ToeJam & Earl

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.

Supremely funky alien homeboys ToeJam and "Big" Earl, proud residents of the planet Funkotron, have crashlanded on the decidedly lame and non-funky planet of Earth. The impact, while leaving them unharmed, scattered pieces of their spacecraft all over the planet, and finding all of these pieces is the only way to get back home. Sounds simple in principle. The Earth's natives might be a bit of trouble, though...

ToeJam & Earl is a series of video games known mainly for its first entry, released in 1991 on the Sega Mega Drive/Genesis, although two more games exist. The first game, with the same name as the series, is an exploration-oriented Action Adventure game with an overhead perspective and (the option of) randomly-generated levels. The sequels are ToeJam & Earl in Panic on Funkotron, an extremely different two-dimensional Platform Game released on the Mega Drive in 1993, where the Duo has made it back home, only to find that several Earthlings have somehow stowed aboard, and are now causing Panic on Funkotron, and ToeJam & Earl III: Mission to Earth, a three-dimensional Platform Game released on the Microsoft Xbox in 2002.

Tropes used in ToeJam & Earl include:
  • Abnormal Ammo: The original game features tomatoes as the protagonists' weapon of choice. Panic on Funkotron features jars that capture enemies (though it takes multiple jars to weaken the enemy).
  • Alcohol Hic: Guzzle a Root Beer and the boys will spend a few seconds burping as they walk around.
  • An Aesop: Never let Earl drive. Ever.
  • Bad Humor Truck: One of the enemies. Worse, it's a ghost ice cream truck that teleports around.
  • Blinding Camera Flash: Panic on Funkotron features Hawaiian Shirted Tourists who use their camera flash as a weapon.
  • Cartography Sidequest: In the first game, you acquire points for every map tile you uncover.
  • Chest Monster: Variation: the dreaded Mailbox Monster, who will totally send you to Lamerville if it gets you. Less notable are the Earthling presents which may or may not summon harmful enemies.
  • Co-Op Multiplayer
  • Cutscenes: In the first game, when traveling in the elevator to the next level while in Two-Player mode, you can hear a conversation by ToeJam and Earl, with hilarious results.
  • Easy Mode Mockery: "Lil' Kids" mode in Panic on Funkotron makes it impossible to die, but ends the game after level five, thus robbing players of the chance to collect the Funkopotamus' favorite things and get the good ending.
  • Everything's Even Worse with Sharks: If a shark gets close, you'll hear a quick snippet of the Jaws theme as a warning.
  • Fake Balance: Earl has a little more health, but screw that, walking faster is a huge asset in this game. The difference between the two is pretty slight so it doesn't matter much.
  • Floating Continent: Each level in the original is a piece of land floating in a void. If you drop off the edge, you will land in the previous level, implying that they are arranged in a vertical stack. Try falling off the bottom-left corner of Level 1.
  • Fragile Speedster: ToeJam is faster than Earl, but has a shorter life bar.
  • Earthlings Are Lame: For the most part. Some Earthlings will help you out for the right price.
  • Hyperactive Metabolism: Food items heal you to varying degrees, generally corresponding to the tastiness or richness of the food (e.g. a hot fudge sundae will heal you more than a bowl of cereal). Some food items will harm you instead; these take the form of rotten or health foods.
  • Idle Animation: In the original game, if you leave them idle too long, they'll actually fall asleep. You then have to mash the buttons a bunch of times to have a disembodied voice yell at them to wake up.
  • I See London: Earl's shorts occasionally fall and he has to stop to pull them up. A rare example of this trope as a gameplay mechanic (incidentally, his underwear is almost identical to his pants).
  • Medium Awareness: In the first game, the characters introduce themselves and explain the entire situation to the player.
  • Mercy Invincibility: Or lack thereof. Can lead to several otherwise-innocuous enemies becoming Demonic Spiders.

Youch! Youch! Youch! Youch! Youch!

