ToeJam & Earl: Back in the Groove Brings Home the Funk Fall 2018

Hey, so, remember ToeJam & Earl? You're probably not alone. Believe it or not, the bizzarely-shaped creatures were one of Sega's big exclusives back in the 90's, mascots with recognizability just behind that of Sonic himself. Unfortunately, a mishandled sequel led the series into a spiral that saw it vanish for over 15 years...until now.

Originally announced in 2015, ToeJam & Earl: Back in the Groove crawled its way through a kickstarter campaign, raising $500,000 in a month with a $400,000 goal. At the time, only three people were tied to the game, including Greg Johnson, who created the originally, well-loved classic, as well as its its less fondly-remembered sequels. The game was originally set to be released in 2016...but it was not meant to be. Since then, Adult Swim Games was announced to be attached to the project as publisher, and the game was announced to be releasing not only for the PlayStation 4 and XBox One, but also the Nintendo Switch.

The team recently surfaced with more news about the project including one big surprise: Adult Swim is no longer tied to the game as publisher with the development now being handled entirely by Johnson and his development studio, HumaNature Studios. Johnson also announced emphatically that the game will be released this fall, with a more concrete date to follow.

"Going forward Adult Swim Games is no longer going to be our publisher," Johnson stated in a press release. "Instead, we are going back to self-publishing! Adult Swim Games has some other big titles they plan to launch this summer so when Back in the Groove pushed back, we both agreed that it made sense for them to hand us the reigns, rather than taking a chance on this getting pushed back any more."

"Also I’d like to say how deeply grateful I and all of us here at HNS are to Adult Swim Games," he went on to say. "We wouldn’t have gotten this game to this point without them…seriously. Thank You Adult Swim."

Johnson revealed that an early access beta would be available for backers, hoping for feedback as the game nears its long-awaited release. 

"The Nintendo Switch version of the game is just about ready to be submitted for certification by Nintendo, and the other console versions are not too far behind," he said. "I’ll give you more details about all of this before this update is done.”

You can check out the rather self-aware trailer up above, featuring some brief gameplay clips. The game is reportedly going back to its isometric roots after ill-fatedly dipping its toes into platformer gameplay at the behest of Sega back in the 90's, and will feature multiple player characters as well as online and local co-op.