Ratatan hands-on preview — Difficult, yet satisfying!

From the makers of Patapon comes the newest game from Ratata Arts, Ratatan! While I had not played Patapon, I am a drummer by trade, and so I was asked to take a look at the new Ratatan game and see what I thought about it. So this is coming from someone who understands rhythm but is new to this style of gameplay. With that little caveat, let’s jump into this musically wonderful world of Ratatan.

Rat-a-rat-a-ra-ta-tan! 

We jumped straight into combat, which seems to be a choice for this game to have more combat focus than Patapon. It was pretty difficult for me when I first started to figure out what to do with my little band of soldiers as I led them into a war I had no idea why I was fighting. We fought anyway, because that’s the plot. So off we went to war. The opening level was in 4/4 time, so my brain knew where the beat hits needed to go and for the most part, was correct with the screen. I did feel it needed to be calibrated to the TV a bit more, but the developers mentioned we’ll have the ability to calibrate to our screens when we play at home. 

The closer you get to hitting the beats, the better attack, defense, etc you do and the better you keep everyone together. So keeping the beat stays important throughout the entire level. 

I marched my troops forward, hoping my main attack abilities and tech abilities would lay the groundwork to victory, however, I quickly realized how necessary blocking is in between attacks. So after I died once, I talked with the team and I started using attack, block, tech, block, tech, block, etc. This allowed me to take less damage as I was prepping for the next attack we’d do. 

There were also powerups to collect as you move forward in each level and candies to gather in order to upgrade things at the main hub, which we didn’t do during my preview. 

I learned quickly that this game is not just about attack and defend, but about placement of your playable character, placement of that character to a boss or castle tower, and placement of your little soldiers. This makes for a steep learning curve for some, but I’d guess if you know Patapon, you’ll have an easier time with that aspect. 

The best boss I fought was a giant crab-like creature who shot beams at me that I needed to try and block with my soldiers and avoid with my character. This guy took me two tries, but I got there in the end by using a very methodical approach of attack, block, tech, block, block, attack, etc. It was a lot of fun figuring out what worked best for me and felt satisfying getting the win by the end. 

Dying never felt cheap, it was deserved, but the difficulty can be extremely hard for those newer to the franchise. So make sure to do every tutorial you can!

After playing two levels and beating two bosses, our demo ended. As I’ve mentioned, the learning curve can be high for those who aren’t familiar with the franchise, but as long as you keep that foot tapping, you have a chance. 

You can play the demo now with early access coming July 25th. Coming to PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X/S, Nintendo Switch, and PC via Steam.