suggest that the franchise should return to platforming, after what worked so successfully in Scooby-Doo! Night of 100 Frights. I can’t disagree with that analysis, yet I do feel that there’s something else here that could be done.
Using the flash games as a basis, and recent releases in modern indie gaming as an inspiration, Scooby-Doo! should make a proper attempt at a point-and-click adventure game. Not a point-and-click adventure game with a limited budget like the Flash games, no, a proper full-budgeted attempt at a classic Scooby-Doo! adventure game. Think Monkey Island, if Monkey Island had a talking dog with a lisp and a penchant for solving mysteries that are seemingly always perpetrated by either people who have been screwed over by the world or who are venture capitalists.
Hell, if the point-and-click genre doesn’t appeal to developers, you could take the Telltale model. There are a lot of ways you could branch a Scooby-Doo! story in order to make it something worth actively paying attention to, and not just something that you could passively ignore.
“Scrappy will remember that.”
