Join us as we rate and review every game to feature the characters from Ed, Edd n Eddy…
Find out if the video game adaptations of one of the best Cartoon Network shows ever stand up today, and if you should seek them out.
Transcript
Like most of us born in the mid-90s, I was lucky enough to enjoy the golden age of Cartoon Network. The likes of Courage the Cowardly Dog, Dexter’s Laboratory and The Powerpuff Girls made weekend mornings and after school evenings rich with colourful worlds, irreverent characters and zany plots.
To this day if I’m ever looking for something to pick me up or give me a healthy dose of nostalgia, I’ll whack on an episode or two and take a trip back to childhood.
Of this prestigious bunch, none stack up to the absolute genius of Ed, Edd n Eddy. The hijinx of three 11 year old friends trying to scam their neighbours out of enough money to buy jawbreakers are some of the funniest 20 minutes to be found anywhere on TV, let alone just the kids channels.
But if you’ve clicked on this video, chances are you don’t need me to tell you that. But what are less well known are the various video game adaptations featuring the residents of the cul-de-sac. Like many cartoons from this time, studios couldn’t help but milk their technicolour cash cows and slap them on a game cartridge or disc, to varying degrees of success.
Yet whether they be good, bad or anywhere in between, each is still a fascinating time capsule that’s worth talking about, and that’s exactly what I’m going to do. In this video I’ll be taking a look at each of the Ed, Edd n Eddy titles that received a full console release, as well as games that featured the Ed Boys. I’ll tell you a little bit about each one, whether they’re any good and if you should check them out today.
What I won’t be doing is talking about all the web games that you could play on the Cartoon Network website. One because they’re pretty much all defunct by this point, and also there’s like 30 of them and finding enough information about the console game was hard enough. So instead, here’s a tasteful in memoriam…
Defunct online games
Astro Quiz
Boot the Fruit
Candy Factory
Candy Machine
Candy Machine Deluxe
Cartoon Cartoon Summer Resort
Cartoon Cove
Cartoon Soundboard
Clash of the Idiots
Cul-de-Sac Smash
Cul-de-Sac Smash 2: Wheels of Fury
Ed Over Heels
The Ed-Touchables
The Eds’ Launchbox
Face Builder
Food Bash
Infect Ed
Kart Attack!
Kick-The-Can
Bean-Bag-Tag
Lunchroom Rumble
Nightmare in Space
Operation S.T.A.T.
Picnic Pick-off
Ready, IM, Fire!
Sewer Rat Balloon Bash
Snow Fort
Spin Stadium
Toon Hoops
Toy Twister
Topsy Turkey
Trick or Treat Beat!
What’s Your Eds Name?
Jingle-Bell Ed
Night of The Living Ed
Bowl-Ed Over
To The Eds-Treme
And with that out of the way, let’s begin.
Cartoon Network: Speedway
So the first of the games to feature the Eds in a supporting role was Cartoon Network Speedway, released back on November 17th 2003 for the Gameboy Advance and boy is it a kart racer on the GBA!
You can expect all of the grand prixs, zany weapons and other tropes of the genre, as well as some surprising innovations. Speedway actually introduced a Blue Shell mechanic before Mario Kart, so take that Chris Pratt! And to its credit, Speedway also handles and plays really well, and although I wouldn’t say it offers much of a challenge, I still enjoyed zipping around the various courses.
When it comes to our favourite show, you can pick either the Eds in a shared vehicle, or somewhat randomly, Johnny 2×4 as an unlockable racer. But it’s a good job they tell you who you pick beforehand, because even for a GBA game of the time, everything looks like ass.
Everything looks so muddy and pixelated, and given that Mario Kart Super Circuit came out two years before it is just inexcusable. And listen, I’m all for Johnny getting his moment in the sun, but when Dexter’s Laboratory and The Powerpuff Girls have no representation, even I have to call hot bollocks.
It just feels like a huge oversight, and I’m not sure if it was because it was rushed, or just not enough care was put into it, but it cheapens the package. That’s probably why it’s sitting with an average score of 53% on Game Rankings, and despite being the first stop on our Ed-erific journey, it’s not a game I recommend seeking out today.
