In the world of comic strips, the annual performance known as Fun Fest is coming up. Garfield plans to participate, but finds his routine in jeopardy when he loses his sense of humor and Arlene falls in with a suave new star known as Ramone. As a result, Garfield (with Odie by his side) sets off to find a magic pond that can make him funny again.
This videogame contains examples of:
- 100% Completion: Collecting all items in the game is necessary to obtain all trophies in the Awards section: The Pooky plush in every exploration level, all dingle balls in every riding level, all balloons in every flight level, all food in every level from the aforementioned types, and all cues (plus hitting them with perfect timing) in every dance level.
- Achievement System: The Awards section in the title screen's menu showcases the gold trophies the player has earned for meeting certain achievements in the levels. There are ten of them in total, and require doing respectively the following things: Simply beating the game, completing all exploration levels without falling asleep even once, getting Pooky in said levels, getting all dingle balls in the Odie-riding levels, getting all balloons in the flight levels, performing all cues in the dance levels, getting a perfect score of 10 from all judges in said levels, and finding all food in the exploration, riding and flight levels. The last two are the hardest, and the second can be a potential source of difficulty as well.
- Adaptational Nice Guy: Garfield comes off substantially nicer here, especially when it comes to his interactions with Odie.
- Collection Sidequest: Levels usually have a kind of collectible for Garfield to gather, depending on the levels' type. In each category, getting all of them in every level nets you an Award:
- Dingle balls are collected during the Odie-riding stages.
- Red balloons are collected during the paraglider stages.
- Each on-foot platformer levels has Pooky as a collectible. It's well-hidden in some of them.
- Death Mountain: During the eleventh level, Garfield and Odie have to climb a steep rocky mountain in order to ffind a bottle where they store water from a pond that is said to be magical. They have to climb rope ladders and avoid spiders, wolves and angry blue birds along the way. There's also an explorable small cave.
- Defeat Equals Explosion: Played with: enemies defeated by Garfield disappear in a puff of smoke. That even includes mail carriers.
- Green Hill Zone:
- The first level takes place around the grassy backyard of Garfield's house. He has to look for Odie as well as the keys of Jon's car to clear the level, and as he looks for them he has to move through tree branches, rooftops and fences. Spiders, dogs and mailmen appear as mooks.
- The fifth level has Garfield and Odie race through an uphill prairie to reach a forest as part of their quest to find a magical pond. Other than some steep hills, there aren't any major hazards to worry about.
- Levels Take Flight: The levels preceding the final two are flying stages, which control similarly to the Odie-riding stages. Garfield and Odie use a triangle-shaped paraglider to travel across an alpine forest in one level, and across the upper part of their home city in the other.
- The Lost Woods: The sixth level takes place inside a dense forest where Garfield and Odie have to retrieve four playing cards Junior the bear lost. During their search, the duo has to climb between tree branches and check for items in small crags, all while defeating flies, angry clue birds and hungry wolves. Later in the game, in the eighth level, Garfield and Odie race deeper into the forest, needing to jump between tree branches and traverse the interior of a cavern at one point.
- Metropolis Level: The second level has Garfield ride Odie in a race across a street's pavement to quickly make their way to a theatrical building. During their race, they have to watch out for concrete cylinders, cars and the wires of electric poles.
- Mooks, but no Bosses: There are no bosses in any of the levels in the game. Even the game's antagonist, Ramone (who is Nermal in disguise), is unfitting, as Garfield simply outperforms him in the last level via a dance, so in terms of gameplay the level is no different from the other rhythm-based stages; and when the main antagonist's true identity and intentions are exposed, he runs away in shame, ending the story and the game.
- Remixed Level: Some of the platforming levels are repeated, often because Garfield and Odie return to them in a later time. In fact, this is the case with the final two levels, which take place in the studio hosting the Fun Fest just like the third and fourth levels respectively.
- Sprint Meter: Garfield has an energy meter, which depletes even from walking, let alone jumping. It is only replenished by eating food.
- Take That!: The plot of the game sounds like the developers are making fun of how the comic strip has lost its sense of humour.
- Wizard Needs Food Badly: In play on every level except the rhythm stages. Garfield will steadily lose energy and you must get food to replenish it. If he runs out of food, he falls asleep, and you then take control of Odie, and must find an alarm clock in order to wake him up.
- Yodel Land: The ninth level takes Gardield and Odie to an idyllic hill with blue-colored rocky terrain where they find a rural township where a friendly frog named Freddie lives. He tells them that they have to train a little before they can drink water from the magical pond, so they agree to find some items for him. Along the way they find ponds inhabited by crocodiles, an extensive cavern, climbable trees, and stems of cut trees that serve as platforms.
