Scooby-Doo Mystery Mask Mix-Up!
Written: Jul 10 '02 (Updated May 24 '08)
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Product Rating:
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Pros: Cool collectible coin, fun activities, and perforated pages.
Cons: Hard to find all six books in the Scooby-Doo series.
The Bottom Line: Scooby-Doo's Mystery Mask Mix-Up is a great book that is jam packed with fun, cool activities. Scratch off the secret sections on each page for even more fun!
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| Freak369's Full Review: Mystery Mask Mix-Up (Cartoon Network Scooby-Doo!) ... |
I honestly thought the boys were over their Scooby-Doo fascination, I thought wrong. On a recent outing to Target the youngest of the brood spotted a “new” book called Scooby-Doo Mystery Mask Mix-Up - more to the point – he spotted to cool silver coin attached to the book. He begged, he pleaded then he remembered that he had his wallet with him and just enough cash to pick up the book. I reminded him that if he wanted to pick up the new Lego set at Wal-Mart [Lego Extreme] he better start saving up his money – it fell on deaf ears.
The other boys were a bit too thrifty to pay $3.59 for a “coloring book”, they sang a different tune when they saw all the cool secret images that were hidden within each drawing. Still, they haven’t asked for their own copy yet and little bother was kind enough to share, for .25 cents a page that is.
Mystery Mask Mix-Up
There really isn’t a solid story through the book, which didn’t sit well with me. Some of the pages contain the same characters but overall there is no defined story or plot. It’s best summed up that these are collections of images from various Scooby-Doo adventures – the usual mishaps that the gang encounters. All the gang members are present and accounted for as well as the masked villains and A. Fong. Some of the really cool activities include mazes and connect the dots. At the bottom of the page there is a clue as to what is hidden – in some instances it asks who is in the Mystery Machine or where is Scooby-Doo headed. Smaller kids might need some help reading the questions or riddles but they’ll have so much fun scratching the images that they’ll hardly realize you are standing over their shoulder.
One of the most interesting things about this book is that once they get done scratching everything in sight they can sit down and color all the images. So it’s kind of like getting two books in one – a scratch off book and then a coloring book. The images that are revealed by scratching the coin over the surface are also able to be colored, but you might have to play around with different markers or crayons to see which ones work best. My son used regular Crayola crayons and they worked just fine.
Coin Reveal Activity Book?
That needs a little explaining doesn’t it? The silver coin that is attached to the front of the book can be used to scratch off hidden little messages or images on each page. On the first page it suggests using a nickel for the best results – and lets face it – you wouldn’t want to use the coin to scratch off all the images. The coin is about the size of a silver dollar and has images on both sides. The front shows Scooby-Doo surrounded by small stars and the back has the Scooby bone logo and the same small stars. This is a very cleaver marketing tool that’s guaranteed to get Scooby-Doo fans in an uproar. I haven’t been able to track down the other five books in the series so I don’t know if the coins are attached to those books or if they are different designs.
This is a “no mess” activity meaning that there are no scrapings that come off the pages. So if you have the image of a mount of silver shaving [like lottery tickets] in your head – you are way off base. Don’t worry about the pages taking a beating, the paper is about twice as thick as regular coloring book pages and is printed on white paper instead of newsprint. If you really want to go all out you can make copies of the pages before the scratching begins, this way if you child wants to use markers you don’t have to worry about the other side of the paper getting ruined.
On the last page there is a puzzle piece that can be cut out. This book has piece number 1 with a rather frazzled looking Shaggy on the opposite side. Collect all six pieces to build your own mini puzzle. I am really hoping that I can track down the rest of the books in this series since my youngest had an absolute ball with it. I’m also curious to see if there are coins attached to the other books and if they have different designs on them.
The Bottom Line
As I said, my son picked this out and paid for it himself. He gave up his hard earned Lego money and showed absolutely no regrets about it. He sold some of the pages to his brothers then came to me and felt a little guilty about it. He returned the money to them and said I’d rather share than sell. When I check out the book it really impressed me. The drawings are simple but have enough detail to provide hours of coloring fun for kids of all ages.
The perforated pages make it easy to rip them out of the book – great for sharing or for making a few copies. One word of caution, the book is stapled so be careful with the younger crowd; it’s been my experience that they love to work at those staples until they mysteriously come apart. The last thing you want is to have a small child rip their finger open and bleed all over the book. So, if you have a Scooby addict, this might just be something to keep your eyes peeled for. This is good for at least two hours of fun – so that means for about $2.00 an hour [according to the suggested retail price] you can buy some Mom time :]
Stats
Name: Scooby-Doo Mystery Mask Mix-Up
Published By: Dalmatian Press in
Series: Coin Reveal Activity Book
Pages: 32
ISBN: 1-57759-865-2
UPC: 00639 92865 4
Price: .$3.59
Suggested Retail Price: $3.99
Age Recommendation 5 and up
As always, thanks for stopping by!
^V^ Freak ^V^
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Recommended:
Yes
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