With the release of the new Katamari Damacy game last week on the Xbox 360, I thought I’d make a little tribute blog to all the games in the Katamari Damacy series.  Let’s roll:

If you don’t know what Katamari Damacy is, I would say, “this is the Internet, look it up yourself.”  But if you did that, you might forget to come back and read this article, so I’ll explain it a little bit so you’ll keep reading.  THEN when you’re done looking over my article, use the Internet to learn more about Katamari Damacy!

In the Katamari games, you roll around a ball that causes things smaller than it to stick to the ball when you roll over it.  And just like a snowball, your ball, called a Katamari, gets bigger and bigger the more things you stick to it.  When it gets bigger, you can roll up larger things.  You’ll first start off roling up small things like tacks, buttons, bits of trash and food, etc.  Soon you’ll be big enough to roll up furniture, animals, people, cars, then houses, buildings, mountains, and then the whole world!  It’s as wacky as it sounds, and the premise and characters involved in this rolling are just as weird.  You play as a one inch tall alien guy called simply The Prince, while your father, The King Of All Cosmos, requests that you roll up Katamaris for him to make new stars and planets in the sky.  The King berates you every step of the way, but the way he talks in an almost poetic manner, it’s really quite amusing.

There are various reasons why I love the Katamari Damacy games.  They’re silly, weird, simple, colorful, and made by Namco.  But I think the main reason why I like Katamari games is that they’re like Pac-Man.  Now, I know what you’re thinking.  “HOW is Katmari Damacy anything like Pac-Man?”  Well, let me explain.  The things you can roll up are like the dots.  Your environment you roll around in is like the maze.  And the ghosts?  Anything bigger that can bump into you to slow your rolling down.  But what about Power Pellets?  Well, I think that getting bigger is like your Power Pellets in Pac-Man.  And the ‘hunter becomes the hunted’ chomp and chase gameplay of Pac-Man is recreated in Katamari games when you are big enough to roll over the things that caused you trouble when you were smaller. 

And that’s really why I like the Katamri games, in a nutshell.  Now I think I’ll share my experiences, highlights, and lowlights of each Katamari game in the series.

Katamari Damacy

I remember first reading about this game in some video game magazine.  EGM or whatever.  I didn’t think too much of it then.  I just chalked it up as yet another Japanese PS2 game I’d never get to play.  The next time I saw Katamari Damacy was at E3 2004.  It was on only one or two monitors in the back corner of Namco’s booth.  I remembered it as the game I read about from before.  I asked the Namco PR professional standing there if it was coming out to the US.  He said he couldn’t say anything.  And then I said, “But why would you show it at E3 if you weren’t planning on bringing it to the US?”  And he said, “Exactly.” 

Highlights:

Since it was the first game, I guess everything about Katamari Damacy was a highlight.  The fun gameplay, the weirdness, the catchy, surprisingly high quality Japanese music in the background.  But there are a couple of things specific to the first game that was extra special to me. 

One was the 20 dollar price tag.  That made it accessible to many gamers who would otherwise pass up a game with rainbows and cows on the cover, and the cheap price made it easier to swallow some of the game’s shortcomings. 

The other thing about Katamari Damacy that was a special highlight was it was the GamerDad game of the year for 2004.  I also named it my personal game of the year for that year, and I thought it was cool that more than one person agreed with me then.  Usually when I pick my game of the year for that year, it usually is something totally different from everyone else’s opinion, and I get a lot of complaints, flak, and questions about my choices.  Like last year, I said that Okami was better than Twilight Princess.  The year before, it was Psychonauts.  Other years, my favorite games were Wario Ware, Animal Crossing, and The Misadventures of Tron Bonne.  Other than Super Smash Bros. Melee, I think that Katamari Damacy was one of the only times that people other than me agreed on the best game for that year, and I thought that was cool.

The last thing that was cool about the first Katamari Damacy game is the sense of buildup the game had.  You started out small in the early stages and would get bigger and bigger.  Then in the last stage, you started out as small as you did at first, but at the end of the level you were rolling up whole continents!  No other game in the series had that kind of buildup.

