![]() This, in turn, keeps your final score at the end of the level a fair bit lower than it should be. For starters, as mentioned above, increasing in size is a gradual thing sometimes your time limit is so tight that you're really forced to roll over anything in your path just to get up to a decent diameter so you can get to the area containing the highest concentration of objects that match the King's request. This focus on themed objects is new to the series – and it doesn't quite segue as well as it should, given the heavy emphasis towards this new twist on the traditional theme. It's this gradual expansion that causes the most headaches and makes Beautiful Katamari into something of a puzzle game too. The larger you become, the larger the object you can stick to the side of the katamari. Suddenly, you're ploughing through a candy store countertop, latching onto lollypops, thumb-tacks, building blocks, crayons and other small objects, as your katamari gradually increases in diameter. Generally, this is a tight time limit of a few minutes, weighed against the size you're supposed to expand your katamari to. So, the next big hurdle is about being picky with the objects you roll into, while also racing against the clock. Trying to scoop up solely water-themed objects is almost impossible. ![]() The kink in the chain is, these themed objects are scattered in an environment that is littered with thousands of other objects of varying size across every available surface. Venturing into each themed world, The King tasks you with very specific missions – create a watery Katamari covered in boats, fish and maritime objects for a Neptune-like planet, for example. Still with me here? In practice, it's like many other platformers – you have your hub landscape (amusingly littered with obtuse objects and buildings, as in the last PS2 version of the game, We Love Katamari). After completing the tutorial level, The Prince is whisked away to the technicolour overworld where the ruler of the universe, the flamboyant and camp King of All Cosmos, issues you with tasks to perform. That is, using two analogue sticks to control just about all your movement and orientation in the field. ![]() If you've never played a Katamari-universe game before, there's a short, sharp learning curve that must be mastered. Unfortunately, it also falls victim to rush-job porting process and gimped content, thanks to the developer's decision to leave portions of the game off-limits unless you fork out for Xbox Live Marketplace DLC. Mostly, Beautiful Katamari succeeds on both counts. It's your sole task, and as such, it needs to be a lot of fun and work really well. Beautiful Katamari is all about the rolling process – simply because that's just about all there is to the whole game. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |