We Love Katamari [PS2]

When we first caught a glimpse of this sequel to the coolest game of 2004, there was a lingering fear. Would it only be more of the same? Could another dose of the rolling Prince be as much fun as the first? Now we know how silly those suspicions were. Because, with many sessions of We Love Katamari now in the past, we know that it truly is more of the same. And that's another way to say Katamari is pure gaming joy

Anyone so unlucky as to have missed the first game might be a bit confused. We Love Katamari is exceedingly simple -- players use the two analog sticks to control the Prince of the Cosmos, who holds a ball which rolls up everything it touches. As the Prince works, the ball (or katamari) grows larger and larger, eventually becoming sizable enough to grab clouds and continents.

The basic visual and audio style hasn't changed, but both aspects have been refined and improved. The graphics are still drawn in an almost childish pastel style, blocky and simple, but the lines are smoother and the details more dense. With a lot more of everything onscreen at once, this is a far more interesting game to look at.

Musically, Katamari Damacy was one of the best releases in a decade; the soundtrack is still on the playlist a year later. This time, the songs are often like expanded riffs on the original themes, and so lack the indefinable spark of originality found on the initial soundtrack. But they're no less catchy, and over time some of the tunes are actually more interesting. Like the graphics, they build and expand upon what has gone before.

That design imperative -- bigger and more interesting -- is why We Love Katamari performs perfectly as a sequel. It's devoted to giving players more of what they liked last time. In the first game, players had to pass quite a few stages before they could wield a katamari large enough to grab people, much less countries. But now only a few levels go by before everyone is rolling up the world. And in each stage, there are more objects to pick up, larger areas to explore, and even stranger sounds and sights around every turn.

Levels also display a far greater variety than before. Yes, in some, the tasks are still quite simple: create a katamari of specific size within the allotted time, or grab a designated number of one object while racing the clock. And one slightly irritating Katamari Damacy level returns, where play stops as soon as the Prince rolls up an animal of a specific type. Other areas, however, are more esoteric.

There's the racetrack, where the katamari moves on its own at high speed, leaving players to the simple satisfaction of performing jumps and leaps while rolling up formula 1 cars. There's the simple snow level, where building a snowman can be enjoyed free of time constraints. Or the campground, where the only things to collect are fireflies. Finally, a favorite is the level featuring a flaming katamari; sadly, people are off limits for rolling here.

The single-player game is still fairly short; a dedicated player might knock it off in a day, certainly in a weekend. But many alternate versions of each stage are lurking in the post-completion game world. Once those are done, Katamari is such a simple, satisfying pleasure that repeated play is entertaining even when there's nothing more to explore.

And if that was all there was to We Love Katamari, the score hovering at the top of the page would be a full 5 stars instead 4.5. Play length is a pretty cheap reason to knock points off a score, especially when the included levels are so well designed. It's much better that Katamari is short but fantastic, rather than twice as long and half as smart. But buyers should nevertheless know that, despite an extra 10 bucks on the price, Namco hasn't offered much more gameplay in total.

No, the real reason a point was docked is the multiplayer game. The expanded battle mode is fun, and has become what it should have been last time. Players can roll on three different size fields, including the huge "world" area.

But the co-op play represents the downside of quirky, where a kooky idea rolls over fun gameplay. Asking two people to control one katamari is a novelty, nothing more, and after one session we were ready to leave that aspect of the game behind. Too bad, since any stage can be played as a co-op game. There's got to be a more compelling multiplayer game hidden inside this concept, and we're disappointed that Namco hasn't yet found it.

Multiplayer knocks aside, however, We Love Katamari is everything a fan could have hoped for. More stuff, more variation, and more satisfaction. Sure, it's essentially Katamari Damacy: The Remix, but this is one case where the alternate version equals and in many cases exceeds the original.