Katamari Forever

After waiting weeks for this game to finally go on sale, I found that GameStop has finally begun their pre-order phase for what may be the final installment of the Katamari Damacy series: Katamari Forever.

Exclusively for the Playstation 3 (for now), Katamari Forever looks to continue off the story of the last Katamari for the Playstation 2. From GameStop's description:
The Prince and his cousins have generated millions of fans and want to roll more katamaris. But the King of Cosmos bumped his head and lost his memory. When the Prince built a robot King of Cosmos to replace him, the robot went crazy and destroyed all the stars (sound familiar?). So it is your job to roll up enough katamaris to replace all the stars as well as your father's memory.

Obviously, as expected from a Katamari sequel/spin-off, the gameplay is pretty much the same. In fact, about 50% of the levels are just remakes of older levels from other Katamari games. Still, they now have different artistic view modes that you can roll in, from black and white, to some kind of stencil sketch, and it is all in full 1080p high definition.

The game is also adding a few more goodies to the gameplay. There will be useage of the six-axis controls on the Playstation 3 controller, and under "certain conditions", the katamari will have a magnet effect to suck in nearby objects, which will no doubt make rolling easier (or harder if you're doing those specific item missions). There is also going to be use of the Playstation Network: they have announced an online ranking system.

For any Katamari fan, and especially for first-timers, this will be a great game to have. The only downside is the lack of online capabilities announced outside of a ranking system. I was hoping for online versus mode, co-op mode, or maybe a Little Big Planet level creation system. There is a lot of potential in this game, but it will be unfortunate if the creators don't tap into all of it, especially since it won't be making full use of the Playstation 3's capabilities. Still, it's all about the gameplay, and rolling a katamari in itself has unlimited replay value. This game is set to be released on October 1st.