The Garfield Movie is getting its own video game.
Now one may think there’s nothing more straightforward than Chris Pratt, who already voiced video game icon Mario in the Super Mario Bros Movie, will also get a video game for his new movie, but it’s surprisingly more convoluted than that.
Production on The Garfield Movie started in 2016, when Jim Davis still owned the rights to his orange creation, via his company Paws, Inc. Alcon Entertainment acquired the rights to make the movie. Now that name may not be familiar, but Alcon’s film output should be, as it includes the likes of Dude, Where’s My Car?, 2006’s The Wicker Man, The Blind Side, and Blade Runner 2049.
In 2019, Viacom, now known as Paramount Global, acquired Paws, Inc, putting the status of this film in limbo. However, director Mark Dindal confirmed it was still in production.
In 2021, Alcon partnered up with Sony to make the film. They also chose DNEG, who made Nimona, to be the official animation studio.
Now, as reported by Deadline, this film is also getting a video game adaptation, but with no involvement from either Paramount, Garfield’s current owner, or Sony, the film’s producer.
The game will instead be coming from Stars Collective, who holds a 25 year exclusive merchandising license for Garfield in China. Details are sparse on the full arrangement for now, but that might just be because nothing’s been decided yet. We highly doubt that Sony’s involvement will make it a PlayStation 5 exclusive.
Garfield’s most recent video game outing was as a returning playable character in Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl 2, where he can duke it out with the likes of Spongebob Squarepants, Rocksteady, and Arnold’s Grandma Gertie.
Franchise games are usually expected to be bad, but maybe things are different here. We are of course looking at the year where Marvel’s Spider-Man 2, Hogwarts Legacy, and Baldur’s Gate 3 all released to critical and commercial success.
A major factor here is the relative shortness of development time provided. Unlike the abovementioned games, The Garfield Movie video game will have to release at the same time as the film itself. That puts limits on what creative or technically proficient things you can do with the game. But if Stars hires someone like WayForward for this project, maybe they can pull off making another The Mummy Demastered.
Maybe it’s premature to dismiss this project right now. We don’t even know if the project just started or if the game has already been in production this whole time. We really need to wait for the full production details to emerge before we can make a judgement call on it.
