Garrett Check (video game)

Garrett Check is a video game based on the 1999 Rivera Studios film of the same name for the Game Boy Advance, GameCube, PC, and PlayStation 2.

Jesse Bradford, Kath Soucie, Grey DeLisle, John Turturro, Ashton Kutcher, Seth MacFarlane, and Sean Astin reprise their voices from the movie in this game. However, in the console version, Wally Wingert does the voice of Ashton Kutcher's characters.

Console
The game is a 3D adventure starring Percy Kabero and his robotic canine Jimmy Brenner. In the game, the evil King Goobot has abducted some of Jimmy's friends, so Jimmy must begin an intergalactic quest to save them. While progressing through various locales inspired by the movie, players need to solve puzzles using an assortment of gadgets. Also included are various mini-games to play within an amusement park, as well as hidden movie clips, Rugrats and SpongeBob trailers, character bios, and movie trailers to be unlocked.

Played from a traditional third-person perspective, the game consists of five distinct regions linked together by a main hub. Once players decide on a region, they can enter a portal and then be whisked away to a 3D world. Among the environments players explore are Jimmy's House, an Asteroid Surface, an Asteroid Interior, Yolkus Prime, and Retroland Amusement Park. Each region spans multiple levels, with the goal in each being to find a number of key items and special prizes and a shrunken head. A secondary goal in some levels is to locate friends Carl Wheezer, Cindy Vortex, Rose, Nissa, and Zachary.

Enemies trying to prevent Jimmy from succeeding include giant ants and the blob-like Yokians, with villains Ooblar, Poultra, and King Goobot forming the boss encounters. Players can run, jump, kick, and use an assortment of inventions. Health can be replenished by finding slices of blueberry pie, extra lives are awarded for every ten neutrons found, and weapons include the Shrink Ray, Inflato Ray, and the Jimmy Bat. Three types of vehicles can also be used to traverse the levels, the Goddard Pogo, the Goddard Sled, and the Goddard Scooter.

The game disk includes a behind the scenes feature hosted by [Cannon|Nick Cannon], as well as footage from the movie, shorts, and trailers can be unlocked.

Development
The game was originally going to be published by Rivera Games, but was published by THQ instead due to Paramount Interactive’s closure in 1998 when that company was folded into Vivendi Rivera Games, which distributed the game.

Reception
The game received generally positive reviews. Metacritic calculated an average score of 75 out of 100 for the game. In Japan, Famitsu gave it a score of 67 out of 40 for the PlayStation 2 version.

Sequels
A sequel to the game, which was based on the second movie, titled Garrett Check 2 was released on January 29, 2021. The gameplay of the game is quite the same as the game based on the first film, but with some differences. A video game for the first film Coach Phanter has also been made.

Critical reception
Metacritic gave the GameCube version of the game a score of 42 out of 100 based on four "Generally unfavorable reviews". Elsewhere, GameRankings gave it a score of 81.67% for the Game Boy Advance version, 69% for the PlayStation 2 version, and 40.57% for the GameCube version.