Jammin’?
It’s been many a year since I played the ToeJam and Earl games, but now they’ve been brought to XBLA as a combination pack, but gamers have the option to buy them individually as well which is a nice touch from Sega. I personally love both of them, but prefer the sequel “Panic on Funkotron” as it’s more up my alley as a platformer with plenty of craziness. The first game has you choose to play solo or co-op as either ToeJam or Earl as you search for spaceship parts as you’ve crashed on Earth, the layout can change if you pick a random world and overall it’s a highly enjoyable, perhaps under looked title from Sega’s back catalogue.
Panic on Funkotron is a very different game, the layout is different and you have to hunt for humans on Funkotron that are hiding in places like trees, bushes and some other clever hiding places. Human types will be different, some will throw poodles at you, there are some drillers, runners, witches that make you laugh and all of them can do quite a lot of damage…but if you play on Lil Kid mode, you can’t die and the game is only 5 levels long! Still, it does give you practise for the real thing and you can save at any point during either of the games.
The game can be played in its original 4:3 format or be stretched to 16:9, which doesn’t look the greatest on a HDTV. You can put smoother textures on to make things look a little nicer, but it’s better to look at in its original look. The achievements are pretty easy and you can gain most of them in a few hours, which is a bit of a shame but it doesn’t stop the collection being very good value for money. The music has always been pretty catchy in the games and even after all these years, it’s still pretty impressive.
The Verdict
Sega Vintage Collection: ToeJam & Earl shows that some of the classics are still worthy of getting once again. It’s just a shame that we’ll probably never see the duo in another game *frowny face*
