Garfield has never exactly enjoyed the greatest reputation when it comes to video games. There have been plenty of attempts to turn the lazy cat, his love of lasagna and his hatred of Mondays into interactive entertainment, but very few have managed to rise above the level of forgettable licensed fare. That made Garfield – Escape from Monday an interesting prospect from the start. OSome Studio’s involvement offered reason to be hopeful, particularly given the developer’s earlier work, and thankfully the result is considerably better than the character’s previous gaming outings might have suggested. It certainly isn’t going to redefine the 3D platformer, but it does something arguably more important for a Garfield game: it understands that simply being a licensed character isn’t enough and delivers a genuinely enjoyable platforming foundation.
The premise is suitably ridiculous without becoming completely detached from Garfield’s personality. After being subjected to a spinach-filled lasagna, Garfield falls asleep and finds himself trapped in a bizarre food-themed nightmare ruled by the sinister Chef Monday. This gives OSome Studio an excuse to throw the character into vegetable-filled environments, dessert landscapes and barbecue-inspired areas, while bringing in familiar faces such as Jon, Odie, Arlene, Pookie, Nermal and Squeak. The dream setting is hardly an original storytelling device, but it works particularly well here because it allows the developers to be as silly as they want with the environments and situations. The game’s tongue-in-cheek attitude and occasional fourth-wall jokes also capture some of the dry humor associated with Garfield, although the frequent interruptions for dialogue and cutscenes can become more distracting than amusing. The writing is therefore at its best when it keeps things moving rather than trying too hard to turn the nightmare into a proper narrative.
The real surprise is how well Garfield himself moves. His basic moveset is relatively small, combining jumping, wall-jumping, ground-pounding, attacking and a roll that doubles as a useful burst of speed, but these abilities work together considerably better than expected. Garfield can chain movements together to cover ground quickly, extend his time in the air and reach platforms that initially appear just out of reach. The controls are responsive and straightforward enough for younger players to understand almost immediately, while there is enough freedom in Garfield’s movement to make more experienced platforming fans appreciate the way he handles. It is still a fairly forgiving game, with enemies posing little threat and falling or taking damage rarely resulting in much punishment, but the accessibility feels deliberate rather than poorly balanced.
Exploration is what keeps that simple structure from becoming completely routine. The levels generally involve reaching the exit while collecting food along the way, but hidden lasagna pieces encourage players to wander away from the obvious route and investigate corners of each environment. There are also time trials and optional challenges that add some replay value, while the food collected throughout the adventure contributes to Garfield’s Yum-O-Meter and unlocks furniture and other decorations for Jon’s house. The latter is a rather strange reward structure and doesn’t add much beyond giving completionists another reason to keep collecting, particularly since the lasagna itself isn’t always tied to meaningful progression. Still, there is something satisfying about returning to a level to find that one collectible that was missed the first time around.
The three special costumes are another welcome addition. Each world introduces its own outfit, giving Garfield a different way to move through the environment, whether that means gaining additional aerial mobility, surfing across water or using a lasso to reach distant points. These abilities are temporary rather than becoming permanent additions to Garfield’s arsenal, but they provide each area with its own flavor and help break up the basic jumping and rolling. Some of the later sections are particularly inventive, including mine-cart sequences and other changes in perspective, and the costumes come into their own when the game combines their abilities. Unfortunately, the overall level design doesn’t consistently maintain that creativity. With more than 40 stages spread across only three worlds, the formula can start to feel stretched, and the game is simply too easy to provide much of a challenge for seasoned platforming fans. The later levels demonstrate that OSome Studio was capable of doing more with the formula, which makes some of the more conventional earlier sections feel like missed opportunities.
Visually, however, Garfield – Escape from Monday makes a good first impression. The food-based worlds are colorful and imaginative, with vegetables, sweets, baked goods and other edible objects incorporated into both the environments and enemies. The presentation isn’t technically spectacular, but the bright art direction suits the licence extremely well and gives the different worlds enough personality to remain pleasant to explore. The lighting and overall image quality are solid, while the performance is generally smooth and free of major technical problems. Some animations and character movements can look a little cheap, but those shortcomings are rarely serious enough to undermine the overall presentation. It is a game that benefits more from its coherent visual style and playful ideas than from raw graphical power.
The audio is more problematic. The soundtrack itself generally supports the colorful, family-friendly tone well enough, but Garfield’s constant stream of comments and one-liners becomes increasingly irritating. The character’s dialogue is supposed to reinforce his sarcastic personality and the game’s self-aware humor, yet the delivery often feels monotonous or simply doesn’t sound like the Garfield players expect. This is particularly unfortunate because much of the writing does capture the character’s general attitude, meaning the voice performance undermines material that might otherwise work better.
Ultimately, Garfield – Escape from Monday is a pleasant surprise in part because expectations for a Garfield game have historically been so low. It is not a particularly ambitious 3D platformer, and anyone looking for a serious challenge or the kind of depth found in the genre’s best examples will probably find it too easy and occasionally repetitive. The basic combat is functional rather than exciting, the bosses rarely test the player, and the three-world structure could have benefited from more variety. Yet the movement is genuinely enjoyable, the controls are responsive, the collectible-driven exploration works, and OSome Studio has created a colorful world that feels appropriate for Garfield rather than simply placing the character into a generic platformer. For younger players, families and Garfield fans, that combination makes this a surprisingly solid adventure. It may not finally give Garfield a platforming classic, but it does give the orange cat a game that is much easier to recommend than his previous efforts.
Score: 7.7/10