Lowlights:

Like I said before, the 20 dollar price tag kind of eases the pain of the lowlights of this first game.  The graphics weren’t so hot (though you can argue they aren’t supposed to be that way), the game was very short, and a bit buggy in places.  Camera angles weren’t too good sometimes and every now and then you’d get stuck in places while items mysteriously were bumped off your Katamari.  But when a game’s only 20 bucks, I don’t think you can complain too much.  The only other bad thing I can think of about the first game is that it was a little hard to find at first.  I don’t think Namco made enough copies.

We Love Katamari

Naturally, when a game is well-liked, a sequel is bound to come out.  So in 2005, nearly one year later, Namco pooped out another fun PS2 game.  It was really more of the same, but if a game is fun enough, sometimes that’s OK as long as you don’t overdo it. 

Highlights:

While there were still lots of levels where you were rolling around a house, then a city, then the world, there were a lot of more imaginative levels, too.  Special stages where you’d roll your katamari underwater, in the snow, in a flowery field, around a fairy tale gingerbread house, around a campsite (you had to pick up things that would burn up your katamari for a big campfire that night).  And then there was my personal favorite, rolling around a race track (your katamari even controlled more like a race car).  Too bad they can’t make a racing game with that kind of gameplay mechanic.

Lowlights:

The game was ten bucks more this time, so it was a little harder to look past the shortcomings.  Especially since the game was about as short.  Since it was more of the same, people were starting to worry that Namco was turning this once original property into a cash cow.  It really didn’t have the sense of buildup like the first game did.  And while there were quite a few new tunes that I liked, the music wasn’t as good as in the first game. 

Me and My Katamari

The first Katamari game on a portable system.  This was on the PSP.  It’s definitely the worst in the series, but I still don’t think it was ALL bad.

Highlights:

Well, I guess it was good that you could have Katamari on the go, but I really never take my PSP out with me very much.  I thought it was pretty impressive that they could make the game look just as good on a portable system as it was on a big console.  I also like the menu interface on this one the most.  You walked around an island, and some of the menus were creative.  Like the music selection menu, you moved a crab around on the beach to select songs you wanted to hear.  I also liked the premise of this game.  Instead of rolling katamaris to make stars and planets, you were making island homes for animals who had lost theirs.  But my favorite thing about Me and My Katamari is the reward you got after beating it.  During the credits, you could play a 2-D, 8-bit looking Katamari game that kind of looked like a mix of Katamari Damacy and Super Mario Bros.  There were even multiple levels, too!  It was great!

Lowlights:

Full price.  Namco really was turning this into a cash cow.  Nothing really new at all in the portable version.  The game even used the same songs from the first two games.  There was also no sense of buildup whatsoever.  When you got to a certain size, the game would load forever and then put you in a new part of a stage.  It felt very disjointed and a step back from We Love Katamari.  But perhaps the worst thing about Me and My Katamari was the controls.  The other Katamari games used the PS2 dual analog sticks for easy rolling, but here you had to use buttons.  Granted, it wasn’t as bad as it seemed, but it still wasn’t very good.

Beautiful Katamari

This is the newest in the series, and now it’s on Xbox 360.  I haven’t played it all the way through yet, so my opinions on some things may change later, but here’s my general impressions so far.

Highlights:

I guess it’s good that it has HD graphics, but it doesn’t matter to me because I don’t have an HDTV.  And even if I did, it probably still wouldn’t matter much because I have low-def eyes.  And the game’s simple style and graphics aren’t the best use of HD anyway.  I haven’t tried the online multiplayer yet because the multiplayer in the other Katamari games underwhelmed me, but I do like the online worldwide records it has, like how big a total katamari everyone in the world is making right now! 

I think the downloadable content will be another highlight, as long as it’s not too expensive.  I haven’t seen any new stages to download yet.  I hope they’re more creative stages like in We Love Katamari, because the stages in the main game are kind of all the same.  Though I do like how they brought back the sense of buildup like in the first game. 

