Episode 28: Katamari Damacy

In 2004, an insane man named Keita Takahashi was given an enormous bucket of money and was told he could make a video-game with it. He decided to make a game about God getting drunk and destroying each and every star. The obvious fix for this silly mistake was for his son to roll up objects on Earth into a sticky ball using something called a Katamari, which he could then turn into stars...somehow.

And that's the entire game of Katamari Damacy. You roll things up into your Katamari, allowing it to grow and roll up increasingly larger objects. You go from hoovering up paperclips and thumbtacks, to soda cans and dog bowls and eventually even chairs and fence posts! After that, well...it starts to get a little out of hand. But for all its novelty and weirdness, is Katamari Damacy actually a fun game to play?

On this episode, we discuss:

• Should Katamari Damacy’s levels have a time limit? Is this best enjoyed as a purely zen experience, or does an element of anxiety add to the experience?
• What’s the deal with the control scheme? Why does up go left and down go right? Is this a controller nightmare or does this weird setup have its advantages?
• Speaking of weird, this is the one of the most bizzare games we’ve ever played. Is it off putting and random, or thematically cohesive and charming?

We answer these questions and many more on the 28th Episode of the Retro Spectives Podcast!

If you enjoyed the episode then come and join us on our discord server! Whether you want to hang out, suggest a new game for us to play, or simply call us idiots for our terrible opinions, we’d love for you to drop by!