same, i'm very happy with the switch version. god i had missed this game.Very pleased with the Switch version so far. I didn't expect Namco to do such an accurate job with it, and all the 2D art looks amazing at 1080p.
same, i'm very happy with the switch version. god i had missed this game.Very pleased with the Switch version so far. I didn't expect Namco to do such an accurate job with it, and all the 2D art looks amazing at 1080p.
For what it's worth, you need to match the anti-aliasing and transparency settings for it to work correctly. You won't get proper sampling otherwise.If you're on PC, you can really crank the settings up in nvcp to clean it up and it doesn't break a sweat, even at 4K for me
Also, DS4 works great
Thanks I didn't know that! Something I did in there did make a big difference though.For what it's worth, you need to match the anti-aliasing and transparency settings for it to work correctly. You won't get proper sampling otherwise.
I think I might get one of them ps4 or mayflash Wii U adapters to fix that myselfAhh it feels good to roll again. Been years since I played any Katamari besides that endless runner phone game. First time playing it on a controller with asymmetrical sticks and it definitely throws me for a loop.
it seems like there's no way to restart, you can only go back to the home planet from the pause menu.If you want to restart a level does it make you go back to the planet select level screen (original design) or does it include the option to just straight up restart the level (ala we <3 katamari)?
Whatever justifies the purchase
i'll try them once i get home.
it's a shame the english voice acting was cut, i think it's pretty good. but there's really not a lot, you can listen to all of it in these three videos.I wonder how easy it could be to mod back in the English voice acting into the PC version for the Hoshino cutscenes. If they're stored as separate files in a Unity asset package, maybe it could be as simple as re-inserting them somehow. If it's (more likely) part of the CRIWARE video files, you could theoretically extract the separate audio and video streams and re-mux them. I'm not sure how feasible either would be; these are just some cursory observations and I'm really inept about the subject of modding for Unity and/or CRIWARE stuff otherwise, I haven't taken a look at the Unity assets or video files myself personally.
The omission of English voice acting isn't the end of the world but I just find it rather disappointing. Presumably it either had to do with royalties or the fact that Bandai Namco found the quality retrospectively unsatisfactory.
I think the fact of the matter is that the English voices possibly suffered from not-great voice direction as a consequence of the voice acting being recorded in Japan through whatever expats they could happen to pick up. This is a common thing for many Japanese games, and Namco did it for several of their games back in the day. Another infamous Namco example from around the same time would be the first Baten Kaitos. It still happens today, even—Pokkén's English acting was notoriously bad and recorded in Japan (another Bandai Namco joint, maybe not a coincidence!). I think Earth Defense Force 5 might be the same way (I haven't confirmed personally) but I digress.
Late edit: A comparison of Baten Kaitos and Katamari's credits tells me both were recorded through a company called Art Quest if anyone's curious. Seemingly a frequent if not erstwhile collaborator with Bandai Namco and incidentally were involved with other things such as F-Zero GX & Metal Wolf Chaos (both English VO only).
i don't know if there's something wrong with my joycons (i don't think there is) but the motion controls just don't work for me. the katamari just keeps rolling backwards no matter how i move the joycons. if i waggle them randomly i can get it to dash or turn but i can't make sense of the motion controls AT ALL.
i just finished the game in handheld mode, using the original controls. the camera is just wonky, you'll get used to it.Any way to play this effectively in handheld mode, I'm having some issues with the camera but I'm still getting levels done but the rotation of the camera in handheld is a struggle. I did play with the joycons detached with the game in tabletop mode but I've always been a handheld guy but I'll be willing to play joycon detached if it's better.
I've never played this before. Just downloaded the demo. The controls and camera seem....really bad? Took me like 30 seconds to realize how to even move the ball and now I'm awkwardly moving around the area and it feels really rigid?
Like what am I doing wrong here? Lol.
I think I swapped to simple, had trouble turning with the default controlsi just finished the game in handheld mode, using the original controls. the camera is just wonky, you'll get used to it.
are you playing using the original controls or the simple controls?
