In my continuing obsession with Namco’s Katamari Damacy game, I’ve finished the PSP version of the game “Me and my Katamari” (僕の私の塊魂 / Boku no Watashi no Katamari Damashii). The end sequence was quite nice, with an ‘8 bit’ version of the game, as a side scroller as the credits run past. Very nice. Fear not though, there are still 2 gifts I need to collect from a couple of levels, and two songs to unlock. On the last level I even managed to roll the King and Queen into my Katamari!
Aside from the very quirky game play and characters, the music is also some of the best songs I’ve heard in a game; no cheap remixes like EA often use, these are all well themed pieces. I was disappointed this game got a lot of 7/10 reviews as I thought it added even to the PS2 Katamari Damacy game, allowing you to go indoors on outdoor levels and do a few things you couldn’t before. I sometimes wonder if living in Japan has benefits for this type of game because so many objects, sound effects are Japanese, and without knowing the context, maybe it lessens the scope. Just a thought.
It’s also really well designed as a portable game, with some later levels split into for or five sub levels of five minutes, with different weather effects thrown in. You can also name your own island, and even change how the prince looks – personally, I had him with the dragon hat and the Queen’s pink roller head…but I digress.
Anyway, now time to move on to the PS2 Katamari sequel “We love Katamari” (みんな大好き塊魂 / ‘Minna Daisuki Katamari’ which I guess is closer to ‘Everyone really likes katamari damacy’).
By the way, for those who don’t know (looking at you NA), 8-bit computers describe the technology of the early to mid-1980’s. As in, my PC has an Athlon 64, it’s a 64bit data path in the CPU, so the Atari ST was 16-bit, and before that the Sinclair Spectrum and Commodore 64 (and Nintendo Famicon I believe) were 8-bit.
Thanks also to my aforementioned gamer wife for pointing out the kanji 「塊魂」for ‘Katamari Damacy’ is entered as ‘katamari’ ‘塊’ and tamashii ‘魂’. Which is why I was struggling to enter it.