Hands On: Scooby-Doo! Unmasked
It’s the world’s greatest scardy-cat canine detective
Tags: Scooby Doo! Unmasked Categories: Previews, Xbox Previews
Posted by Daniel "monk" Pelfrey on Jul 28th, 2005
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One of the things that it is hard for companies to do is to capture the spirit of a given license when translating it to a videogame. While it is easy enough to take a character 9or several) and have them run around various environments and collecting items is easy enough – so much so that it has become a cliché.
Enter Scooby-Doo! Unmasked – a platformer where the players are asked to co about collecting items. Not exactly a novel approach, to be sure, but one that is fairly tried and true. What separates this title from the others of its kind is the presentation and the attention to detail with regards to the source material.
Taken from the original series (not the new “updated” cartoon that crops up periodically on Saturday mornings), this entry in the Scooby-Doo! videogame series seems to be a culmination of the various learning experiences presented in earlier games, as well as finding the developers hitting their stride in regards to how the game plays.
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Fans of the cartoon will immediately recognize the voices don’t sound exactly like they did 30 years ago (but then again, how many of us do?) but the characters sound like they should. There is even an attempt to sync up the voice and lip movements at various points, which is not only commendable, but helps to draw the player into the game world. Also enhancing the game is the laugh track, a holdover from the original show. Thankfully, the sound effects have been toned down to a non-obtrusive degree, allowing the player to actually hear the game, rather than a bunch of “boing” style sounds.
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Visually Scooby-Doo! Unmasked looks like it could almost be a cartoon – almost. The cell shading technique is put to good use here, and not overdone with a heavy hand as in other titles. It would have been a bit nicer if the animations were a bit smoother (though some of that may be fixed by the time the final game is released) and individual fingers modeled out (I’m sure that not every character is wearing mittens, as it appears).
It also appears that the cutscenes are generated using the in-game engine rather than being pre-rendered. I could be wrong, but if I’m not, I’m glad, because far too often we see pre-rendered clips being offered up as gameplay, which is always a misrepresentation.
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The basic gameplay is the “explore and collect” variety. This being a Scooby-Doo! title, the staple of the collecting will be Scooby Snacks. This ties in to how the health is maintained. Collecting various ingredients will allow the Great Dane sleuth to visit Shaggy and his mobile kitchen to whip up a tasty treat, which will extent the health meter of our canine hero. There are a few other items to find and collect throughout the game, and they are all license appropriate, thankfully.
Older gamers may not be into the “explore and collect” style of gameplay (especially when trying to find a specific item to move onto a new area) but younger fans and those die-hard Scooby devotees should find a pleasant experience upon the game’s eventual release. As it stands now, Scooby-Doo! Unmasked doesn’t move the genre ahead or take any bold steps forward, but it appears to be shaping up to be a solid entry.
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Tags: Scooby Doo! Unmasked
Posted by Daniel "monk" Pelfrey on Jul 28th, 2005 and is filed under Previews, Xbox Previews. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can post a comment, or trackback from your own site.
