Katamari Damacy’s prototype was initially made on the GameCube
The Katamari Damacy series started way back in 2004. For the first time, the franchise is appearing on a Nintendo console with Katamari Damacy Reroll in December. Interestingly, the IP has some ties to Nintendo platforms in its earliest days.
As revealed in a new book from L. E. Hall due out this week, the prototype for Katamari Damacy was developed on the GameCube. This was due to “Nintendo’s developer-friendly outreach and the released specs for the PS2 indicating it would be a difficult path for even experienced game developers”. Even though creator Keita Takahashi wanted it on the PlayStation 2, Katamari Damacy may not have happened without the GameCube.
Takahashi said:
“Our engineer didn’t have much expertise, and neither did I, and the schedule was tight. So for these reasons we picked the Nintendo GameCube platform for prototyping. I wanted to use the PS2 controller though.”
