Understanding the language is the problem when it comes to using imported Japanese software. One can usually make out the odd word in French or German, but with Japanese and it’s three alphabets it’s a tad difficult. Luckily, we can go to NTSC-UK for a gamer’s guide to Japanese. Luckily, it’s not needed for Katamari Damacy.

The plot of Katamari Damacy probably confuses the Japanese let alone the monolingual Nige. As far as I can make out, the King of Space has gone out, got drunk and lost all the stars in the sky and it’s up to you, his son, to build new stars to replace them – by rolling a ball around on the earth gathering up, well, everything.

You start off by controlling a sticky ball just a few centimetres in diameter. As you roll it around the top of a dining table, small objects like pins and buttons will cling onto it. As they do, the ball gradually increases in size. Each level generally tasks you with reaching a certain size within a certain time limit. During the game you move out of the dining room and tower above the streets themselves, tugging hot-air balloons out of the sky and yanking football stadiums clear of their foundations.

The world you’re rolling around is designed so that you can move into different areas to  find a way to increase size quickly. For example, at a certain size you can escape out of a garden and roll down a hill into town, where you can pick up animals, people and vehicles, but once you reach a certain point you’re much too large to get back into the garden and pick up the smaller objects you missed. It’s a good balance and despite splitting the game into stages, the developer has somehow managed to maintain the sense of growth and an attachment between locations.

Katamari Damacy is available now in Japanese NTSC format. A Western release is penned in for September 2004.