The Garfield Game That Never Was

There's a Garfield game for the Atari 2600. Or rather, there's a prototype. The game was never released, in the end. A sad fate for what amounts to quite a beautiful almost-game. I wish Garfield (the game) was real. But I will accept this gorgeous ghost. This pretty shadow.

Garfield himself is rendered and animated beautifully. You start out atop a garden fence, and may traverse in a sprightly way across its surface. Above float enticing burgers, which careen through the air towards Garfield's gaping maw. Yum.

Garfield under a beautiful starry sky.

Since this is a prototype, there is actually no way to avoid the burgers. Garfield doesn't need to do a thing - they'll always hit him and be absorbed. Wonderful. 

Other screens have Garfield avoiding projectiles, or weird enemies, or Odie, and then you'll see something out of a warped dream - several Odies in a row to hop over. Things like that. Fantastical, slightly wrong landscapes. Once you traverse enough screens, Garfield will soon perish. There are, indeed, ill-coded, unformed dangers he cannot really go past. 

But for a while, there is bliss. Garfield is in an endless zone of pleasure, consuming and continuing. As we all must.