Patapon announced for Feb. 28th in North America

Exciting news for PSP owners, the game Patapon has been confirmed for a February release here in North America. A quirky puzzle adventure game created by Sony, this game promises to be unlike anything seen in the puzzle or rhythm genre before it. The premise of Patapon is simple, you are a god the “Patapon” have been waiting for to lead them back to their homeland, you do this by sending them commands through drum beats. The Patapon themselves are basically an eyeball with legs and arms, they very much resemble the Unown from the Pokemon series.

The Patapon apparently only understand commands issued through drum beats, and thusly your PSP becomes a drum, how you ask? The Square button becomes the word and drum rhythm “Pata” and the circle button becomes “Pon”. With just these two buttons you begin the game, throughout the first levels there is a 4/4 beat constantly playing, you must play in rhythm with the beat to issue the commands. So “Pata-Pata-Pata-Pon” means forward march or go back depending on which command you just issued, and “Pon-Pon-Pata-Pon” means attack. It may sound confusing at first, but after issuing commands a couple times they stick a lot faster than you’d imagine.

To advance in the game you must gather more Patapon to build an army, and use strategy to topple some of the game’s bosses which are massive compared to the tiny Patapon. There is also an element of RPG gameplay in which you can organize your army and provide the different warrior types with different equipment items. As you get better and better you are rewarded for keeping the beat going and issuing commands right after the other, allowing you to build up your combo until you get “fever” status which boots your Patapon’s power. Eventually you will be using all four of the PSP’s buttons to issue commands and going from 4/4 beats into more complicated ones. This game definitely looks to be an unforeseen hit for Sony, with addicting gameplay and an amazing price of $19.99 be sure to look out for Patapon in shops on February 28th.