Katamari Damacy REROLL (2018) - Review

The Katamari Damacy series has always existed in my mind as the best kind of video game that I never intended to play. It would've probably stayed that way if my then 5 yo son hadn't seen it somewhere and loved the concept. I decided I would get it so we could play it together. So I did get it, but we ended up playing something else together instead.

Katamari Damacy stayed in my game log untouched until I had one of those days when you go "Eh, why the heck not" with a shoulder shrug. It's not that I don't like the idea of Katamari Damacy, like mentioned I think it seemed like a brilliant game concept. Make a huge ball out of random stuff just because? You couldn't make a movie or book out of that, that idea could only exist in a video game.

The game was originally released on Playstation 2 in 2004, but as you can see I am playing the Reroll release from 2018. As far as I read up on it is about the same as the original but with updated graphics, but if you happen to be curious to know more details there is a great video on Youtube about it.

You have probably heard of Katamari Damacy before but if you haven't, you read that right - the core concept of game play is to make a huge ball of random things lying around on the ground. You play as the little prince who has to clean up the mess his father, the almighty King of All Cosmos, has made when he accidentally destroys all the stars in the sky. Apparently, balls made of random stuff can substitute for stars in the sky if you don't think too hard about it. 

And really, you could make up any excuse here because why wouldn't you want to roll things up into balls anyway? It's just plain fun, that's why, you don't need another reason. Each level comes with a minimum ball-size requirement and a time limit. Rolling things into balls isn't as easy as it first might seem. You can't just grab any old thing immediately, for things to stick to your ball they have to be smaller than your ball. Larger things will at best make you bounce off, at worst make things fall off your ball. So you have to be smart about how you go around collecting things, trying to avoid the things you can't pick up just yet and get back to them later. There is definitely a kick to get from finding a good path through the random items (they are very random and can even include living things like cats and dogs) and a high level of annoyance when you screech to a halt from something that you can't pick up yet. 

As your ball grows the area you're in will grow, revealing more items for you to pick up. Everything that attaches itself to your ball makes a satisfying ploppy, bloppy and shwoppy sound, for lack of better description. And let's talk a little bit about the music. It is great. From the intro song to the stage themes, each tune fits perfectly and makes it a joy to fail, because fail you will.

The game is a joy to look at as well, and the items scattered around are clearly organized in a way to entice you to move around the levels in certain ways. I want to mention it again here that the items you get to pick up can really be just about anything, but every now and then you get special stages where the Almighty King wants you to create a ball made up of some certain item - swans for instance. It all makes perfect sense when you play the game. I'm kidding, it doesn't, but rolling a ball of flapping swans around is equal parts hilarious and disturbing.

Knowledge of the places you go around in seems crucial to be able to make the time limit because despite the games best intentions to give you control and overview, it fails somewhat on that.

The game designers have really tried to think hard and clever when designing the controls, realizing that a game like this above all requires this to work well. To wrestle your ball around you have to use both control sticks, which allows you to get more control over things like speed and turning - absolutely essential to be able to cut corners and avoiding rats that are trying to ruin your ball. (On the keyboard it is a double-WASD setup, using JIKL as the other "stick", and I actually had more success with playing it this way).

Shoulder buttons allow you to get an overview but for all the good things they've thought of I can't help but feel like they've missed a huge point - how to control the camera. This problem becomes very frustrating when you try to get your ball the way you want it to, but you can't even see what is around you. The overview button, which gets your character to jump up in the air, doesn't solve this issue at all. As I wrestle the control sticks I literally feel like I am rolling a big ball of garbage in front of my face, and plus points for realism I guess. Unfortunately it takes a lot of the fun out trying to doing a good job when you feel like you are constantly being resisted. The ball at times doesn't feel cooperative in the slightest, making any bumps and knocks you take a lot more frustrating than they should be, as you see your hard worked bits fly all over the place.

