Originally developed in a partnership between Sony’s Japan Studio and developer Pyramid, Patapon is an action-adventure game with rhythm-based commands. The concept revolves around guiding a group of small creatures, the eponymous Patapon, through stages filled with challenges.

Walking, attacking enemies, defending or any other move you wish for the small ones to use demands the input of specific “songs” composed of four beats. It’s necessary to press the specific buttons corresponding to each sound (Pata, Pon, Chaka and Don in the right order and at a satisfactory timing). While the games are lenient with timing, rushing the inputs or being too slow will invalidate the command.

Once the player does it correctly, the Patapon will respond by singing along with the same verses of the input while doing the designated action. It’s necessary to wait until they’re finished with the song before doing the next command.

By keeping up with the rhythm consecutively, players build up combos and may enter Fever Mode. During this state, the Patapons become stronger and more resilient, making this effect especially helpful when facing strong enemies.

Patapon’s visuals are stylistically simplistic so that players can focus on the action and the rhythm, with lines on the borders of the screen as a subtle clue to when each beat strikes. Meanwhile, the soundtrack has a tribal tone, filled with percussion and voices that are a thoughtful display of the context of the story and characters.

Building Your Team

A major part of Patapon is choosing which allies to use, as there are various different types of little creatures. There are those that use bows to fight from a wide distance and others which may be better suited to the frontlines, like the Tatepon, which use shields and may drastically reduce damage when the team is in a defensive command.

The Patapon army is composed of three groups of up to six units each. Those smaller squads are strictly tied to a specific weapon type so players need to keep that in mind when coming up with strategies for army composition. You can also equip them with different weapons and items that affect their strength in various ways.

On this subject, Patapon 2 brings a significant element to the table: the Evolution Map. Thanks to it, players can create special units called Rarepons with ease and individually plan the best traits for every unit. While the first game also allows for the creation of special units by using better materials, this menu allows for an expansive search for better traits in a much more user-friendly fashion.

Another thing the game introduces is a Hero unit, which can use special skills when the player hits the buttons with perfect timing. This ally can be helpful and change the tides in hard battles, rewarding players much more for learning the rhythm.

There are other additions, like the Paragate (previously known as Patagate), which has four Hero units representing different players. These limited-time missions were originally meant for multiplayer, but this feature is only available on Switch for Replay. Instead, on PC and PS5, we can only use Komupon, which are CPU-controlled Hero allies, to play these stages.

The New Edition

To bring the two games to new audiences, Replay adds tweaks to improve the quality of life. For instance, there’s a Help button during stages so players can see a list of commands on the bottom area of the screen, which can be especially helpful when starting or when coming back after a long time without playing.

Another added element is the possibility to skip specific videos. Unfortunately, this is not as helpful as it could be, as there are various sluggish text sequences that the player can’t do anything about and has to wait for it to play out.

There’s also an input timing setting for players to fix potential lag issues, a tips album for both games that are unlocked as you continue playing, difficulty options for the first game and other adjustments. All of these additions are helpful and make the experience comfortable for newcomers, though they don’t bring any major changes to the package.

There was never any need to go beyond this, though. Patapon’s concept was innovative back in the day and still remains unique and compelling to this day. As a game, there’s nothing quite like it and having the chance to play those classic titles once again on modern systems is an incredible opportunity.

There was never any need to go beyond this, though. Patapon’s concept was innovative back in the day and still remains unique and compelling to this day.

It’s no wonder that some of the creative staff behind it still wants to explore what can be done with this base with the indie title Ratatan, and that Sony hasn’t really been able to do anything new with the IP ever since Japan Studio was disbanded. It’s a shame, however, that the package doesn’t include Patapon 3 as well, which would turn this into the entire series in one place.

Closing Comments:

Patapon 1+2 Replay brings back a classic Sony IP to modern devices, even allowing it to reach audiences beyond PlayStation. It’s just as good a time to enjoy these two games as it ever was, as they prove unique and capable of standing against the trying passage of time.