Katamari Damacy Rolls On With Its First New Game In 8 Years

After almost a decade, Katamari is back with Katamari Damacy Rolling Live, which launches exclusively on Apple Arcade. Five other games are joining Katamari starting April 3: Space Invaders Infinity Gene Evolve, Puffies, Atari's RollerCoaster Tycoon Classic+, The Game of Life 2+, and Sesame Street Mecha Builders+. All games are free of ads and in-app purchases.

Like other installments of the franchise, Katamari Damacy Rolling Live has players roll the Katamari as ordered by the King of All Cosmos to gather objects in a giant, chaotic ball to fill the sky with stars. This time around, it incorporates a "streaming" aspect.

Now, players have to energize the king's "livestream" by rolling their Katamari to create stars once more. As the game goes on, in-game fans appear in the "comment section," and the longer they play, the larger their audience grows. Players advance the game by completing the king’s challenges and boosting their subscriber count.

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After a moderate success in Japan, the Katamari Damacy series became a cult classic and one of the top-rated games back in 2004. The sequels We Love Katamari and Me And My Katamari were released a year later, on the PlayStation 2 and PlayStation Portable, respectively.

The last entry in the franchise was Katamari Damacy Reroll, a remake of the 2004 classic. Originally released for the Nintendo Switch in late 2018, the game eventually made its way to PlayStation and Xbox in 2020.