Tom and Jerry: Frantic Antics screenshot

Release year: 1993

Tom and Jerry: Frantic Antics

Category: ActionPlatformerPuzzle

Tom's first job in Tom and Jerry: Frantic Antics is getting home past a dog named Spike. His second is walking back into that house while a wrecking ball takes it apart, because Jerry is still inside. They come out of it homeless, and end up helping a runaway named Robyn Starling look for her father while Aunt Figg tries to stop them.

"WE BETTER STICK TOGETHER FROM NOW ON!" they tell each other after that rescue, and Beam Software built the game around it. Alone, you switch between them, four levels each: Tom jumps higher and takes more punishment, Jerry jumps farther and has a hitbox small enough that a lot simply misses him. With two players, both run every level at once, which very few Genesis/Mega Drive games allowed.

The jumping is merciless. The library, the carnival and the cabin each cost a stack of lives. Sega-16's review scored the game a 6 and still admitted it "has a charm to it that I just can't understand", which sounds about right.

It runs online in your browser, alone or with someone beside you. And it ends on the roof of a burning cabin, where the only way to put Aunt Figg down is to hit a run, curl into a ball and roll through her.

Start
Start / Pause in game
Joystick
Movement
A
Run
B
Jump
C
Throw
Save / Restart / Load

Animated Screenshots

Tom and Jerry: Frantic Antics title screen on SEGA Genesis/Mega Drive
Tom and Jerry: Frantic Antics — The Alley level gameplay on SEGA Genesis/Mega Drive
Tom and Jerry: Frantic Antics — Basement level gameplay on SEGA Genesis/Mega Drive
Tom and Jerry: Frantic Antics — The Attic level gameplay on SEGA Genesis/Mega Drive

How the rolling attack works

Hold L with a direction to run, then tap . Tom or Jerry curls into a ball, knocks over whatever is in the way, and cannot be hurt for as long as the roll lasts. Work this out in the first minute of THE STREET, because every other answer to an enemy costs you something.

Walking into one is the obvious example: the enemy dies, and so does a slice of your meter. Weapons are cleaner but rationed. Each level hands you its own ammunition, you throw it with K, and after a few throws you are empty again. Underwater you get nothing at all. You can swim in any direction and press Space near the surface to jump out, but the throw button does nothing down there.

There is no mercy window in this game. Take a hit and you do not flash, and the rat with the shotgun is still standing exactly where it was. Two or three of them in the same stretch of a level will empty the meter before you have decided which one to handle first, and a few things in here kill on contact regardless. Rolling straight through a group is almost always smarter than trying to fight it.

Can Tom and Jerry double jump?

Not officially. In practice, yes. Jump with Space, then in mid-air press K+Space to jump a second time, and repeat once more for a third. You need ammunition in hand for it to work, and it stacks with running, so a running start plus two stolen jumps carries you over gaps the level was never built to let you cross.

THE ALLEY is where it pays off hardest. Two walls clear in a single sequence, and most of the level goes with them. Everywhere else it works as insurance: falling into a pit costs a life and puts you back at the start of the level, so having a spare jump in reserve takes the sting out of the hardest thing about Frantic Antics.

Health, lives and the level timer

The yellow bar in the status area is your health. Tom refills it with fish, Jerry with cheese, and the game counts everything you pick up: a hundred of them inside one level earns an extra life. That sounds impossible until you notice the big fish and big cheese, which are worth ten apiece. Cookies are the better deal anyway. Four in the same level refill the bar completely and give you a life on top of it. Hearts simply hand over a life with no conditions.

Three things take one back: the bar emptying, the timer running out, and a bottomless pit. All three put you at the beginning of the level again, because there are no checkpoints in Frantic Antics. Keep running whenever the road ahead is clear. The clock is fair to players who move and cruel to players who explore.

Lives are the hearts in the status bar, and running out of them ends the game, though you can continue from there. If the whole thing is going badly, press K before START on the title screen to open the options and pick Easy, Normal or Hard. Given how the jumping in this game behaves, choosing Easy is not an admission of anything.

All eight levels and what to find in them

Levels here are closed boxes rather than corridors. You can walk in any direction, and nothing points you at the exit. That is what gives the timer its teeth: searching costs exactly what dying costs. Enemies respawn behind you as well, so doubling back for something you missed is the expensive way to play. Know what you are after before you set off.

  • THE STREET (Tom): get home. Spike is in the way, and footballs are your ammunition.
  • LIVING ROOM (Tom): find Jerry before the house comes down. Light bulbs to throw, and a wrecking ball that empties the whole health bar in one touch.
  • THE ALLEY (Jerry): find Robyn, with trash can lids for company. This is the level the triple jump cuts in half.
  • THE LIBRARY (Jerry): both halves of the telegram from Robyn's father, not one. Inkwells.
  • BASEMENT (Tom): the CONTROL PANEL first, which sets the dogs free, then out through a window. The game refuses to let you leave until you have found it. Crowbars.
  • THE ATTIC (Jerry): Robyn's backpack, then Robyn herself. Tennis balls.
  • CARNIVAL (Jerry): find Captain Kiddie, who the briefing screen tells you to watch out for in the same breath. Milk cartons.
  • THE CABIN (Tom): the roof, and Aunt Figg. Burning logs.

Playing online, there is nothing to stop you using the level select code below to drop straight into THE LIBRARY or CARNIVAL and practice the jumps that keep ending your runs, instead of clearing THE STREET one more time to earn the right to fail there again.

THE CABIN: fires, water and Aunt Figg

The last level arms Tom with burning logs, which tells you exactly what kind of joke it is running. Fire is the real opposition here, and the counter to it is a water cooler. Take a drink from one and K stops throwing things and starts spitting water, which is how the fires get put out. The briefing screen is blunt about the stakes: stop Aunt Figg on the roof before the whole building goes up in smoke.

The fight itself is an anticlimax, and a welcome one. The roll needs a run-up, so the whole fight is a matter of building up speed and going through her. Measured against the jumps that got you to the roof, Aunt Figg barely counts as a boss. Arrive with a life or two in reserve and the hard part is already behind you. What is left is one line of text: Aunt Figg is out of the way, and Robyn is safe.

Cheat codes

Level select screen in Tom and Jerry: Frantic Antics on SEGA Genesis/Mega Drive

How to enter cheats

Enter these on the title screen, before starting a game. A car horn confirms the sequence went in; silence means you fumbled a press and should try again from the beginning.

  • Level select: LLSpace
  • Invincible: SpaceSpaceL
  • Freezes timer: LSpaceL
  • View ending: LLSpace

Invincibility and the frozen timer are two separate codes, and that matters more than it sounds. Damage is only one of the three ways to lose a life, and the clock is another, so on the longer levels you want both entered. Level select is the one to reach for first: it turns eight punishing levels into eight short games you can retry as often as you like, which is the only sane way to learn the jumps in THE LIBRARY.