The timer continues to tick down as you find yourself stuck in a corner, or trying to get up a tiny ledge, and it takes way too many precious seconds to try to find a way to move forward. There is a lack of control and cooperation that feels unforgivable for a game like this, despite what seems like their very best efforts to avoid these problems.

Maybe I am just getting old and slow, I am noticing I have a hard time taking good turns in Mario Kart 8 as well... But whatever the reason, and however much I think Katamari Damacy in many ways can stand as the perfect example of something that a video game can do that other media can't, I end up struggling too much to have fun. And yet, when I am not playing it I find myself thinking it would be nice to load it up to roll some more balls. There is something about it that is simultaneously relaxing and frustrating. It seems I am not the only one who thinks this way, the comment section on the OST on Youtube is full with similar sentiments like "Katamari Damacy is the most infuriating, frustrating, stressful, stress-reducing, enjoyable, satisfying, joyous game ever made" and "the katamari franchise is simultaneously the least stressful and the most UNGODLY STRESSFUL game i've ever played.",

I've decided to uninstall it several times, but I haven't. I am having more success when I am not trying to use a controller, so maybe Katamari will get to stick around a while longer still... there is just something appealing to the idea of rolling up garbage.

There is a two-player mode that works quite well since there can be some fun to be had from sharing the pain of trying to build the bigger ball. You can even roll each other up if you manage to get that much bigger than the competition. For all the frustrations I still want to recommend checking it out, if nothing else than to experience something truly unique. And then I am going to do something as horrible as recommending a mobile game if you want a better version of this style of gameplay. Check out the Tasty Planet series - it's fun.

Field Report #31 - End of an Era, Again

About a month ago I decided it was time to quit World of Warcraft, again. This time it happened without too many emotions and fanfare however. In all honesty it all just sort of fizzled out. The final couple of months of my play time I noticed I was only logging on a few times a week to do a raid here and there, and the urge to do pretty much anything else in the game was completely gone. I used to love leveling alts for instance but couldn't even muster the energy to do that. That was a big sign that it was time to move on.

It was difficult to justify the fairly high subscription cost for what in the end turned out to be very little play time. And with the "new" expansion (Mists of Pandaria) coming up the thought of leveling my characters to the new max level didn't entice me at all. I just sort of realized that I had gone bored with World of Warcraft. But it had been another fun run, a fair few years of the usual Guild drama and highs and lows. Overall I really enjoyed that they brought classic back and I don't doubt that I will get back into World of Warcraft in the future again. 

So what do I fill my days with now? Well, as I mentioned I had lost interest in most things in WoW even before I finally pulled the plug and as I have a huge backlog of games to get through there is never want for things to fill my time with. Some of these things I have posted about on this blog. Right at this moment however I am mostly playing Yakuza 0 which I am having tremendous fun with. Yakuza has turned out to be a series of games that seems fully suited for my likes and I enjoy every second of it. Yakuza 0 has turned out to be the most lecherous part in the series so far, an aspect of the series that I've always giggled at more than I've fully enjoyed it. For the first time I might be feeling that they've actually taken it too far but fortunately most of it is optional content.

Summer vacation has just started for me and the rest of my family with the regular challenges of agreeing on what to do. Me and the SO agree on most things  - we enjoy the same nerd culture (Pokémon, Godzilla, certain manga/anime, certain video games, martial arts movies and B action movies from the 80's and 90's to mention some) and we both love being outdoors in the forest. The rest of my family doesn't share my passion for board games and no one shares my SO's passion for Dragon Ball, but no one is perfect.

My kids couldn't be more different however. My younger one is outgoing and loves running, dancing, singing, sporting, playing with toys. The older one hates all of that and pretty much only enjoys video games. So there is a real challenge trying to find something that everyone will enjoy. Most of our days include a bit of both if possible. First a few hours doing something outside, and then playing some sort of video game together afterwards. That usually works well for everyone. It gives us old folks a chance to dig out some gems too, playing things like Bomberman on the SNES, Golden Eye and Mario Kart on the N64 (Golden Eye has become a real favorite among the kids, Diddy Kong Racing was a disaster), Pokémon battles and Tetris on the Game Boy to mention some.

