Every Katamari Damacy clone misses what made it so great: the transition between zoom levels. "I started so small and now I've sucked up everything on the planet!" The transitions between zoom levels was so well done in the original game, and none of these clones even attempt it.
I enjoyed watching someone else play a Katamari game that ended with rolling around the planet picking up monuments. That was fun.
Later, I bought Katamari Damacy, and it doesn't have that aspect. You can't suck up everything on the planet. You can get moderately bigger and pick up objects the size of a car instead of objects the size of a paper clip.
What you're describing just isn't a strength of the original game; it was a strength of the sequels.
• Provide a toggle for the music. It sounds like it was procedurally generated by Claude Code. I understand CC was trying to give it a "Damacy vibe", but it just doesn't have any of the charm. I can still sing the very memorable original's theme despite not having played it in over two decades.
• The camera has a bit too much elasticity when you haven't accreted much on the ball. For whatever reason, good camera controls give even SOTA LLMs a surprising amount of grief. Might be worth a bit of manual tuning.
On Firefox mobile, the controls are way too sensitive. I could barely aim at things. Also the joystick indicator stays in place even though you can press and drag from anywhere.
The loading is extremely slow - I'm not sure I need all the objects loaded before selecting the first level.
Also I'm not sure if some textures didn't load, but the first level is just... almost empty with random things on the floor? It doesn't have any interesting surroundings. https://photos.app.goo.gl/cEnu76hb5JeJ3DhP7 If it's not an artefact of my phone, a Katari clone needs way more polish/scenery.
At this point, every web game I try starts with testing for one specific bug - if you right click while moving, does it screw up the movement so that you are still moving after you let up on WASD.
Yup. It does.
It is a cute idea. But the implementation is flawed.
And if the goal is to help people explore cultural artifacts, building a game that actually minimizes the importance of the artifacts, and literally just drives the player to squash them up into a great big ball might not be the best way to help people actually appreciate the items.
Also, the items in the game are very artfully arranged.
This version (the part I played) just dumps everything on the floor and the music is lifeless.
Later, I bought Katamari Damacy, and it doesn't have that aspect. You can't suck up everything on the planet. You can get moderately bigger and pick up objects the size of a car instead of objects the size of a paper clip.
What you're describing just isn't a strength of the original game; it was a strength of the sequels.
• Provide a toggle for the music. It sounds like it was procedurally generated by Claude Code. I understand CC was trying to give it a "Damacy vibe", but it just doesn't have any of the charm. I can still sing the very memorable original's theme despite not having played it in over two decades.
• The camera has a bit too much elasticity when you haven't accreted much on the ball. For whatever reason, good camera controls give even SOTA LLMs a surprising amount of grief. Might be worth a bit of manual tuning.
I hope you'll forgive an unrelated tangent: what culture does your ~~ tag come from?
- The down key should move backwards
- I found the left / right keys don't just spin left / right, they move forward a bit, which I found quite frustrating at points.
The loading is extremely slow - I'm not sure I need all the objects loaded before selecting the first level.
Also I'm not sure if some textures didn't load, but the first level is just... almost empty with random things on the floor? It doesn't have any interesting surroundings. https://photos.app.goo.gl/cEnu76hb5JeJ3DhP7 If it's not an artefact of my phone, a Katari clone needs way more polish/scenery.
Yup. It does.
It is a cute idea. But the implementation is flawed.
And if the goal is to help people explore cultural artifacts, building a game that actually minimizes the importance of the artifacts, and literally just drives the player to squash them up into a great big ball might not be the best way to help people actually appreciate the items.