"Katamari Damcacy" a Playstation 2 instant classic
Daniel Loane
Issue date: 1/20/05 Section: Entertainment
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"Katamari Damacy", pronounced (Kata-maree Dahmah-see) is a one-of-a-kind Japanese title that has graced our shores. You'll probably go into your local game store and totally miss this title, and for many reasons. One reason is the cover looks, in a word, cheesy. There's a cow standing in front of a meadow with a confused look on its face, and in the lower left there's an entire city in ball form. You'll most likely laugh and continue looking. This would be a HUGE mistake. "Katamari Damacy" is one of the best puzzle games I have ever played. At a value price of only $19.99 it's definitely worth the price of admission.
The story of "Damacy" is simple; your father, the king of the universe, goes on a bender one day and proceeds to eat all the stars in the sky. The next morning, realizing his mistake, the king places the task upon you to rebuild the stars. How would you go about doing this you may ask? Well it's simple, take a sticky ball, roll it around on earth and pick stuff up. I must admit, I wasn't taught that in EAS 171, but apparently that's the way it's done. So, yes, the story makes little sense, though I've seen people do crazy things while drunk....
So enough about the story, what's it like playing the game? Each level has a target size for your sticky-ball-o-doom, which you must reach within a certain time limit. You can only stick to things that are smaller than your ball. When you start the game, you're tiny, we're talking TINY. You can't even pick up paperclips, and sugar cubes are a chore to add to you're collection. Eventually you're ball gets bigger, and you can stick to larger objects. When you stick to you're first small child, you will feel that you've completed a major task. By the time you reach the end of the game, you're rolling up entire buildings in a single push. Your character is still about the size of an ant, but your ball is the size of a few city blocks. The levels are broken up by various goofy cut scenes which show a family doing various activities. These include eating breakfast, watching the news, and going to the airport.
The story of "Damacy" is simple; your father, the king of the universe, goes on a bender one day and proceeds to eat all the stars in the sky. The next morning, realizing his mistake, the king places the task upon you to rebuild the stars. How would you go about doing this you may ask? Well it's simple, take a sticky ball, roll it around on earth and pick stuff up. I must admit, I wasn't taught that in EAS 171, but apparently that's the way it's done. So, yes, the story makes little sense, though I've seen people do crazy things while drunk....
So enough about the story, what's it like playing the game? Each level has a target size for your sticky-ball-o-doom, which you must reach within a certain time limit. You can only stick to things that are smaller than your ball. When you start the game, you're tiny, we're talking TINY. You can't even pick up paperclips, and sugar cubes are a chore to add to you're collection. Eventually you're ball gets bigger, and you can stick to larger objects. When you stick to you're first small child, you will feel that you've completed a major task. By the time you reach the end of the game, you're rolling up entire buildings in a single push. Your character is still about the size of an ant, but your ball is the size of a few city blocks. The levels are broken up by various goofy cut scenes which show a family doing various activities. These include eating breakfast, watching the news, and going to the airport.