Enter: My homey Owen from SMB. Was chatting with him a few weeks ago and out of the blue he asked me if I’ve ever played Katamari. On PS2. Suddenly my brain jumped… “HEY! Is that the one where you roll a ball around and pick stuff up??!!” Sure enough, that was the game. And it turns out that it is readily available on American soil. Last night I broke down, went to Target, and picked up We Love Katamari for a mere $29. Hoooo-Leeee addicting, Bat Man. Very rarely do I get sucked into hours of video game nerd-ness like I did last night.
In Katamari, You are this teeny little dude with a head shaped like Rosie’s from The Jetsons and you roll around this sticky ball called a Katamari. It starts out very small, picking up things like coins, batteries, and crayons, but the bigger you get, the bigger things you can pick up on your Katamari, such as farm animals, giant lobsters, cars, houses.. and once you’re done, your Katamari is measured, thrown up into the cosmos and becomes a star or planet. Gee, makes perfect sense, doesn’t it?
Here's what it looks like when you're starting out with your Katamari:
And peep this - once you become a good enough roller, here’s what can happen:
WHOA. That's pretty fucked up, huh?!
It has everything I’ve ever wanted in a game: Incredibly addicting simplicity, a storyline that really makes no sense but does in some weird way, hilarious character dialogue which admits to that and makes no real sense as well, and some of the most interesting video game music I’ve ever heard (I’d actually buy I if it were on CD).
All I can do this morning is sit and daydream about rolling a ball around and having things stick to it. I’m not kidding you; it brainwashes you and suddenly you want to roll everything. Case and point: I’m looking at the orange I brought in to work today on my desk. Here is the first thing I thought when I took the orange out of my bag:
1. I will roll my orange over that pen and the pen will adhere to it.
2. I will then roll it over Josh’s pen and gather that too.
3. I will spill out some paper clips and roll over those.
4. Then I’ll roll over the 10 CDs I brought to work. Aw hell, and my headphones, too.
4. Next, I will hopefully be big enough to roll over and gather all of the telephones.
5. At that point my orange-a-mari will certainly be large enough to roll over the computer monitors and gather those as well.
6. See all of the office chairs? They’re next.
7. Then I’ll roll up the desks.
8. Then I’ll go outside with my orange-a-mari and roll up some trees, cars, buildings…
I have been sucked into this game - Big Time. I was up until 1AM playing the damned thing and I have a feeling I will be tonight as well. Please send help… I have no life as it is and fear that this will only make things worse. My skin will start to turn blue. My hair will get greasy. Oh no.
Well, it was nice knowing everybody. Say, if you see me rolling a giant ball down the street anytime soon, don’t run. Just stand there so I can roll you up and make you part of the biggest Katamari ever. It’s gonna be awesome.
