what a beautiful game

ngl i like it better than we love katamari. i know, i know, but before you get your pitchforks ready, the vibes in this one are immaculate. completely replicates the vibe of katamari damacy, from the zany ost to the comedy to even the great credits sequence. my biggest complaints with we love katamari were how it just didnt have the same vibes, and whilst ive learned to love it in spite of that during my october replay, it still holds it back from being a 10 in my eyes. the story is meta commentary and its just not as memorable as damacy's. accessing levels through talking to random people never sat right with me either. and the credits, something i adore damacy for, for having one of the best credit sequences in gaming, are complete ass compared to wlk's. dont get me wrong i love wlk, but theres tons of micro criticisms i have.

so before my wlk replay i went through me and my katamari and touch my katamari. while those ranged from alright to pretty good, they still didnt touch the first two in my eyes. the katamari itch came back over the past month as i was finishing cs2(which is done, btw) so decided id get through beautiful after i finish. this shit blew me away. like i stated in the first paragraph, the vibes from damacy are here in full force. the story feels a bit redundant and like a retread of damacy, but its still better than the meta commentary of wlk. in fact, id say the epilogue level which sees The King yap about shit from his youth is a better way of telling the story that WLK ended up telling anyway. the silent cutscenes were alright, but it's another thing to just hear The King talk about his childhood in his hilariously narcissistic tone. also fantastic use of the song the royal academy of katamari for the level. this was initially the credits theme for wlk and it just didnt do anything for me, but here it works perfectly and fits the tone.

i havent mentioned it in any of my prior reviews, but i think the biggest boon this series ever had after takahashi left was keeping the same composer. no katamari ost has ever been bad from what ive played, but this definitely has some of his finest work for the series. it's also not entirely shibuya kei, which was an interesting but welcome choice. granted katamari osts have never been entirely in the shibuya kei genre, but at least for damacy a lot of songs were. some of my favs include bless my stars, katamari dancing, sayonara rolling star(the goat) and ofc, colorful heart the credits song.

we need to talk about that credits sequence. oh ye gods, its so good. katamari of love in damacy is one of my favorites for a reason, the rock ballad + the minigame of rolling everyone up was such a breath of fresh air, so imagine my surprise(when most of the other credit sequences afterwards have been ass or unmemorable) when there's a) a fun minigame and b) an insanely good credits song. just left me so fucking satisfied and glad i played this game.

i also checked out the dlc, and for taking me a total of just under 1 hour, its definitely a scam to not include it in the base game. being that i played this through means of dubious legality, i didnt have to pay, but it's also a scam that each level costs 1 dollar. 5 bucks for every dlc, including all the extra cousins and shit (which are apparently 2.5 dollars??? more than the levels what the actual fuck who bought this) i could get behind, but in it's current state, since each dlc level took me 5 mins or less, its totally a scam lol. being i dont interact with the xbox ecosystem at all idk if theyd ever go on sale but if theyre like half off definitely check em out. all of em are fun jaunts that feel right at home with the rest of the game. i hope if this one ever gets rerolled theyre bundled into the base game.

it feels weird saying this, but i think beautiful katamari feels like the true sequel, like for me im praising it as much as people praise wlk, so it feels like im in an alt timeline where wlk is the one that takahashi was not involved in. BK was an extremely well rounded experience, and if damacy didnt have the "did it first" bonus, im struggling to say if id choose damacy over this one as #1 in the series. it just feels right sitting at a 10. very underrated game in the katamari series, definitely check it out if you love katamari(and i mean, who doesn't)

#breakfreebeautifulkatamari