Once Upon a Katamari

Once Upon a Katamari was provided by Bandai Namco for review. Thank you!

When it comes to the PS2 era, there weren't many games that stuck in my head apart from my favorites like Kingdom Hearts and Naruto Ultimate Ninja. However, no game sticks out to me as much as Katamari Damacy does. It was just so weird compared to most of the games that stuck out to me on the console, but it was so addictive and hilarious. Now, after almost 15 years, we are finally getting a new game in the series, and I couldn't be happier. I was hoping for more Katamari, and I got exactly what I was hoping for in Once Upon a Katamari, with maybe a little too much variety at times.

It sounds like a weird issue to have, and I thought I was weird for thinking it as well. Once Upon a Katamari still plays exactly like how I remember. We roll a ball and try to stick as many objects to it as we can to make it larger and larger, doing so within a time limit to make it as big as possible. I still got that same giddy feeling I had during the PS2 era, watching as my ball gets bigger and bigger, ultimately sucking up animals and humans, who are all doing some odd routine while waving their hands around as fast as possible. It brought back so many great memories from previous entries, and I was having a blast.

The levels are kept interesting thanks to multiple changes that can happen during and power-ups. In some levels, as we grow our ball, new areas will unlock or levels will change, ranging from being able to go outside of a building or a ladder coming down to access the roof to an entirely new pirate ship coming up next to ours. Add in the power-ups like a magnet to bring in objects that can fit on our ball, and a rocket to blast our way across the map, and each level feels more invigorating and exciting than the last.

There are also collectibles that can be tracked down across each level. There are three crowns to find, one of The Prince's cousins, and a present. The crowns are more like collectibles, while finding The Prince's cousins gives you new playable characters. As for Presents, well, we can get some costume items from them to customize our playable character. They are ultimately small additions, but I love the little bits of customization we have for both our playable character and how they look.

Now there are a good chunk of levels in Once Upon a Katamari, and I love how they are structured. The King of Cosmos has once again destroyed the cosmos, and it's up to us to replace the stars and planets. To do so, we will be traveling to different eras of time, creating new stars as we go. It's a similar premise, but it opens up interesting levels that feel wildly different from each other. Whether it be roaming with the dinosaurs or trekking around Japan's Edo period, I enjoyed the visual variety between them.

However, it's the level variety that started to get a little rough. While we do have the usual levels where we have to grow as much as we can within the time frame, there are also levels where we have to get a number of specific items, having to get certain items within a limit of how many we can roll up, and different variations of those. It was nice at first, but these variations happen more often than I thought, and I missed the older style of levels, where we just made our ball as big as possible. There are some specialty levels that I fell in love with, like having to roll up a person to fatten them up with food, but there weren't as many of these as I would have liked.

I was happy to see the series' brand of humor still alive as much as ever. The developments of levels, actions of characters and animals, the way the King of Cosmos acts, and even the small cutscene showing the Queen's adventures in different eras were all on brand and just hilarious. The small cutscene talking to the King of Cosmos when starting each level was a little obnoxious, but it was quick to skip it if I decided to, which I appreciated.

Outside of the normal levels, we can also play KatamariBall. This is a special little mode where you compete against three others, trying to get your ball as big as you can and submit the objects you gather for points. Whoever has the most points when the time limit is over takes the win. KatamariBall can be played online against others, and as you win, your own level can go up, unlocking new balls and such. We can also use the currency we get to unlock expressions for the hub and other customizable items.

Once Upon a Katamari - Steam Deck Performance

Once Upon a Katamari generally plays quite well on the Steam Deck, but it was a little heavier than I expected. The game locks to 60 FPS, so we do have to change our framerate/refresh rate to get the smoothest performance possible. However, on the default settings, there were moments where the battery drain would go much higher than I anticipated, sometimes hitting 17W or 18W, and there were some drops to 40 on some very crowded levels. For a game that looks like this, I expected better, but I am happy to say there is a solution.

By turning down shadows to Low, we can get rid of the bulk of the issues, bringing down the drain by almost 6W - 7W on average, saving almost 2 hours of battery life. Oddly enough, this doesn't actually change much visually, and the game still looks fantastic and retains its signature charm. There are some smaller shadows that disappear on low, and some shadows have less detail when further away, but ultimately, the pros outweigh the cons with battery life savings for minimal visual difference.

In general, you should be able to play at 60 FPS 98% of the time, but with the battery savings for almost no difference to the graphics, I recommend the change. I also noticed that the hub feels a little off compared to how smooth it feels in the levels. I am not sure exactly why, but the hub feels a little stuttery.

Accessibility

We can change the control type, toggle the rumble, reticle, hint guide, invert the camera, change sound bars, and change keybindings, but that's about it in the settings.

The game doesn't support 16:10 resolutions, but it does have cloud saves and controller support. There are no HDR settings.

Conclusion

Ultimately, Once Upon a Katamari is exactly what I was hoping for. The lack of core gameplay changes invoked the wonderful feelings I had with the older games, and with the extra collectibles, power-ups, and level changes that could happen, it felt fresh and exciting. There was a good variety of level aesthetics, thanks to having to travel to different eras of time to repair the damage the King of Cosmos had caused. I do wish there wasn't as much level variety, so I could play more of the classic gameplay I had come to love. Still, with the collectibles, customization, and multiplayer, this is a fantastic new addition to the series, and I couldn't be happier that it exists.

The game is also great to play on the Steam Deck. Changing the shadows to low fixes some of the smaller issues I encountered, as well as saves a good chunk of battery life, and ultimately, we can expect a solid 60 FPS with around 4-4.5 hours of battery life. This is a great game to take on the go, and I highly recommend it.

Our review is based on the PC version of this game.

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