Cartoon Network: Block Party
The next game our boys took a supporting role in was Cartoon Network Block Party, released on August 5th 2004. If Speedway was Cartoon Network’s answer to Mario Kart, then Block Party is its version of Mario Party. You guide a character across a game board, competing in mini games against your opponents to wrack up the highest score before the game ends.
You can pick between quick play which whips you round one board, tournament in which you’ll have to tackle all four, or dive into an individual mini game, and I’d say you can’t go wrong with any choice but that’d be lying – they’re all ass bad.
Although there’s a pretty respectable amount of mini games on paper, in reality most of them are just clones of each other with a different coat of paint. I think there were only about 5 actually unique games on offer, and most are little more than hitting button prompts at the right time.
To make matters worse, party games like this need to be played multiplayer, I’m pretty sure there’s a register for people who choose to play Mario Party by themselves. But the limitations of the GBA meant you’re flying solo most of the time, and whether your opponents are better or worse than you comes down to the offscreen decisions of an AI. It just leaves everything feeling pretty unfulfilling, unsatisfying and painfully dull.
But where do the Eds play into this mess? Well although all three plus the Kanker Sisters are featured, you can only play as Eddy. Like Speedway, Block Party suffers from a severely limited roster given the back catalogue they could’ve picked from, and this is one of many cases of this.
In the Ed, Edd n Eddy stage, Eddy wants to win a skateboarding competition but Double-D doubts Eddy has a chance. You’re then tasked with collecting three trophies and 50 dollars before returning to the start and winning. Although it’s fun seeing Eddy on a skateboard, like the other mini games you only really need to hit button prompts at the right time to perform tricks, and there’s really no incentive to play it more than once.
With an average Metacritic score of 52, this is another entry I’d steer well clear of.
This has been a pretty disappointing start to the rundown. I think it’s time for the Eds to take centre stage and save the day.
Ed, Edd n Eddy – Jawbreakers!
Ed, Edd n Eddy – Jawbreakers! released back on March 25th 2003, and has the unique distinction of being the first game to bear the Ed boys’ names in the title. The premise is pretty classic – the Eds enter a competition to win not just jawbreakers, but jawbreakers that never lose their flavour and boy that sounds good, I’ve been dipping my old ones in MSG.
You’ll have to earn money, solve physical puzzles, and interact with your chums from the cul-de-sac to win the day.
It’s all pretty much framed as a 2D platformer, where you control one of the Eds at a time, each of which has a unique ability to help you progress. Ed can head butt things (if he has the football helmet) and push carts, Double D can use a slingshot, a wrench and use switches that do different things, and Eddy can use the Hypnotising Wheel or the Jet Pack. He can also double jump, meaning he can reach places the others can’t, take shortcuts and grab out of reach items. You can cycle between any of the three at any time, which is handy.
There’s also a bunch of items you can pick up throughout the game which give you new powers and upgrade your base moves.
The 24 levels will take you through classic show settings, including the cul-de-sac, the junkyard, and the Kanker’s trailer park which serves as the backdrop for the game’s final battle.
Now this game got a slating back in the day, scraping a 49% on Metacritic, but honestly I think this is really unfair. I’ll admit that the controls are pretty clunky and it might’ve been nice to get a few more tutorials, but this is the first time the spirit of the show had really been captured in a video game.
The art style is pretty spot on, even mimicking the wavy outlines of the character models. And that’s not to mention the writing, which is also razor sharp. Every time you interact with a character, it feels like it could’ve been taken from a lost script from the show. There’s even a brilliant 4th wall breaking gag at the end when the Eds inevitably fail to win the jawbreakers.
It’s definitely a game for fans before anyone else, but I really enjoyed it and actually think it’s aged pretty well.
Ed, Edd n Eddy – The Mis-Edventures
Next up we have 2005’s Ed, Edd n Eddy – The Mis-Edventures, to date the only game to feature our boys on a fully fledged home console, appearing on Xbox, PS2, Gamecube and PC, as well as the GBA.
