In other words, they made a Scooby-Doo edition of Clue! This is a child-friendly production, so there is no murder – instead there are abductions, and it’s up to Scooby and friends to determine who was abducted, where, with which object. Each player gets a character, who are the show’s five regulars each cosplaying one of the more traditional Clue characters. Well, except for Mrs. White, starring as herself and owner of the haunted house where the abductions have taken place. Each character comes with a special ability that can be activated once per game, indicated by flipping over the character card. For instance, Fred/Mr. Green’s ability is to start two rumors in one turn.
To start, one Location, Item, and Character are hidden in an envelope and the remaining cards are shuffled together before being dealt out evenly between players. Any leftovers? Set them face-up beside the board – those are free clues, so make sure to cross them off! This game is all about process of elimination, and it’s easy to make mistakes if you don’t mark your deduction sheet.
On your turn, you’ll start by rolling the dice – you may move up to as many spaces as the dice indicate, excluding diagonals and keeping in mind the secret passages between opposite corners of the board; they’re extremely useful. If you’ve ended your movement in a room (including choosing not to move at all!) you can start a rumor – a term they use on Fred’s character card, but not in the actual rules, which presumes that you’re familiar enough with regular Clue to know it… but I digress. Your rumor is a speculation on what may have gone down, using the room you’re now in as the where and selecting both a character and an item to be moved into the room with you. (“Who got abducted? Did you get abducted?” they ask, pointing at someone who is standing right there.) If the player to your left has evidence the claim is inaccurate (the card for that person/place/thing) in their hand, they will privately show you so; if not, the responsibility falls to the player on their left, and so on and so forth until you’ve either been shown an evidence card or made it through a whole table of nobody having evidence to share. Which probably means you’re right! Or you intentionally suggested something you have evidence against, to throw them off the trail. Depends on how competitively you’re playing.
The other factor of gameplay is the question mark deck. These are cards that you draw when you roll a question mark on the die, land on a question mark at the end of your movement, or are called into another room thanks to someone’s rumor. Most of these cards are munchies like donuts, complete with helpful abilities to aid in your deductive process! They may, for instance, let you trade the snack for getting to sit in on someone else’s investigation, so you get to see the evidence too. However, there are also eight monsters in the deck; while first seven are harmless and just get set face-up alongside the board, the eighth startles whoever drew it so badly that they’re out of the game – they can no longer take their turn or draw question mark cards when called, but their hand is still theirs and they still get to show evidence cards as they pertain to other players’ rumors. Furthermore, monster eight gets shuffled back into the deck, so it may well be drawn again!
Winning is pretty straightforward: when you think you know which cards are in the envelope, make your way to the middle of the board and guess. But be careful; you only get one try! Your deduction is announced publicly, but only you look inside the envelope. If you’re right, congratulations! You’ve won! If not, put them back without saying what they are. Like the poor soul who drew the eighth monster, you’re now out of the game in every capacity save evidence rotation. Better luck next time!
For our game, I believe we determined that Velma (as Ms. Peacock) was abducted in the Graveyard using the Funland Robot’s Ray Gun. Fun times! Well, except for Velma.
