Once Upon a Katamari
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Critic Reviews for Once Upon a Katamari
Once Upon A Katamari's appropriately ostentatious, energetic return is the best the series has been since the PlayStation 2 era.
Each stage is full of delightfully posed little jokes, characters, and charming anachronisms before you roll them up.
Once Upon a Katamari is a delightful return for the series, offering the same core gameplay fans know and love while also adding even more fun and cleverness.
Once Upon a Katamari proves its worth as a mainline sequel and differentiates itself from other action-puzzlers with its irresistible game feel.Rolling the katamari and sticking things to its surface with a satisfying pop is a continuous, sensory delight not dissimilar to vacuuming up gems in Vampire Survivors. Refined controls and the introduction of power-ups like the Magnet simply enhance this core experience, making for a deeply satisfying roll-'em-up.
Bandai Namco really hit a home run with this latest entry in the Katamari Damacy series. It's calming, cozy, and whimsical—in other words, everything you expect from a Katamari game. The time travel theme works well, and the ability to customize your appearance based on your gameplay performance really sells it.
Yet another entirely unnecessary sequel to a classic game that should never have got any follow-ups at all. But if you want even more of the same old thing there are few small sparks of imagination here and there.
Once Upon a Katamari doesn't stray one inch from the series' formula; in fact, it plays practically the same. But it enriches the formula with more challenges, more varied objectives, crazy levels, and four-player competitive multiplayer (including online). And it's all sprinkled with the game's trademark absurdist humor.
Review in Spanish | Read full review
Katamari is inherently a chaotic game, despite its adorable, silly visuals and legendarily chill music tracks such as Lonely Rolling Star (the GOAT, in my humble opinion). There’s a lot going on, only so much time to engage with it all, and that’s a big part of the series’ classic appeal. It’s a score-challenging arcade game at heart, with the original game’s scope mostly about trying to make the biggest Katamari within the time limit.
