ToeJam and Earl is a 1991 video game for the Sega Genesis, featuring two aliens from a planet called Funkotron, who accidentally crash on Earth after their ship being hit by a meteorite.

The gameplay consists of the player controlling the characters around several levels in a search for their funkotronic space ship parts, while fighting earthlings with tomatoes. During the game, the player will also collect present boxes which contain special items.

The items vary from food (to gain or lose health points) to rocket-skate shoes, and each different type of present box contains the same kind item.

The music plays an important role in the game, even being part of the major concept. The whole game revolves around "funk". The soundtrack is composed by John Baker .

Another notable feature of the game is the multi-screen capability. When on two players mode, if the characters get too far away from each other, the screen will split in half letting each character free to move through the game. The players could even be on different levels at the same time.

The two characters also talk with each other during the game, if they're close enough and if they're both not moving. When two players get together again, the characters also say things like "Yo, what's up!". They also talk in most elevator scenes, between each level.

Characters

• ToeJam: a skinny three-legged red alien with snail-like eyes. Wears a white hat, black and white shoes and a golden necklace.
• "Big" Earl: an obese yellow alien. Wears sunglasses and blue shorts.

Sequels

The game spawned two sequels:

• Toejam and Earl II: Panic on Funkotron (1993) — after getting back to their planet, ToeJam and Earl find out that some earthlings hitchhiked on their spaceship. The humans are now disturbing the funkness of Funkotron, and it's ToeJam's and Earl's mission to trap them in jars and send them back to Earth. This was a platform game and featured a lot more characters.
• ToeJam and Earl III: Mission To Earth (2002) — ToeJam and Earl must get back to Earth in order to bring back the "12 Vinyls of Funk". This game presented a more adult approach, full random 3-D levels and another playable character, Latisha. It was released exclusively on Xbox.
• A mini-game entitled Ready-Aim-Tomatoes, packaged with the Sega Light gun, was also released just after the first game. In this game, the player would have to use the light gun to make ToeJam shoot tomatoes on the earthlings.

External link

• Official website
• The ToeJam & Earl Theme Song (mp3 file)