Ah, the wonderful contradictions of Japanese culture. On one hand there's the fascinating history, the deep spirituality, the complex interpersonal relationships and the industrial might. Truly a 21st-century society.
Then you have vending machines that sell used schoolgirl panties, game shows where losing contestants get covered in butter and licked clean by dogs, a subset of comic book porn that features women being violated by tentacle monsters, and Katamari Damacy. Sweet, sweet Katamari Damacy.
A Japanese game that Namco wisely decided to localize and offer to audiences on this side of the ocean, Katamari Damacy is easy to explain but impossible to describe.
You play as a little prince whose father, the King of the Cosmos, is 110% certifiably insane. On a drunken whim he's broken all the stars in the heavens, but then he realizes maybe that wasn't such a great idea and he needs your help to put things right.
Naturally, this involves rolling around a sticky ball - the katamari - and picking up objects with it, until the ball is big enough to replace a missing star in the sky. Wait, it gets weirder.
At first your royal pop doesn't need the balls to be all that big - a metre or so in diameter will do - so you'll roll around the house picking up things like thumbtacks, candy, batteries, chopsticks, action figures, small animals and whatnot. Later, though, they've got to be massive, so you'll find yourself picking up cars, people, vending machines (used schoolgirl panties not included) and eventually entire buildings. And some levels need you to pick up specific items to form a constellation in the zodiac, so you'll find yourself chasing down crabs (Cancer), cows (Taurus) and women (Virgo). But only in the clean, wholesome, giant-ball-making way.
Each time-limited level looks like what Dali might have done with the old Dire Straits' Money For Nothing video. After licking a psychotropic toad. And smoking crack. Soaked in tequila. It's freaky beyond description, but in the best possible way.
The graphics are blocky and cartoony, but it not only serves the overall quirky-bizarro look, it's a necessity from a technological standpoint - your ball grows in real time as you pick stuff up, and whatever sticks to it remains stuck at that point until it's covered by another layer of stuff. Even the physics react realistically to the shape of your ball.
But you won't be thinking about the physics or graphics. You'll be thinking, "If I can just pick up all the animals in the zoo, I should be large enough to start grabbing the houses in the city." Exactly.
And don't get me started on the king's hilarious non-sequitur comments, or the bizarre inter-mission cutscenes with a family of what appear to be animated dolls, or the truly awesome soundtrack, or the tons of goals and bonuses you can strive to achieve and unlock, or the head-to-head multiplayer mode. The game is a steal at $30, so just go buy it already. Domo arigato, Japan.
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BOTTOMLINE
It's safe to say you've never played anything quite like this one. Easily one of the coolest, weirdest and most original games of the year.
