Me & My Katamari
Feb. 16th, 2015 02:37 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
chuckroThe King of All Cosmos and his family are on vacation, so rather than rolling up stars, we need to roll up new islands to occupy the ocean. Many of our animal friends have requests!
This is a PSP title, and since there’s only one analogue stick, the control scheme instead uses the cross keys and the four buttons together. It takes a little getting used to, but it works. It does seem to make my thumbs more tired than the PS2/PS3 analog sticks do, though. The bigger problem (appropriately enough) is the screen size: Katamari just doesn’t work as well on a smaller screen with lower resolution. They do all right with choosing camera angles and giving you room to see things, but it’s just not as good.
The islands are given a percentage-based points score depending both on size (there’s a minimum most of the time) and on however many in-theme items you pick up. A number of these levels/challenges don’t seem to have been re-used in Katamari Forever (which took most of its material from other games in the series), so it’s nice to see something new on that front. Unfortunately, most of them are very similar and annoyingly nebulous (what’s the difference between things that are “big,” “heavy” and “grand”?). A lot of the levels themselves are very repetitive, too—same map, mostly the same items, slightly different set of requirements. And I’m apparently very good at making very large katamaris at this point, just not as good at finding the objects that fulfill requirements and get high scores.
The collection Chameleon level was probably the most interesting new thing: The king gives a number and a category, and you have 30 seconds to find that many things in that category. (Though I think my game glitched—I got the “children” category 10 times in a row!)
They had issues with loading, and they tried to handle them as best they could—mid-stage size transitions are the worst, where you’ll actually sit at a static wavy screen for 5-10 seconds, and then reappear in a completely different place. (They actually made an odd choice in the longer stages: You’re given a size and a time limit, and then after you hit it, you get a new size and time limit for a new area. I guess it’s just because there’s a separate set of cousins and presents and they couldn’t run the levels together anyway; but it’s an odd choice that doesn’t appear elsewhere in the series.)
Eternal Mode seems to originate in this game: Scoring high in any of the main stages unlocks it for that stage. The final credits game is sweet; an 8-bit side-scrolling version of Katamari. I don’t recall if this reappears in a later game; I don’t think it does.
Overall: This is not really designed to be marathoned; it’s a casual pick-up-and-play way to scratch your Katamari itch. Because the different levels are often basically repeats of each other, you’re not going to want to replay them much (you’re already replaying them by continuing through the game). If you’re decent at Katamari (and I think I’m quite good at this point), you can clear through everything in 5-6 hours. I might pop it in if I’m traveling and get a Katamari urge, but when I’m at home, Katamari Forever is vastly superior.
This is a PSP title, and since there’s only one analogue stick, the control scheme instead uses the cross keys and the four buttons together. It takes a little getting used to, but it works. It does seem to make my thumbs more tired than the PS2/PS3 analog sticks do, though. The bigger problem (appropriately enough) is the screen size: Katamari just doesn’t work as well on a smaller screen with lower resolution. They do all right with choosing camera angles and giving you room to see things, but it’s just not as good.
The islands are given a percentage-based points score depending both on size (there’s a minimum most of the time) and on however many in-theme items you pick up. A number of these levels/challenges don’t seem to have been re-used in Katamari Forever (which took most of its material from other games in the series), so it’s nice to see something new on that front. Unfortunately, most of them are very similar and annoyingly nebulous (what’s the difference between things that are “big,” “heavy” and “grand”?). A lot of the levels themselves are very repetitive, too—same map, mostly the same items, slightly different set of requirements. And I’m apparently very good at making very large katamaris at this point, just not as good at finding the objects that fulfill requirements and get high scores.
The collection Chameleon level was probably the most interesting new thing: The king gives a number and a category, and you have 30 seconds to find that many things in that category. (Though I think my game glitched—I got the “children” category 10 times in a row!)
They had issues with loading, and they tried to handle them as best they could—mid-stage size transitions are the worst, where you’ll actually sit at a static wavy screen for 5-10 seconds, and then reappear in a completely different place. (They actually made an odd choice in the longer stages: You’re given a size and a time limit, and then after you hit it, you get a new size and time limit for a new area. I guess it’s just because there’s a separate set of cousins and presents and they couldn’t run the levels together anyway; but it’s an odd choice that doesn’t appear elsewhere in the series.)
Eternal Mode seems to originate in this game: Scoring high in any of the main stages unlocks it for that stage. The final credits game is sweet; an 8-bit side-scrolling version of Katamari. I don’t recall if this reappears in a later game; I don’t think it does.
Overall: This is not really designed to be marathoned; it’s a casual pick-up-and-play way to scratch your Katamari itch. Because the different levels are often basically repeats of each other, you’re not going to want to replay them much (you’re already replaying them by continuing through the game). If you’re decent at Katamari (and I think I’m quite good at this point), you can clear through everything in 5-6 hours. I might pop it in if I’m traveling and get a Katamari urge, but when I’m at home, Katamari Forever is vastly superior.
