Chaos in the Cosmos: The Play of Contradictions in the Music of Katamari Damacy

Abstract

At first glance, Katamari Damacy (Namco, 2004) is a simple and cheery video game. Yet the game is full of thematic complexities and complications, which raise a number of ethical and aesthetic problems, including the relationships between childhood and terror, father and son, and digital and analog; furthermore, the complexities governing each of these pairs are cleverly underscored by the game's music.

The article traces a musical theme that serves as the game's idée fixe which is transformed in the music across several of the game's levels. Because the music has the potential to affect player performance, even non-diegetic, non-dynamic video game music can serve profoundly different functions than non-diegetic film music.