Noby Noby Boy: Takahashi’s Digital Playground

By Spencer . February 19, 2009 . 11:27pm

After Katamari Damacy became a hit creator Keita Takahashi said he was interested in making playgrounds for kids. Noby Noby Boy is Takahashi’s digital playground.

The game has no levels to beat. You control the BOY in randomly generated rooms and interact with the world. Loop the BOY inside donut shaped clouds, knock boxes into the abyss only to watch them fall from the sky, eat knights, and digest… your own tail. While you’re doing whatever it is your doing animals and the curious inhabitants might ride on you. Eating things makes the BOY grow, which similar to a massive Katamari ball is harder to control. However, this game isn’t Snakamari Damacy. It’s up to the player to use his or her imagination to make a scenarios or goals other than collecting trophies.

Well, there is a common goal in Noby Noby Boy. The game keeps track of how far your BOY stretches if you report to GIRL. See, she’s trying to get to loop around the solar system starting with the moon and it’s going to take the cumulative playing power of everyone to get her there. Once GIRL gets to the moon everyone around the world who purchased Noby Noby Boy will have new areas to play in. It’s hard to say what these are or if there are more surprises in store because we’re not there yet. What we have now include town, forest, and desert areas. Only Namco Bandai knows what surprises the moon and other planets will bring.

Complete freedom is a nice twist and because of it Noby Noby Boy is a great virtual toy. It seems like there is still much to be discovered and or discussed since figuring Noby Noby Boy out is trial and error. Some things I messed around with are entangling the trees, blasting things out of BOY’s butt to see how far I can shoot them, and morphing the people by eating them.

What have you done with your Noby Noby Boy?

TAGS: Highlight, Namco Bandai, Noby Noby Boy, Playstation 3, Playtests

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Nekobo

I only got to play it for half an hour and I had no idea what I was doing.

Community effort to unlock new content...what a rad concept. Hopefully the that new content (and future DLC?) is free, but knowing Scamco's history, I'm not too hopeful.

Spencer

I think the planet collecting quest is going to be free DLC, but Namco Bandai is working other DLC that you'll probably have to pay for. In this case that's OK since Noby Noby Boy was only $5. I'd gladly pay another $5 for some kind of crazy obstacle course.

Mister 庭

Im like 200m long already.. ... ...... ................
WHAT THE HECK IM SUPPOSED TO DO!?

Spencer

Do whatever you enjoy. The game doesn't have like a "goal", but please try to grow your BOY so we can get to the moon.

vicviper42

Of course, Takahashi also said he'd abandon the video game industry to design his playgrounds. He clearly has not.

SpoonerismsRock

Mister...

Just sit back, relax and let your curiosity play the game for you :D

Im off now,to shite out a train of cats into deep space!

Phil

I somehow managed to make my Boy's rear end about six times the size of his front end. It's not obvious when he stretches, but when all the segments are gone, he looks really goofy.

Chow

It took me the longest time to realize I was supposed to report to Mr. Sun in order for my length to count toward the community effort.

sNsKid

That BOY can jump to sky all the way out of this world.

Roto13

I discovered today that if I eat a ton of stuff and concentrate it towards my butt and hold it in for a while, I can make my butt explode.

Then I played some Noby Noby Boy.

Aoshi00

lol, after reading all the comments and watching those wacky videos, I still hesitate in getting the game even though it only costs as much as a Subway sandwich. The BOY just seems so perverted..

Chow

Boy's butt segment fell off at one point, but I was zoomed pretty far out at the time, so I thought he gave birth. I only noticed it because the camera was following it as it was falling into the abyss, so I was like "is that a baby Nobi Boy?". When it reappeared, I ate it and restored my butt.