Garfield is the most relevant character in comics today. With his laissez faire attitude about life and the way he hides his deep abiding love for his family behind a wall of standoffishness and mild abuse, he’s a charming allegory for the decade we live in, an icon of our time.
What do you mean it’s not the 1980s anymore? I knew I should have gotten this watch fixed.
Garfield is not the most relevant character in anything today, but he played a large part in my childhood so his current status gets a pass. I’m positive that behind every child that loves the little furry bastard there’s a parent around my age, one that used to order Jim Davis’ compilation books from the RIF (Reading Is Fundamental!) catalogue back in elementary school. A parent that once had a Garfield sleeping bag that he’d hop around his apartment in all day, his own real-world trapped in the bottom (sorry Jean Claude, the French pussycat, wherever you are.)
I am one of those parents, so I respect developer Web Prancer for both keeping the character alive through a series of mobile games and for adopting the name Web Prancer in the first place.
What I do not respect is starting off the new-ish running platform game, Garfield’s Escape, playing as Odie, Garfield’s pet dog.
I get that it’s for plot purposes. Odie’s been tracking in mud, so Jon orders a menacing cleaning robot to chase the animal relentlessly through the house, waving brushes about. This is a thing you have to do to dogs. So what if Odie winds up chewing up and/or peeing all over everything in the house out of anxiety — he’ll be clean.
So Odie has to run, jump and slide through the world’s longest living room to escape utilising far too many on-screen controls. There are two different jump buttons, a slide, a go downstairs button and a grab the hanging thing button, five functions that could have easily been handled by two buttons or a pair of finger swipes.
Despite the convoluted control scheme and the stupid opening protagonist (Odie is stupid, this has been established in Garfield lore), Garfield’s Escape is a solid little running and jumping game, with capable 3D graphics and plenty of collectible items and unlockable wallpapers for Garfield fans old and old-sponsored. It really picks up around level five, when you finally unlock Garfield.
Garfield’s Escape
Genre: Platform Runner
Developer: Web Prancer
Platform: Android / iOS
Price: $1.99 Android, $0.99 iOS
Get Garfield’s Escape on Google Play
Get Garfield’s Escape on iTunes
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