The only really great Katamari games are We <3 Katamari and the first game. The level design and game structure isn't there for the later titles, and it needs to be a fully Keita Takahashi game.
i suggest changing back to original controls. they're a little hard to get used to, but once you do they feel very natural, and plus you don't have to worry about camera, you just roll the katamari and the camera does it's own [not so perfect] job. i hear the simple controls are just horrible (haven't tried them yet).I think I swapped to simple, had trouble turning with the default controls
i don't think you're overthinking at all. yeah the games are about rolling balls, but what elevates them from a basic game to a memorable experience is takahashi's touch. the style, the humor, the dialog, the characters, those all help the game become this amazing cohesive package. seems like after he left bamco just tried to come up with bs "wacky" stories and stuff just to make sequels. i'm sure they play fine, but like anything you love, it's easy to not care about a continuation when the original creator isn't involved.Agreed completely. It's not just the level design and structure for me either. It's the whole package from even the between level segments and all the odds and ends that gives a more complete feeling in the first two games. Sure I enjoyed the later ones but they never felt like the complete experience that the first two did, and at times felt more like they were trying to hard to "get" what made them great.
But maybe I'm overthinking a series of games about rolling things up in a giant ball.
nothing new, content-wise.Any extras over the first game? New endless modes, etc?
Stuck waiting for the jp release.
Any extras over the first game? New endless modes, etc?
Stuck waiting for the jp release.
You can limit framerate down to make everything 30 - but don't expect anyone fixing the simulation framerate, that's obviously something that was never designed to run differently.
If you're trying to control it like every other game, you're doing it wrong. I've seen lots of people intuitively do the exact opposite of what tutorial teaches and get confused by controls not responding in kind. One of the key things is to USE the momentum rather than try fighting it, and that does take a fair bit of practice to get good at. The fact you have to coordinate both hands also trips some people when using sticks - it may actually be easier to use button-based mappings (on PC it's easy to do so), as it's easier to control keeping direction etc. that way.
the simple controls seem to be truly dumb:I'm speaking only in reference to original controls though - never tried 'simple' so I have no idea what that behaves like.
The easier control scheme doesn't fare much better either, as the right stick can only be tilted up or down for you to look left and right, which feels weird to say the least.
Bummer.It seems as direct and unchanged of a port as possible (for better or worse), excepting the removal of the ENG voice acting.
Probably limited since it's only at GameStop/EB Games.Does anyone know if this is a limited release? The game is sold out in Canada and I am wondering if it will be restocked or if I should go ahead and buy a copy from the US.
Looks like someone actually did make a mod to replace the Japanese cutscene voiceover with the English voiceover for the PC version.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1586689748/
As I'd theorized earlier this was apparently done by more or less remuxing Reroll's high-quality cutscene videos with the PS2 English audio tracks, judging by the files, so it's a somewhat hefty download. I haven't tried it myself though (yet).
oh wow, that was quick. and seems like it was easy to do, just replace some files.Looks like someone actually did make a mod to replace the Japanese cutscene voiceover with the English voiceover for the PC version.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1586689748/
As I'd theorized earlier this was apparently done by more or less remuxing Reroll's high-quality cutscene videos with the PS2 English audio tracks, judging by the files, so it's a somewhat hefty download. I haven't tried it myself though (yet).
yeah, they messed up by both having a bad demo and having a bad release date. i also think it would have been easier to recommend to people if it was 20 dollars (the game is 20 euros). i don't feel like i paid too much, but considering how short it is and that stuff like okami HD are $20, 30 seems a bit much.It sucks that this almost certainly is going to get buried, it really is odd how little they've promoted it since announcement. Also it hit me how awful the demo was when I realized the full game makes you learn the controls first but as far as I remember there's no tutorial at all in the demo.
It is odd. Like was mentioned, there's a unity plugin called "PS2KatamariSimulation", so I'm guessing they have something to run the original code for gameplay. It doesn't seem to entirely be for physics though, the level-select planet (and only that one) also runs at 30.I find it interesting that they seemingly recreated the game in Unity for this version (rather than any other method of porting).
But I guess they re-used the original physics code? For a game like this I feel like it would be hard to exactly match up the gameplay otherwise -- and if you were redoing it completely I assume you wouldn't design it for 30 FPS.