My older kid loves playing almost any game, I would say that is a trait I really like about him. Doesn't matter if the game is 30 years old and in black and white, he will play the hell out of it if he gets the chance. He is completely open-minded when it comes to video games. My younger one has no patience with video games at all, so if we want to play something together we have to choose something where she can get some sort of special treatment or handicap (Mario Kart 8 Deluxe is good for this, and in Golden Eye she can get +10 health).

In a few weeks we're going hiking for a week and then all we'll have to entertain us with is a deck of cards. We'll see how that goes.

SteamWorld Quest - Hand of Gilgamech

Writing this post my first thought was to start out with something along the lines of "this game might not blow your mind but...".

But... I don't actually want to say that, because I don't actually think it's a fair way to start a text on my feelings on SteamWorld Quest.

So let's begin somewhere else. The SteamWorld games seem to be a franchise in which the core idea, i.e steampunk style robots in a cartoony aesthetic, has been crammed into a variety of game genres. It started out with SteamWorld Tower Defense, which I had never heard of before researching for this post. I, however, started out with SteamWorld Dig, which I loved, and that brought me to check out more games in the series. SteamWorld Quest looked like my cup of tea and suffice to say, it definitely turned out to be.

SteamWorld Quest may disguise itself as a role-playing game, but don't be fooled. This is 95% a deck building game. You move your characters around and you find treasure (almost exclusively more cards) and can buy things (more cards). You can equip yourself with some gear, but other than that the game revolves pretty much entirely around cards. I didn't know this going in, but fortunately I am a closet super-fan of deck builder games. I have tried a fair few, from the regulars like Magic the Gathering (2013 is the best edition) and Hearthstone, to more obscure ones like Card City Nights and Runespell: Overture.

Making a good card game is not easy, but few things can hypnotize me like a well-designed one. Maybe it's the board game nerd in me. SteamWorld Quest dresses all the card playing up in a story that starts out with friends Copernica and Armilly out doing nothing particularly important. They quickly get involved in a much bigger story and joined by a few more heroes as you move along. The story is simple and a reason for all the card battling you're going to do. I am actually happy they put the money, time and effort on the gameplay here because I would've accepted any excuse to get on with my cards.

And the way the card playing is designed is just pure fun - SteamWorld Quest manages to get gameplay that feels both snack-sized and more-ish, it's easy to jump in and difficult to put down. It has no ramp-up time to get into, and the rules are simple to learn yet so much fun to proper dig into.

Combining cards certain ways unleashes combos and each turn is a joy to figure out which cards to play. You can combine cards between characters or try to build chains, it all comes down to what you want to achieve a certain turn. There are buffs, debuffs, weaknesses and resistances to take into account. Between fights it's fun to tinker with your decks and try to optimize combinations, there are many fun and interesting cards to play around with.

Though I rarely got game over in my playthrough on normal difficulty, I rarely felt completely safe either. There isn't a sure-fire setup, but I do recommend that as soon as you find a combination of cards that feels good, you try to keep things fresh by swapping in one of the other characters. The balance of the difficulty is pretty spot on, some times I even wondered if enemies leveled along with me, though I never grinded for levels. You can return to already completed segments of the map, but that also meant re-watching any and all cutscenes so I quickly decided against that and just played onwards.

For better or worse it is difficult to prepare for a match before-hand. Theoretically you could, since you can see your opponents on the screen before you engage with them. This means you could go into your decks and tweak the setup before starting the fight, to avoid fighting fire with fire, literally. Practically this isn't something you're going to do though. There are some foes that have really annoying skills, like despair which prevents healing or bleed which makes you take damage for every action. You might want to equip something to counteract that, and the game throws gear at you that offers protection against or boosting of a lot of different stats.

The game doesn't really provide you with much information around debuffs and what they do, mostly this is not an issue since you can deduce them fairly quickly. I would've loved more information about what the different masks of Orik do however. There are some that I am still not sure of.