I hope one of the downloadable stages is a Namco Museum level full of Namco game cameos.  You could roll around a museum setting.  First start out rolling up small things like Pac-dots and bonus fruit, then Mappy the mouse and the Meowky cats.  Then bigger things like Pookas from Dig Dug or mushrooms from Libble Rabble.  The people you could roll up would be characters from other Namco games, all in blocky form of course.  Roll up Wonder Momo, Gil and Ki, Reiko Nagase, Nina Williams, Taki, Mitsuragi, Siegfried, Xianghua, Nightmare, Susumu Hori (Mr. Driller), and others.  Then you could go outside and roll up Ridge Racer cars, Ace Combat planes, and Galaga and Xevious spaceships!  I think that would be a good idea for a Katamari stage.  What do you think?

Lowlights:

Yup, again, more of the same.  And even though it’s at a lower price than most Xbox 360 games, I still think 40 bucks is expensive.  And the new music really hasn’t grabbed me either so far.  Plus they use old songs like in the PSP one.  It’s a fun game, but so far I’m a little underwhelmed.

Rolling it up

And that’s abuot all there is in the Katamari games.  Namco likes to put characters as cameos in their other  games (like names on Ridge Racer cars).  But the only game that Katamari characters made a cameo in was Pac-Man World Rally, a Mario Kart clone (you could also play a couple of Katamari songs in Taiko Drum Master).  You could race as The Prince, and there was a track near the end with a Katamari motif.  You know, when Pac-Man World Rally first was announced, the preview screens made it look very bland and uninspired.  I wrote a complaining letter on my blog and message boards on what I think they should’ve done to make it better for Namco and Pac-Man fans.  And you know what?  Nearly all my suggestions were put into the final product (they even had Mappy and Mr. Drilling racing in the PSP version). Makes me wonder if Namco reads my blogs.

Anyway, that’s about all I feel like saying about Katamari Damacy games.  Even though they’re in grave danger of becoming tired cash cows (if not already), and the only NECESSARY game was the first one, I still think they’re fun games.  But then, I have a pretty high tolerance for repetitiveness.  But perhaps the best thing about Katamari games is that, along with games like Wario Ware, paved the way for other companies to be encouraged to bring more creative Japanese games to the US, like Cooking Mama, Okami, and others.

How do YOU roll?

OK folks, it’s reader participation time!  Answer these questions and share your own Katamari experiences and opinions and we’ll make one big katamari of it all!  Oh, and I’ll answer each question too!

What is your favorite Katamari song?

From the first game, I like “Lonely Rolling Star” because it’s catchy and cute and the instrumentation sounds like a Neo Geo Pocket Color.  I also like the Vegas style lounge song with English lyrics.  In the sequel, I like “Everlasting Love” from the race track stage.  And the one that’s just a bunch of animal sounds.  Though there is kind of a catchy rock song on the 360 Katamari game, none of the new songs there have really grabbed me yet.  But I haven’t given them a good listen yet either.

What is your favorite Katamari stage?

My favorite is the race track stage from the second game.  But I like all the stages really, except the ones where you have to pick up a cow or a bear!

Who is your favorite cousin?

Call me unoriginal, but I still like The Prince the best.  Mainly because he’s green and that’s my favorite color.  I also really like The King, too bad he’s not playable.  Jeff’s favorite is Miso, a red cousin with a bowl of soup for a head.  Miso soup is good, but it’s a bit too watery for my tastes.

What’s your favorite rolled up items?

I like the arcade machines because they play Pac-Man and Xevious sounds when you roll them up.  There’s a piece of cheese with a wedge taken out and the King says the shape looks familiar.  There’s also a tricycle named “Rolling Thunder.”  My favorite item description in the collection menu of the first game is for socks.  The King says “they’re bags for your feet.”  The Race Queen is fun to roll over, too.

Do YOU like the Katamari games?  Why or why not?

If you don’t know my answer to this, you need to read this blog again!

That’s all for now!  Later!  –Cary

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