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Katamari Damacy marks the start of the Katamari franchise, a series of roll-em-ups. The concept is simple. Roll shit up. It may not sound like an amazing time but I can assure you it is. It’s an original game that’s humorous, surreal, and bizarre, and the gameplay is very fun and addictive. I also consider it to be a collect-a-thon. Katamari Damacy released for the PlayStation 2 and became a hit. My research tells me the creator was opposed to the idea of a sequel but agreed to direct when Namco executives said they would make one with or without him, and that sequel is We Love Katamari. Developed and published by Namco, We Love Katamari was released for PlayStation 2 in North America in September, 2005. A remaster titled, We Love Katamari REROLL+ Royal Reverie, was released for Switch, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, PC, Xbox One, and the Xbox Series systems in June, 2023. For this review, I played REROLL for PC. Like many remasters, REROLL supports higher resolutions and comes with other improvements but it also comes with additional story content and challenges.
Set after the events of the previous game, the story goes that the King of All Cosmos discovers he has a lot of fans on Earth and seeks help from his son, the Prince, and his son’s cousins to fulfill their wishes. The story also covers the King’s life before he became King and REROLL features additional story content that covers the King’s childhood. I do feel that there is a charm to the plot and storytelling here and it’s nice to see the King fleshed out more. We Love Katamari does retain the brand of humor and surreal aspects introduced in the previous entry and I would say it amps up some of the more bizarre elements. This is definitely a silly game that’s very easy to jump into and enjoy.
The gameplay of We Love Katamari is almost identical to that of its predecessor. But it comes with refinements, new features, more content and more variety. As a result, I would argue the replay value is even better than that of the last game. I would also say it’s a bit more challenging. You are put in the shoes of the Prince at the start but you can swap him out with any of the cousins you find and all of the mechanics from the previous game are retained as are the controls. I did find it easier to roll around and got stuck much less here. You can push the katamari around freely and even roll it up walls. But the Katamari isn’t the only thing you’ll be pushing. Certain levels will have you pushing different things but the concept remains the same. One might argue that the gameplay can get repetitive and I can see how that may be the case but I can’t say I ever got bored or tired of rolling around. There are certain levels I’m not a huge fan of but I was always eager to jump in whether it be to find and collect everything or to simply grow the katamari bigger than before.
The game features a Select Plaza which is like a hub area. This is where you can save and load your game, interact with Fans, switch cousins, and access your Presents. Fans are basically the game’s levels. A Fan will have one or more wishes or dreams and these are the levels. For several Fans, one level will require you to grow the Katamari as big as possible and the other will require you to grow it to a certain size as fast as possible. Other fans offer more varied goals. For example, one level requires you to clean up a bedroom, another requires you to make the Katamari as bright as possible by rolling up fireflies, and some levels have you pushing wrestlers and growing them bigger than their opponents. There’s a lot more variety to the gameplay compared to what was present in the previous entry. The new content added in REROLL has you playing as a young King and the new levels are remixes of existing ones but they do offer unique challenges in the same vein as the main ones such as finding specific things, rolling up specific things, defeating a boxer, and one level requires you to avoid touching any ghosts.
I really appreciate the more varied gameplay and I think most of the levels are fun but I admit, I’m not a fan of some. And it’s not that they’re badly designed or anything, I just don’t like the requirements or challenges. One requires you to roll up a single cow or bear and you want it to be the biggest one you can find. The level immediately ends the moment you roll one up so you need to be careful as your pushing and growing the katamari. Anything that resembles a cow or bear counts. The Just-Right girl offers a set of levels that require you to grow the katamari to a certain size but without the size indicator on the HUD. There’s nothing necessarily wrong with the levels but they made me realize that I just don’t care for goals that are way too specific. I like the more simple aspect of just rolling things up and growing the katamari as big as possible. It may not be as challenging in some respects but I do find it somewhat relaxing and euphoric.
Just like the previous game, I consider We Love Katamari to be a collect-a-thon. Whatever you roll up is added to your collection which you can view from the Select Plaza. Levels will include cousins, presents, and stickers to find. Cousins found in the levels will appear in the Select Plaza where you can choose to play as them. Finding Presents unlocks accessories or cosmetic items that you can equip your character with. Taking photos of stickers you find with the in-game camera will add them to your sticker collection. Needless to say, there’s plenty of things to find and collect. For many levels, the general idea is to grow your katamari as big as possible and most of the time, as fast as possible. Growing the katamari enables you to roll up more things and access new areas and that’s all part of the fun – accessing new areas which in turn allows you to roll up more items. You typically start out by rolling up small items but you can grow it to a size enabling you to roll up massive items like vehicles, buildings, and even land masses among other things.
One aspect I feel is an improvement over its predecessor is the variety of environments. You’ll navigate around a house, campground, zoo, school, race track, and some levels will have you rolling up cities. You’ll even get to push the katamari around underwater in one level. As expected, items and objects are littered about everywhere. Almost everything you see can be rolled up. From the people and animals on the ground to the clouds in the sky. While most locations in the game reflect real-world environments, the portrayals of life are far from realistic. You’ll often see people and animals doing humorous and bizarre things, environments simply look messy with random stuff just littered about, and moving objects typically act as hazards. That is until the katamari is big enough to roll them up. The environments are fun to explore. Bumping and crashing into things can result in items flying off the katamari but I can honestly say I had a much easier time avoiding that this time and I’m guessing it’s due to multiple reasons. The refinements being one and another is I played this fresh off the previous game so I was already familiar with the mechanics.
We Love Katamari is a colorful game and it retains the unique look and feel of its predecessor and features more visual variety. Once again, I really love the art style of the cut scenes and feel the heavily stylized presentation as a whole helps add to the game’s surreal quality. It is a pleasing game on the eyes as well as the ears. This is yet another game with a phenomenal soundtrack consisting of a lot of catchy tunes. The music covers a range of styles with a mix of both instrumental tunes and songs with vocals. The soundtrack is memorable and a big part of We Love Katamari’s unique style. On the technical side, I’m happy to say I did not encounter any major problems.
I do indeed love Katamari. We Love Katamari is a fantastic sequel that not only retains what made the first game fun and addictive but also adds more variety to the formula. If you’re a veteran of the first game, you should be able to get into the groove of things here pretty quick. Not that these are hard games to jump into but, mechanically, they are basically identical. It’s just that We Love Katamari has some welcome refinements and more content. It’s a roll-em-up and collect-a-thon with a heavily stylized and unique presentation. It’s an audiovisual feast as far as I’m concerned. Much like its predecessor, I feel We Love Katamari can be a relaxing experience. I find it easy to just sit back and enjoy the gameplay and I was always eager to jump back in. I also feel it is a more challenging experience with certain objectives really putting some of your skills to the test. Nevertheless, while I may not like every objective, I can’t say anything about the game feels broken or poorly designed. Most challenges are unique and some force you to think a little differently than what you may be used to. Ultimately, We Love Katamari is a wonderful game.
I absolutely recommend We Love Katamari REROLL+ Royal Reverie. It’s a fine remaster of an excellent game. It takes everything that was great about its predecessor and refines some things and gives you more. More content, more variety, and more stuff to roll up. The concept is unique and the gameplay is fun and addictive. It’s also humorous, surreal, somewhat bizarre, and it should keep you coming back for a while. Definitely check it out.