None of that takes away from the fun of setting up combos and trying new cards though and it's so easy to slip into the "just one more"-mindset. I pretty much "just-one-more"-myself through this game, and it was a long time since I played a game so hard as I did this. It really speaks to the fun gameplay that it feels fresh and engaging all the way to the end, which I reached in just under 20 hours. I accidentally engaged the final boss without a solid healer and only managed by the skin of my teeth. But that only shows to the strength of the decks that no one character or type of cards is absolutely necessary, but it all comes down to the abovementioned combination and chain building.

The music is another good thing about the game, and the battle themes are even quite banging. Which is good, since you will be hearing them a lot. Apparently the composers (Erik Gudmundson, Pelle Cahndlerby, and Oscar Rydelius) are all from Sweden, which is a bit extra fun for me.

I briefly mentioned the main characters Armilly and Copernica - as mentioned they will be joined by a handful of other heroes before long and each new hero comes with a new deck of cards. They've done an excellent job of keeping each deck distinct from each other, and while I had my favorites I felt they were all useful and fun to play, if you make sure to make them work towards each others strengths and weaknesses. The characters are trope, but lovingly so. Their personalities also fit their decks and I not only enjoyed playing with all of them, I wished for more. It's almost crazy to say, but even after 20 hours I almost felt like the game was too short.

It is fortunate then that the game comes with a generous New Game +, in which you can try the hardest difficulty which not only makes enemies stronger, but also gives them new skills. I tried this for a bit and yeah... I was steamrolled immediately.

If you got this far and only end up remembering this final conclusion I am going to leave you with this: SteamWorld Quest: Hand of Gilgamech is a solid Deck Builder game that makes time fly. It does one thing and it does it excellently. Play it.

Top 5 Eurovision Songs 2025

I haven't done a top 5 list in a while and what better way to get back to it than to celebrate the craziness that is Eurovision. If you're born somewhere in or near Europe, you've probably not been able to miss Eurovision but for everyone else out there here is a short explanation: Every year most European, and some that usually don't count as European, countries compete and celebrate in a singing contest. This has been going on since the 50's and started careers, like ABBA's. The quality of the songs is generally quite low, honestly, when compared to mainstream music. But it often has charm. And some je ne sais quoi.

I think the European countries care about the competition to varying degrees. Some take it very seriously. Sweden is one of those countries (where I am from). The UK is usually considered not very bothered, and for some reason their entry almost always ends up in the bottom ten. Some countries come and go, depending on politics (though the competition is trying very hard to be non-political) and funding.

As someone who grew up in Sweden it has been very hard to avoid Eurovision, and though I have always loved the concept I have honestly not given it much attention most of my life. I never follow the national competition to pick an entry, and only glimpse at the end result to see if there is a song or two worth listening to. Out of 35-40 entries, there are usually only a handful that are any good. But for some reason it has grown on me. The idea that different areas compete in something as joyful and completely subjective as music, I think it is great.

Sweden is sending KAJ with Bara Bada Bastu (Just Doing Sauna) this year. I don't personally think it's very good, but it's caused a bit of an upset for being out of Sweden's comfort-zone. Sweden usually sends pretty predictable entries, and Bara Bada Bastu is at least not that. For one it's a humorous song and it's sung in Swedish which isn't something that has happened in over 20 years I think. I respect the song for that at least.

I usually joke that Eurovision songs all fit in one of three categories;

1. Ballads

2. 90's eurodisco

3. Generic pop (this is where Sweden often falls).

But let's get on with the list. If you want a medley of all the entries this year to make your own mind, Youtube will provide. Obviously this is completely subjective, and my tastes are rhythm-heavy and high energy which is probably going to be reflected on the songs I have chosen.

I've got to start with some honorable mentions though:

Azerbaijan - Mamagama - Run With You: There isn't really much wrong with this song. It's slick and makes me bop my head, this could've been made by someone close to Pharrell Williams. It gets minus for not singing in their own language.