You effectively play through six scams, from sneaking into Jimmy’s party uninvited to finding pieces of a map to a secret stash of jawbreakers. There’s also these two bonus missions where we tear through the fabric of reality harder than our friend Rolf. We’ve got Ed-Zilla where Ed literally becomes a kaiju facing off against the Kankernator, and Rebel Robot Ranch, in which the Eds need to escape an alien planet infested with mechanised horrors. Cuuurazy.
As for the actual gameplay, it’s the classic 3D action platformer that was popular at the time, but that doesn’t make it any less fun. Each Ed has their own abilities and strengths to exploit, and the levels are as varied as the tasks you’ll undertake, providing a healthy mix of action and strategy.
It might not be perfect, for one you can pace through most of it in less than a few hours – but for real, this is where Ed, Edd n Eddy games peaked. Everything about it is just done right; we get an excellent hub world to explore based on the cul-de-sac, brilliant voice acting coupled with brand new 2D animations made exclusively for the game’s cutscenes and levels that could easily be lost episodes from the show. Heck, each even gets a title card – it’s pure fan service in the best possible way.
When we live in an age when mid-noughties licensed games like Spongebob Squarepants: Battle for Bikini Bottom are getting full remakes, I hope there’s at least one low level executive out there pushing for a redux of Ed, Edd n Eddy – The Mis-Edventures.
Oh and before I forget, the GBA game is pretty unique for obvious hardware limitation reasons, but broadly speaking shares the same structure and spirit of the full fat version – just in 2D. I haven’t played this one as much as the home console game because frankly, it’s not as good, but if you have any memories of this version, do let me know in the comments below.
Ed, Edd n Eddy – Scam of the Century
And finally we have 2007’s Ed, Edd n Eddy – Scam of the Century, to date the last game to star the Eds.
Released exclusively on the Nintendo DS, it kind of fell back on the formula of the first game – a 2D sprite-based platformer, with each of the Eds playable and with unique abilities. The plot revolves around Eddy losing his “Who to Scam and When” book, and the boys having to defeat the kids of the cul-de-sac before ultimately facing off against their big chinned ringleader, Kevin.
This is the game I played most as a kid, and on reflection, it really is a more polished version of Jawbreakers!. The controls and graphics are better, there’s finally some much needed tutorials, and although it doesn’t do anything revolutionary, it’s a fun, breezy game that never outstays its welcome. The writing is top notch as ever, with plenty of fourth wall breaking jokes, as well as a debut for Jonny’s alter ego – Captain Melonhead!
What’s most noteworthy are the three mini games, which do a much better job of taking advantage of the DS’s touch controls.
Firstly, and perhaps my favourite, is Whack-A-Zit. As the name suggests, it’s effectively whack-a-mole, only with Ed’s acne-riddled back filling the screen instead.
Next you’ve got Yeshmiyek’s Bounty of Meat, a match three game based on our friend Rolf’s meat-worshipping religion. I didn’t even realise Rolf’s religion revolved around meat, and to think I thought spending a week’s worth of weekends on ed.fandom.com would be a waste of time!
Lastly, we have Here’s Pie In Yer Eye, a carnival-themed shooting gallery in which you have to hit Rolf, Sarah, and Kevin with delicious cream pies.
Each offers a simple, high score based experience, but it’s that simplicity that makes them infinitely replayable and infuriatingly addictive, and in the time researching this video, I’ve probably played them more than any of the other full games on this list!
And that, my friends, is that. Every single console game featuring Ed, Edd n Eddy reviewed in 2022. To the cynically inclined, you might see them as merely licensed cash-ins of a beloved Cartoon Network show. But to me and many others, they’re so much more.
These games kept us entertained after school, on long car journeys or anytime we wanted to explore what went on in that colourful world beyond what we saw on our TV screens. They may not be perfect, but they’re still special, and it’d be a shame for them to be forgotten.
But did you ever watch Ed, Edd n Eddy? Have you played any of the games? Please let me know in the comments below, I’d love to read your thoughts and memories. And also let me know if you’d like any more deep dives into licensed games like this – it was a lot of fun to make.
Until then, my name is Tom, this has been UDS and we’ll see you next time.
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