  • Mighty Glacier: Earl is slower than ToeJam, and his pants fall down occasionally slowing you down, but has a longer life bar.
  • Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: At the end of the first game, the guys are received as heroes for surviving a visit to the most dangerous planet in the known universe. That is, until it's discovered that a large number of Earthlings followed them back and are trashing Funkotron. ToeJam and Earl set out to solve the problem themselves seemingly to avoid being punished for it.
  • Non Lethal Bottomless Pits: Drop you down to the previous level rather than losing you a life. Of course, the backwards step can be more frustrating than losing a life...
  • NPC: Helpful Earthlings include the Wizard, who will fully heal you for a buck; the Wise Carrot, who will tell you the contents of a given present in your inventory for two bucks; the Opera Singer, who will kill all enemies on the screen with her voice for three; and Santa Claus, who will drop presents from his sack if you can sneak up on him.
  • One-Hit Kill: Accidentally open a "Total Bummer" present, and your character dies instantly.
  • Oxygen Meter: Your life bar drains while you're underwater, but it replenishes to what it was when you climb out (or refills when you die and respawn in the water). Use an Inner Tube to avoid having to hold your breath.
  • Personal Raincloud: It's a nuisance.
  • Poison Mushroom: Some presents have intentionally bad effects, such as the Schoolbook, Randomizer and Total Bummer.
    • There is a literal mushroom that, if eaten, will take a significant portion of the characters' health.
    • The rain cloud is a classic example. You open a present just to have a rain cloud follow you around, giving you a nigh-unavoidable shock for slight damage every so often.
    • The Total Bummer just kills you upon opening it, no questions asked.
  • Power-Up Letdown: Unexpectedly using a pair of Rocket Skates will easily set you back a few levels. It's hard to navigate narrow, twisty paths at high speeds, especially when you can't stop at will.
  • Quicksand Sucks: The protagonists will sink in sand, but not far enough to suffocate; their movement just slows the farther they sink. And it's more like desert sand (including cacti!) than quicksand.
  • Rhythm Game: Panic on Funkotron's "Jam Out" sessions.
  • Roguelike: Partial use. The first game is not a true roguelike, but it has elements of one in that it has two gameplay modes, Random World and Fixed World. In Random World, each level is randomly generated, along with the enemies therein and the locations of presents. In Fixed World, all of these things have set forms and locations.
    • Also, you have to climb up floors, you gain experience points, and presents are challenging to identify. Lots of the presents are bad, including one little SOB that re-randomizes all the presents, including itself!
  • RPG Elements: There are nine player rankings. Which ranking you currently have is based on your score, which is primarily increased by opening presents and exploring more of the map. "Wiener", as seen in the screenshot above, is the lowest ranking.
  • Sassy Blue Alien: Latisha in Mission to Earth.
  • Secret Level: In the first game, the very first level has a hidden entrance to a level 0, where ToeJam and Earl can get extra lives and chat with some cuties in a hot tub. Getting to the entrance requires a lot of swimming (or Icarus Wings or Rocket Skates), so the players must first acquire some appropriate presents to reach it without drowning. Leaving the secret level returns the players to the highest level they've reached so far.
  • Sneeze of Doom: Though it's incredibly rare, ToeJam and Earl may sneeze when sneaking past sleeping enemies or attempting to surprise Santa, ruining the attempt.
  • Sprint Shoes: Super Hi-Tops in the original game. They even come with a cute little honking horn sound.
  • Standard Disco Equipment: Disco balls appear over Earthlings in Mission to Earth who have been "funkified".
  • Standard Status Effects: Quite a few. Schoolbooks put you to sleep, which makes you helpless to enemy attacks, forcing you to button mash your way to being awake. Wahini will make you do a dance if you get too close to her. Cupids fire arrows which make you lovestruck. Finally, the Rain Cloud will randomly drain your health with lightning bolts.
  • Too Awesome to Use: A little different than the normal. Once you've identified most presents, the remaining unidentified presents become Too Scary To Use until you figure out which one is the Randomizer.
    • There are some straight examples too, such as running shoes. You start with 4 identified pairs and can find more later, but they're still super valuable. They let you avoid the worst enemies, jump over gaps, and quickly get through levels.
  • Totally Radical: It would be hard to find someone in Real Life who uses the games' peculiar blend of slang without irony.
  • Video Game Cruelty Potential: You can steal presents from Santa in the first game. In Panic on Funkotron, you can drive your neighbors to distraction by continually ringing their doorbell, but unlike stealing presents, it serves no practical purpose.
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