Croatia - Marko Bosnjak - Poison Cake: The song changes up things throughout, rhythms and style and keeps itself interesting and fresh. Minus again for not singing in their native language.

Spain - Melody - ESA DIVA: It was a close call between this one and my number 5 entry. This song starts off a bit slow but has as cool breakdown towards the end and it has been growing on me.

5. POLAND - Justyna Steczkowska - GAJA

Did I mention I like rhythm-heavy and high energy? Well, this is kind of exactly what I mean by that. This sounds a bit like the UK band Juno Reactor that I quite like. And you've got to respect anyone who can sing and dance with that energy (Justyna is over 50).

4. UKRAINE - Ziferblat - Bird of Pray

Ukraine have had a few good songs the last couple of Eurovisions. And Ruslana's "Wild Dances" from 2004 is considered a Eurovision classic. Bird of Pray tells a story and I love the way it meanders back and forth between more forceful and more gentle. It also feels very sincere and from the heart. 

3. ALBANIA - Shkodra Elektronike - Zjerm

Great beat on this one. Songs that give me a glimpse of where they come from, structurally and instrumentally, often fall high on my lists. I find one of the great strengths of Eurovision (and Europe) are all the different cultures that have different ways of seeing and doing things. Albania gives me some of that feeling with this song.

2. GERMANY - Abor & Tynna - Baller

Full disclosure, I am part German. That has never made me like any song from Germany however. No, not even the Satellite one. But finally Germany sends an entry in German! Melodic and rhythmic, it fits the language great. And she has a voice you want to hear more of.

1. AUSTRALIA - Go-Jo - Milkshake Man

Ok so my number one pick is Australia this year. The fact that Australia is even competing in a competition literally called EUROvision is worthy of an explanation. But long story short, Australia have been huge fans of the show for decades, probably more than most European countries. Apparently they get up in the middle of the night over there to watch it. For the anniversary in 2016 they invited Australia to take part and it was such a success they have been invited ever since. They always have good entries, but none that have been my favorites. But this year they have it, the one I think should win Eurovision 2025. It's fun, has a good beat and I could listen to it all the way to Eurovision. 

It'll be interesting to see if any of my favorites make it high on the lists this year, they usually don't. Käärijää with Cha Cha Cha was an exception, and that song definitely should've won over Tattoo.

Saint's Row IV: Re-Elected (2013/2022) - Review

 If you're not around to play a game series from the beginning for whatever reason, after a few years you'll be stuck with the first world problem of trying to figure out where to begin. The internet is shock-full of lists asking "which Castlevania is the best?" and "Which Super Mario game should I start with?". There are a lot of thing to factor in here - the series might have crossed over platforms you don't even have access to anymore. It might have evolved through different genres, meaning you have to figure out which ones suit your tastes. It might be unclear how much the games reference each other, meaning you have to start from the beginning to enjoy later parts more.

I've managed to end up having to make this choice recently with not just one but two games I am currently playing. Taking on the Assassin's Creed series I had over two handful of games to choose from (you can click the link to see how that went). Looking at the Saint's Row series I fortunately had less than half of that to choose from, but for some reason I went with the latest one (not counting the reboot).

What was my reasoning? Maybe it wasn't deeper than simply being the game that was on discount when I was looking to try it out. When investigating the older games (1 and 2) they also looked a little more serious and a lot more ugly than what I was after. So the choice for me was really between 3 and 4 in the end. 4 won out for unclear reasons and here I am, wondering whether I made the right choice. Can I ever really undo it by playing the third instalment afterwards?

Either way, the fourth game (this being the Re-Elected version, which includes all the DLC) has not been a bad experience. And maybe it could be interesting to read what the game is like for someone who has no previous knowledge of the series and judges it on its own merits alone. If you think so, read on.

