Friday 19 January, 2007

Now that I’ve gotten a second chance to play Katamari Damacy, and have already talked about the basic mechanics of the game, I’d like to dive into more of the minutia, including issues that I have with the game. I know my last entry made it seem that Katamari Damacy is my favorite game of all time. While it certainly is an excellent game that I enjoy playing, it is not without its faults.

My first complaint is with the camera. Most of the time it works just fine. However, if your katamari is near a wall and you turn so that the wall would be behind you, the camera gets obstructed by the wall. What this means is that for a few seconds you’re fumbling around until you can get far enough away from the wall that the camera works again. Considering that most of your missions are timed, and that collision results in losing items from your katamari, this can turn into a very frustrating experience.

While we’re talking about frustration, I might as well talk about going up steps. In theory your katamari can go up steps provided that they aren’t too steep. I say in theory because quite often when I try to go up steps, it treats it like a wall collision and stuff flies off my katamari. Perhaps there’s some secret stair-climbing technique that I’m not aware of, but until I discover said technique I’m going to continue to be annoyed by that.

I complimented the style of the game along with the gameplay in my last entry, but I also have some issues with the style of the game. In particular, there are a couple of things about the items themselves that bother me. I feel like I’m rolling through LEGOLAND than the real world. It’s not the look that bothers me; it’s the fact that every item you pick up feels like it’s made out of hard plastic, regardless of the item. Items made of paper and clothing especially annoy me, since they stay rigid and cause your katamari to become lopsided. I could understand a stick or a pen causing that, but paper and clothing should crumple and fold once it’s been rolled up. However, that would make the game more complicated to create, so I can understand why it was kept the way it is now.

My final complaint I’m not even sure is applicable since I haven’t played through the game in its entirety. The complaint is the absent of a sandbox mode. So far all the stages that I’ve been played have been limited by a goal or a time limit. I want a mode where I can play at my own pace, from the very smallest size to the very largest size. I just think that it would be fun to see just how big you can get if you’re allowed all the time you need.

Now that I’ve listed some criticisms, I would like to say something that I do like about the game. It’s not a big deal, but I want this to end on a happy note, since I do like this game very much. It involves the King of All Cosmos, as most good things about this game do. When he speaks, words of a faux importance are shown in a different color. This is clearly a friendly nod to role playing and adventure games, most notably the 3D Zelda games, which do a similar thing. Again, not a big deal, but I think it makes a good icing on the cake.

Don't worry; there are three "eternal" modes you can unlock: one for the house, the town, and the world :) You can have all the time in the world to create the biggest katamari you can! I don't recall which levels you unlock them on, but you could look it up somewhere, I'm sure.

but I am insane because this is a year old :D woops

Don't worry about it. I'm flattered someone actually read and commented on one of my entries.

I'm not used to it being 2008 :(

So, are you CS 80K, or CS 20?

80k, I haven't had much experience programming (or any interest in programming, actually). But the class seems really fun.