Scooby-Doo
Question tested
How much interface, rules, lore, and preparation can be removed while keeping an immediately recognizable experience?
Burden targeted
Lower player entry cost and preparation required to produce a strongly characterized session quickly.
Complexity to preserve or generate
Play should still generate investigation, comic fear, character asymmetry, absurd plans, complications, and genre rhythm without trapping players in reenactment of known scenes.
Device
Scooby-Doo uses a compressed form of Regard. Characters are created quickly and their tropes can become operative through strongly characterized Prisms.
Observation
A small rules volume can transmit a strong signature when procedures directly orient the gestures that produce genre.
Burden shift
Compression may hide dependence on prior knowledge of Scooby-Doo. Some accessibility may come from participants already knowing how this kind of story is supposed to work.
Implication
The game is a useful test for distinguishing generative simplicity from mere economy of text. It should be tested with players who have very different levels of genre familiarity.
Status
Light game built with Regard; experiment on compression, genre, and entry cost.