Trying to explain the story of SRIV is not easy. Right off the bat it was pretty clear that things had been going on in the earlier games and this was a continuation on that, or at least so I think. There is going to be a lot of assumptions from my side moving forward here, assumptions and straight out guesses. But here we go; You play as a character who is the president of the world. But pretty quickly you learn that there isn't much world to preside over. Alien forces have destroyed it and caught you and your posse, the eponymous "Saints", in their mind game of a simulated world. It's unclear who they are, where they come from or what their motivations are, but these things honestly don't matter so much. In all the confusion one thing stands out clear as day - everything is just an excuse to allow you to try out crazy gameplay.

It's a very dark game, with the occasional neon.

And in this regard SRIV delivers. I am not generally a fan of games that make it their main goal to be weird, games like Goat Simulator for instance, which seem to be designed mainly for those special Youtubers who get their money from screaming a lot on screen.

But I do enjoy a game that takes an odd premise and still manages to build a somewhat interesting story around it, a game like Octodad: Dadliest Catch is a good example of this. While SRIV might lack a bit in the story department, in the sense that you get the feeling that everything is just a "free-for-all"-excuse for more mayhem, it does deliver on heart and character. SRIV has a lot of both.

The character controls well, and I would even dare say excellent when comparing it back-to-back to Assassin's Creed: Unity, which I as mentioned played simultaneously. You get super powers that allow you to jump very high, run very fast, throw huge objects in people's faces and run up the side of buildings. And that is just mentioning a tiny fraction of all the skills you can play around with after a handful of hours into the game. The skills you get can be unlocked with currency, you can unlock other attributes with other currency. Some are found on the stages, some are got by completing quests. There is a lot to keep track off, but it manages to stay fairly easy to understand and use.

The map of the virtual city is littered with objects to interact with. I didn't understand the purpose to having fifteen shops where you could alter the look on your rides, buy a new t-shirt or load up on more ammo, especially not after a short while into the game where it becomes easy and quick to get around the city. Convenience, maybe? There also seem to be quests that are specifically designed for multi-player, somehow, I didn't get a chance to try these.

The game is overall never a challenge on normal mode, probably veered more towards having fun than giving you a real challenge. When I died it was mostly to fooling around and not caring, than genuinely trying to solve something. The only time the game made me scratch my head and reload over and over, was during a quest where I had to fight Giant Paul the Giant Soda Can. That guy blasted me with a laser that was essentially a none-dodgeable one-shot, even on normal difficulty.

You can tell that your character and their gang has a long backstory together, a lot of the quests allude to that. I often felt that it would've been fun to have played the quests and scenarios that this game references first, but the quests often hold up gameplay wise on their own, at least enough to be entertaining even if you don't get that extra oumph from fan service and nostalgia.

And there is a lot of whacky shit to do, that's for sure. I love that the game designers have not held back in the brainstorming sessions. Even character creation allows you to create something with pink chrome skin, if you like that sort of thing. In order to interrupt the virtual world that the alien Zin (as they are called) have created you need to break the code like some Neo on crack. You get to hurl your body, literally, against objects, save Santa from Evil Santa, use all kinds of weird weapons and have a gang of Gingerbread Cookies be your sidekicks. I can't emphasize enough that the pitch document for this game probably just had the words "MORE IS MORE" written in big, bold, red letters.

But generally it works, I am entertained. I like the characters, though I barely know them, and I have fun with the insane things that we get to do. Until at some point I can't help but feeling that even this golden treadmill, is still nothing but a treadmill. Am I asking for a sense of direction in all this mayhem? Maybe. There is just so much to do, so many characters to help and so many virtual pedestrians to run over that it actually manages to feel a bit... empty. When I am given these many toys to play with, I end up feeling like none of them are fun in the long run.

I don't want to tell SRIV to get a grip or to calm down. I think SRIV is doing exactly what it should and it is doing it well. But for us mere mortals it gets a bit overwhelming in the long run. SRIV is an all-you-can-eat buffet where after ten minutes of browsing you realize you're really just interested in the baguettes.