Namco's Bizarre Object Conglomeration Game Rated

Thanks to Game Science for its review of Namco's extremely odd PlayStation 2 game, Katamari Damacy, recently released in Japan. The game's premise involves fixing your father the King's drunken heaven-trashing exploits by "...collecting a load of junk from Earth, rolling it into clumps, and sending it up into the Cosmos to make stars." The gameplay is also distinctly unconventional: "Starting with a clump no bigger than the Prince himself, you must roll around the deepest crevices [MPEG link] of a house, picking up tiny things like drawing pins, moving up to Shogi tiles and batteries", before moving all the way up to "picking up giant octopi and huge monsters." The reviewer ends by noting: "A European release can't be ruled out, but a US release seems very unlikely. It's likely to become hot property when word spreads of its goodness, so I recommend a quick purchase if you're teetering on the brink of buying it."

As seen at GDC

[Anm]

The developer of the game presented at GDC's Experimental Gameplay Workshop. Personally, I'd love to try the game out. It looks like a lot of fun.

For everyone else wondering where the fun is, it's probably no different than Super Mario Brothers (collect stuff/coins on a level within a time limit), but of course the mechanics are vastly different. It should be noted that the arrange of stuff on the ball changes how it rolls. E.g., a pencil sticking out of the side will make it difficult to turn. That and the ball grows in level, making it possible to roll over large objects by accomulating small objects.

Anm

i played this game

[sonatinas]

When you get to the last level you get so big that u can roll over clouds and gods. THe soundtrack is very catchy and is available online at various places. The game can be beaten in a few hours though, but the replay value is in getting better at certain objectives such as getting a bear for a constellation. You can get any bear, but u want to get the big bear; however the whole stage is filled with bears. You also get presents.

Translation

[spood]

So, katamari translates roughly to "lump", "cluster", or "ball", but does anyone have any idea what Damacy means?

Re:Translation

[jetfuel]

Damacy is a whimsical romanization of "damashii", which is in turn a modification of "tamashii". Voicing the t, thus turning it into a d, makes it sound better when compounded with another word. Thus, Katamari Damashii, "Cluster Spirit".

Damn fun

[bugbread]

Unfortunately, the review has been slashdotted, so I can't tell what it says, but my impressions so far are:

It's a short game. You can definitely finish it the same day you bought it.

However, it's also a damn fun game, in a very simple, straightforward way. Controls are extremely simple (left and right thumbsticks and L3/R3 (clicking the thumbsticks) only). There are only three basic game goal types: Collect as much stuff as you can, collect as much of one type of thing as you can, and get as big as you can before collecting a certain type of object.

The music is great. Like a laid-back JSRF.

The game tries to be cute, and it works.

And the only big problem I can see with exporting it to other countries is the sheer amount of Japanese stuff that you pick up:

• Japanese toilets
• Pachinko machines
• Grand Opening wreath decoration things
• Kotatsu tables
• Those gold fish used as roof decorations
• Yanki kids
• Bosozoku motorcycles and cars
• Daruma dolls
• Festival shrines
• Doll's day decorations
• New Years cards
• Elementary school kid's backpacks (Randoseru)
• Geta sandals
• The god of thunder
• Kintaro, giant bear wrester

And on and on and on and on.

(And boy is it awkwards to write a list of things that don't exist in the target language. Can't really translate, but can't really leave the words as-is).