Well I was never expecting this. Or at least not around this time....
As 2020 continues to be a tragic year for the world, it also happens to be a semi-unfortunate year for us, the Garfield fanbase. (Although this definitely isn't even a fraction of misery compared to recent events going on.) But anyways, if you don't know what happened, I'll explain.
Yesterday afternoon, the offical website for Garfield, A.K.A. Garfield.com, briefly went under maintenance for about 20 minutes. Since it of course it wouldn't be up yet, I'd decide to check back at it another time. Later on, the website did come back. But only for me to discover this....
When I initially saw this, I was though this was just an error for a redirect to the Garfield page on Nickelodeon's website. So I ended up deleting all cookies and cache from Garfield.com and tried again. However, I was still getting the same message over and over again. And I when I tried to enter the website using a link to a random comic strip. (Ex. https://www.garfield.com/comic/2009/09/22), I was greeted with a message saying Not found. That's when I knew something was wrong about the website. Then I got to the homepage once again, I clicked on the GoComics page, and some other people saied in the comments that they were having the same issue as me. So then I knew it must've been nationwide or worldwide and that I wasn't the only one dealing with this problem. So then I saw this thread...
https://garfield.fandom.com/f/p/4400000000000000085
And then that's when it was confirmed to me that the Garfield.com is formally shut down. That right folks. The offical website for the Garfield you all know and love, is gone.
Where do I stand on this?
Honestly, I have to say that shutting down Garfield.com for good was a really lousy decision. And I have six main reasons for this
First off, we have no longer have access to all of the Garfield games. Now this isn't a huge problem for me, since I seldom play the games, if ever. But it's really unfortunate for some people or kids who really enjoyed the games and who even visit the website daily just to play those games, And now, they will never get a chance to play them around since there was no warning of this happening. Which leads me to my second point.
Second, If you were going to shut down the site, at least give up a heads up at least a week prior, just so that way we're aware that the Garfield.com site would soon be no more. Sure it's sucks to see the website go, but at least we would be aware that was going to happen. And also so that way we can visit and/or play the games one last time before they fade into obscurity. Plus, I find shutting it down abruptly and with no intentions of ever moving to a new location as of yet, to be rather rude and disrespectful to the loyal fans of this site. Anyways moving on...
Third, we now have to go the GoComics for the Garfield comics. And it's a big letdown considering the Garfield.com site were straight-forward to access the comics and have virtually no problems with it. And I'm not saying GoComics is a bad site, don't get me wrong it's good. But I'd still much rather have me viewing the Garfield comics on the offical website than to visit GoComics. Since GoComics does tend to be quite slow at times and also has a ridiculous amount of ads on your screen. So yeah, Garfield.com was prefectly fine for viewing Garfield strips. If it ain't broke don't fix it. So now, it looks like I'll have to buy ALL 69 COMPLATION BOOKS to have all of the strips. And there isn't even a search option of them. Which leads me to my fourth reason....
Fourth, we can't search for Garfield comics on GoComics. Yeah, that is true. GoComics doesn't have an option to where you can search for a certain strip of two. HOWEVER, there is a site I discovered last August called lasagna.cz . If you don't know what it is, it's bascially a search engine that does a better job at finding terms about words for Garfield comics. The link to link is -- lasagna.cz . But since, agagin, the Garfield.com site is defunct, you won't get redirect to the comic strip date you clicked on. You'll find have to find that comic. And plus that site isn't updated daily so if you're looking for a strip published recently, you won't get it sadly. Anyways, moving on...
Fifth, the US Acres comic strips are no longer available to find easily. At least for the pages that we didn't get a chance to make comic strip pages for before it got shut down. So yeah. For unknown reasons, the page for US Acres on GoComics was removed a couple of months. My guess was because there wasn't that much US Acres comic strips to be reruning every day, as there was only about eleven hundred strips, So I assume they dropped it off their website. So now, we have to find alternative websites just to track down those strips. WHICH IS A PAIN IN THE F*****G A**!!!!!!! Pardon my french, I just got really upset for a breif moment. It's just really annoying.
And Sixth, the biggest reason why I think the whole shut down was lousy at all, was because this was all, very pointless. Seriously? What did this accomplish?! Oh yeah!! Nothing!! Nothing at all!!! You droppped a site that had a wealth of information and entertainment for people of all ages to enjoy for at least 2 decades!! Hey Nick!! Just because Garfield is now part of your "family", doesn't give you a license to just throw it in the trash without thinking twice about how many fans of this franchise actually gave a f**k about this god d*mn website!!!!!! Thank the lord we were at least able to get lots of information and pictures and comics from Garfield.com before it's abrupt demise! Garfield would probably get so disappointed to see what Brian Robbins did to his beloved website! Oh man how pointless this whole was.
And that's pretty much what I've gotten to say. I apologize if I got heated up at some areas, but I just can't help it. I've been visiting this site for a veeeerry long time and they just pulled the plug on it for no adequate reason at all. It sucks how I had to say goodbye to the site without a proper goodbye. But oh well, what can I do but to rant. I'll just have to cut my losses and move on. I'm gonna have to get used to GoComics and attempt to find US Acres strips via non-suspicious third-party websites. So yeah, what do you guys think about Garfield.com going away for good? Let me know in the comments. Anyways, I need to get some shut-eye. I've been working on this for two hours now. Anyways yeah, this is me, over and out.