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To redeem his father's transgressions against the stars in the heavens, Oji-sama (Prince) has to roll. By rolling a lot of objects into a big bumpy blob, perhaps the stars will be replenished. Oji starts small with a nucleus of material which emits magical magnetic power and little objects such as saws, bottles, and boxes are soon attracted to the mass and add to its growing morass. In the early going, larger objects prove to be obstacles rather than fodder for the rolling but once Oji's ball grows a little larger, bigger items become fair game for girth seeking gamers. Once enough garbage, material, folk and anything else that might be in the way are snatched up, entire buildings become mere pickup sticks for Oji and his miraculous mass of matter. Control of the "ball" is mastered through the Dual Shock thumb sticks and maneuverability gets tougher as the mass grows ever larger. The game is a light-hearted and highly enjoyable romp but the sight of citizens adhering to a mass of mass construction may be offsetting to tender hearted gamers. The hapless souls who become stuck to the ball shiver, twitch and shake like little trapped insects. Ever see a fly whose wings have become helplessly glued to a spider's web? Those little legs flail and stammer as the fly ponders it's fate - not knowing that a predator will soon cocoon it for tomorrow's breakfast. That's what the human attachments are reminiscent of...sans the spider. Katamari Damacy probably won't sell any appreciable numbers but kudos should be given to Namco for testing an offbeat premise which may well become our sleeper of the year.
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