The King of All Cosmos has bumped his head and now has amnesia. The Prince and his cousins create RoboKing to temporarily replace the king, but this robotic version goes berserk and destroys all the stars in the Cosmos. To clean up the mess made by RoboKing and restore the king's memory, the prince and his cousins must roll their katamaris and bring colour back to the universe in Katamari Forever for PlayStation 3.
For those unfamiliar with the Katamari series, the basic premise is simple: gamers have to roll a magnet-like ball around an enclosed environment using it to pick things up and gradually increase its size - like a snowball - until it reaches the target size within a given time limit. At first, you can only pick up small things like coins and erasers, but as the ball gradually gets bigger, larger objects can be snowballed into the Katamari, such as buildings and Godzilla-like monsters.
The game features more than 50 playable Cousins (other playable characters) that can be dressed up with a variety of accessories gamers unlock along the way. A new function added to the game is the Prince Hop, which enables gamers to jump with their Katamaris by using the Sixaxis controller. The game also allows players to choose from four different graphics filters that will change the look of the environments to wood block, pencil sketch, cel-shaded and the classic game look. A new game-play function that is possible under certain conditions enables the Katamari to suck in nearby objects.
The Katamari series of games is fun and this instalment is no disappointment on that front. But, unfortunately, Bandai Namco Games has done literally nothing to improve upon the formula - there's nothing new here. There are only three new levels, with the rest being re-cycled content from the previous games. The title of Katamari Forever should really be, 'Katamari: Greatest Hits'.
Overall this will only appeal to fans who want to replay the old levels in full 1080p high-definition resolution. If you're going to spend HK$380 on a game, there are better games out there.