This May marks the start of the annual "Masochism Month" for SuperPod Game Club - a single month out of the year where we struggle to complete a bad game because love to torture ourselves I guess. To kick it off, we voted for Earthworm Jim 3D, and we almost immediately regretted that decision. Released on the N64 in 1999, Earthworm Jim 3D was the third game in the acclaimed Earthworm Jim series, and the series' foray into the world of 3D. It was universally panned for many reasons, which I'm sure we'll read about below.

Synopsis: Earthworm Jim is hit by a flying cow that sends him into a coma. Jim awakens within his own subconscious and discovers he has gone insane. His past villains have entered his subconscious and if something does not happen soon, Jim will become stuck in the coma forever.

Is Earthworm Jim 3D really that bad? How many of us managed to beat the game? Did any of us go bald and develop stomach cancer as a result of how annoying every part of this game is? Answers to these questions and more in this month's edition of SuperPod Game Club.

What do you think about this month's game?

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Earthworm Jim 3D is your average generic 3D platformer that suffers from then usual awkward controls and poor camera angles. The story involves Jim being knocked into a coma and he has to visit memories to regain his sanity or something. The hub world is kind of neat, you can look out of Jim’s eyes and see a first person view of him being rushed to the emergency room. Unfortunately that’s probably the most creative bit of the entire game, at least from what I played up to, because this is one of the rare instances where I couldn’t be bothered to finish the game of the month.

I will say that Jim does control a lot better than I was expecting, at least most of the time. I didn’t have too much trouble with any of the platforming and while the level design is a bit bland and boring, they’re over before things start to become tedious. While playing the first few levels I didn’t really see why the game was so universally hated, that is until I got to the first boss encounter, where you have to race around an arena on a the back of a pig and collect 100 marbles while avoiding enemy projectiles. This is when it all came together and I understood exactly why Earthworm Jim 3D has such a bad reputation, because holy fuck are these boss fights frustrating as hell. Any sense of control while driving the pig is completely non-existent, the bosses are overly aggressive and favor camping around ammo respawns over collecting marbles, making it feel like you’re constantly under fire. Even with save states it felt near impossible to get past the first boss fight with Psy-Crow, but I continued further hoping that the other boss fights would be different, but to my dismay the second one against Fatty Rosewell was the same, only even more frustrating because the motherfucker teleports around the arena. After a few more attempts and referring to decades old walkthroughs in hope of finding some secret cheese strategy I called it quits.

Is Earthworm Jim 3D one of the worst games of all time? Not really, but it’s very boring and on some levels that’s the worst crime any bad game can commit. Supposedly the PC version plays a bit better than the N64 version, but I really don’t care enough to find out for myself and wasn’t about to spend $20 to buy it on GOG to play a slightly less bad version of a bad game.

Earthworm Jim 3D is a strange game in a lot of ways, that's probably the simplest way to describe it. It's notably one of the many titles that made the attempt to transition from a 2D to 3D platforming title as well as the first in the series not to be developed by its original creator Shiny Entertainment (who had recently instituted a bizarre no sequels policy within the company). With the game instead being developed by VIS Entertainment the developer mostly known for creating State of Emergency and a few other lesser known titles. The end result being one of the many failed 3D platformers common during the era.

What makes this game so bad? Well in short it's mostly the camera, which like many Nintendo 64 from the time is very poorly implemented, being strictly locked to horizontal movement with no vertical adjustment at all. This leads to a lot of camera screw, with it constantly getting caught on the environment and making actual platforming way more difficult than it needs to be at times. The game's levels are also generally uninspired and pretty bland which made it very hard to stay interested with the game as I slogged my way through, leading to my other major dislike being the games bosses which are just downright frustrating to the point where I just didn't want to play the game anymore. Aside from that the games other issues are generally minor mostly coming down to poor controls (although not the worst thing ever) and design, with the game being more painfully boring than outright bad.The entire set up is mostly akin to the gluttony of 3D collect-a-thon platformers similar to Super Mario 64 which were popular at the time.

Overall this game has an infamous reputation among the general gaming community, but upon this most recent attempt I didn't really see what made this one any worse than its many contemporaries. It's really just another mediocre platformer that was trying to stay relevant in the changing gaming environment, and looking back at it i dont regret not giving it a second chance sooner than this, because I just know it would have been the same experience. Very short, very frustrating, and just a waste of time in the end.

I would not recommend giving this one a go.

Look, I already went over why this was godawful on Fine Time Episode "They Had Three Bacons", live wherever podcasts live. This doesn't deserve a relitigation in the blog. Instead I'll just rattle off some things you can do instead of wasting your time playing Earthworm Jim 3D.

You could take up cooking something you haven't before. Try watching that acclaimed series everyone's been telling you to start for years. Volunteer at your local food bank. Try to break off the pornography addiction. Take up a new pornography addiction. Build something with your own two hands. Set up a bird feeder and see who comes to visit (hopefully not RFK Jr). Just start binging the fuck out of the 3DO Experience- the 3DO Retrospective Podcast about all things 3DO- the company, the console and all things in between.

Also, follow through on some of that stuff. Unlike Earthworm Jim 3D, things worth doing are worth doing all the way

You've heard it from the other guys and other review outlets - this game blows. The platforming isn't bad, but it isn't anything groundbreaking or memorable like other games in this era, like Super Mario 64, Rayman 2, or even Spyro. You will not miss out on anything worthwhile, especially considering the series creator, Doug TenNapel, is a huge piece of shit and should not be supported in any kind of way. Spend your time on something meaningful, like knitting, playing the harmonica, or even smoking meats.

In short, I got to the first boss and it was beyond frustrating and I moved on.

I don't have anything to say lmao.

I am an Earthworm Jim super fan, (EWJ for short, even though it has more syllables - fellow back of the box readers hello!). From the hysterical first game to the maybe not so hot sequel, and even the Saturday morning cartoon that was cancelled before it really got its stride, I have loved it all. That said, I can tell you I have avoided Earthworm Jim 3D for YEARS based on the awful reviews and screenshots that show EWJ in such a stripped down and bare bones manner.

The Superpod Games club has a semi-democratic method for choosing the next game, so certainly anyone here has a hand in this fate. But to the single person that added Earthworm Jim 3D to the poll, I have one question:

Who HURT you?!

I slotted Earthworm Jim 3d in and I only made it three levels deep. Frankly that is enough. All of the gags and humor completely fall flat in this shift to the 3D platformer genre. While franchise characters like Peter Puppy and Professor Monkey for a Head are here, they completely lack any charm from the 2D games. I believe the original creators of EWJ were not involved in this game's development and that is likely why this rings so hollow. The poor controls, stupid camera, and overall frustrating difficulty were bad enough, but it is made so much worse with a mind numbing loop of music best left to the circus tent or asylum. I really do not know who at the developer thought it was a good idea to have Jim ride a backwards pig in a boss fight, then decide to just make that EVERY boss encounter.

Truly abysmal game.

Thank you for reading!

Come back next month and see what we have to say about Mina the Hollower!

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