GCG Feature: 'Katamari Damacy – A Critique: Part One'

Author: by Beth A.

In part one of a three-part series on Keita Takahashi's whimsical, wonderful Katamari Damacy on sister site Game Career Guide, Vancouver Film School student Ryan Stancl talks about critical approaches to the game, firstly using Bibliographical and New Critical forms of analysis. Stancl begins his argument for game criticism as follows: "Many people claim to be video game critics. Hardly any are. They are video game reviewers. There is a clear distinction between a review of a work – a movie, a book, a piece of art, or even a video game – and a critique of one. Movies, literary works, and pieces of art all have critiques written about them all of the time, so why not video games? It may have to do with the fact that a lot of people still view video games as for children, that games don’t really have anything to say, any depth to them. But whatever the reason (I’m not exploring that issue here), video games are made by a team of people, and each of those individuals wants to leave their mark in some way or another. With so many people coming together to create one thing, how can there not be layers, hidden meanings, subtext behind the work?" You can now read the full Game Career Guide feature for insights on biographical and new critical forms of analysis on Katamari Damacy (no registration required, please feel free to link to this column from external websites).