Patapon 1+2 Replay review - a PSP classic comes to Nintendo Switch

Metro

17 hours ago

Sony takes the unusual step of releasing new remasters of PSP titles Patapon and Patapon 2 on Switch, as well as PS5, but are they worth such an effort?
Microsoft has been rightly criticised for the lack of clarity around their multiformat plans. To be fair, that appears to be because they're just as unsure about what's going on as everyone else, but now it seems that every major first party Xbox title is going to end up on PlayStation 5 sooner or later. It's impossible to image any major Sony exclusive appearing on Xbox but the same is not necessarily true of the Switch.
Earlier this year, Sony announced that both this and Everybody's Golf Hot Shots will be released simultaneously on PlayStation 5, PC, and… Nintendo Switch. Everybody's Golf is out this September, while Patapon becomes the second major Sony exclusive to make its way to Nintendo's format in recent months.
The peculiarly misconceived Lego Horizon Adventures was exactly as big a flop as everyone predicted and it was easy to imagine it ending up as a one-off. But that's not what's happened. Although exactly what Sony expects to gain from this new remaster, of a pair of increasingly forgotten PSP titles, is uncertain. Clearly it's a test, but a test for more Patapon, more PlayStation games on Switch, or both?
It'd be wrong to imply that the that the circumstances of this release are more interesting than the games themselves, as Patapon and Patapon 2 are both intriguingly strange titles that today would never be published by a major company like Sony. Literally, in the sense that Sony shut down developer Japan Studio several years ago.
The two Patapon games were originally released for the PlayStation Portable (PSP) console in the late 2000s. Patapon is often seen as a sister franchise to LocoRoco, also from Japan Studio, but although they share some similarities in terms of art style there's no connection other than they both used to be PSP exclusives.
If Patapon depicted its fantasy warriors realistically, instead of as cute little eyeball people, it'd be a fairly grim tale of what's implied to be ancient tribes warring against each other and wrecking the local environment – in terms of wildlife and resources such as stone and timber – to feed their war machine.
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It doesn't help that you're essentially cast as the god of the patapons, not just their leader. Although, as has always been the case, the games are let down by a very literal translation of the original Japanese text, that leads to some very strange phraseology and, more importantly, considerable confusion as to what you're supposed to be doing.
Each level is presented as a 2D horizontally-scrolling stage, with your army of patapons marching from left to right. However, they'll only do so if you tap out a rhythm on the face buttons. You start off with a four button beat that means move forward, while another means attack. More are added over time, for different formations and orders, but that is the gist of the game, as you control an increasingly large cohort while attacking monsters, other eyeball-like people, and fixed emplacements.
This all works very well and while it's not terribly deep the novelty of it all is more than enough to keep your interest. The problem is that the structure of the game does its level best to put you off with literally everything it does. Rather than just fighting a linear sequence of battles you also have to gather resources, which requires an outing into one of the previously visited stages.
These forays can be dangerous, if you come across one of the bigger dragon-like monsters, but they're essentially just level grinding, as you're forced to repeat stages again and again, in order to feed your troops and make sure they're kitted out with decent weapons and armour.
Rather than addressing this issue the second game doubles down on it, complicating everything further (Patapon 3, which is not included in this compilation, went even further, to the point where it was almost incomprehensible to anyone other than a series veteran). Patapon 2 is a better game, with more variety, deeper strategy, and better graphics, but at no time during the series' original existence did the developers ever seem to realise its failings.
Patapon 1 and 2 have been remastered before, separately, for the PlayStation 4, but surprisingly that's not what this is, as the original remasters had a lot of problems with control lag and latency. Admittedly, we didn't experience any issues the first time round, but apparently it depended on your TV and sound set-up. We did have some minor issues with this Switch version in docked mode but thankfully there's a new latency option that helps address the problem. More Trending
There are no museum features but there are some small but very useful quality of life improvements, starting with a help button you can press to remind yourself of what the commands are – something the originals somehow didn't have. Even more welcome is three difficulty modes that you can switch between whenever you want. The originals are viciously difficult, especially for the rhythmically challenged, but now they're much more accessible.
The pre-rendered cut scenes are still very grainy (the PSP only had a 4.3 inch screen and a resolution of 480p) but they do look better than the PlayStation 4 version. More importantly, the in-game animation looks fantastic, as if it was made brand new today.
Considering Sony could've easily just re-released the PlayStation 4 remasters, there's a welcome amount of effort that's gone into this compilation. We're still not sure what Sony expects to get out of it all, given the originals are cult favourites at best, but almost two decades later, Patapon is still happily marching to the beat of its own drum.
In Short: A welcome new remaster of two of the PSP's most iconic exclusives and while they're as flawed as ever this is arguably the definitive version of the games.
Pros: The original games are as inventive and enjoyably bizarre as ever, with some very distinctive visuals and sound design. Good quality remaster that adds some important quality of life features.
Cons: The level grinding structure of the originals is as frustrating now as it ever was, as is the awkward script. Still some latency issues in docked mode.
Score: 7/10
Formats: Nintendo Switch (reviewed), PlayStation 5, and PCPrice: £24.99Publisher: Bandai NamcoDeveloper: sAs (originals: Pyramid and Japan Studio)Release Date: 11th July 2025
Age Rating: 7
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