Once Upon A KATAMARI Reviews

We Love Katamari, but in HD (we love is better tho)

if you liked the other Katamari games, you'll like this one.

This is one of my favorite game franchises of all time. It feels crazy that 1) we got a new full game like 15 years after Katamari Forever and 2) they still put in this much effort to make new levels with new mechanics and new cousins. And I love it! Yippee! Thank you, your highness!

Roll it up, roll it up, drink a mt dew, turn off brain.

So, you are really just rolling around. Pretty simple. And, no word of a lie; it feels GOOD to roll. The king has a lot of speeches but you just need to understand it. If you don't understand, keep quiet about it! I just cannot listen to that. Have a great day and play this game for Pete's sake.

I have a couple of minor nitpicks. For example, compared to the first 2 games, it's really easy to get stuck in some of these levels, and getting unstuck can be an ordeal. I thought the customization options on the ship were going to be a lot more interesting at first, the game made it sound like you were going to be able to change a lot more than just the background. The first few hours of the game have you being told exactly where to go and what to do even if you have other plans. Some of the levels have gimmicks that are a bit convoluted, like the dynamite in the goldmine level. This stuff is really easy to overlook. The biggest problem this game has is how repetitive and tedious collecting the cousins is. I'm missing something like 11 cousins, mostly from the "as big as possible / as fast as possible" stages, which means I haven't unlocked the final 2 stages ("Tag, you're it!" 1&2), which is mildly frustrating. These stages often have 3 cousins, but you can only unlock 1 at a time, and you have to be a specific size for each one, and the levels get to be like 15 minutes long, so replaying them with the sheer goal of finding and grabbing a new cousin - and having to restart the level if you accidentally get too big first - just doesn't feel worth it for a few bonus levels. I'm tired, man. I paused my playthrough of Yakuza Ishiin to be here. That being said, it is essentially just more We Love Katamari, but not quite as good. I think the more Katamari you've played, the less excited you'll be for this, but I missed out on everything from WLK until now, and for a while - before I went into completionist mode - I was in love with it, but yeah, the level design just can't really touch on the perfection of WLK, and the completionist elements are annoying. I still had a lot of fun with it for the most part though, it's a solid entry and I'm not bothered enough by missing out on a few gimmick levels to say it ruined the game for me.

Your standard Katamari game with lots of collectables and goals to keep the fun rolling.

while the game itself it alright, feels like it lacks soul somehow. i cannot explain to you why i felt that why. it just lacks IT

Katamari Forever has been one of my favorite games of all time basically since its release. Even before that I've been a fan of the series since WHK, and have literally thousands of hours in these games. So I understand the desire for any non-mobile Katamari game after SIXTEEN years (seventeen for you xbox players). This just ain't it. This game shares much of its source code with Rolling LIVE, a mobile game, and it shows. The levels are shockingly small and the physics is painfully clunky, especially when compared to the large expansive levels of Forever. So often will my rolling be stopped DEAD by something as ordinary as a single stair step, even when I'm ten times bigger than it and should be able to roll over it easily. It's so easy to get stuck or to fail wall climbs that it makes me wonder about the decision not to bring back the prince hop. I see and respect that others enjoy it, and if you're coming straight off of the remasters it's ok. But it could have been SO much more after, I emphasize, SIXTEEN YEARS of technical advancement. It's really disappointing that it's somehow less of a game than its predecessor from 2009. We have the technology and the power to go BIGGER, so why aren't we? (bc of the mobile engine truly, but why is this franchise stuck in mobile hell?) Not nearly worth the price tag, especially with the nickel and diming of the "DLC". Funnily enough, I think Rolling LIVE is the stronger of the two games.