Love it or hate it, when it comes to the world's weirdest action puzzle franchise, there's one thing joystick-jabbers of all stripes can agree on -- it's still your best bet for playing stoned.

That's right. Three years, as many games, and countless head trips after the finger-blistering brainteaser first blew our minds, there's no slowing the psychedelic juggernaut's roll, as Beautiful Katamari definitively proves.

Again challenging players to amass giant balls of crap -- figuratively, that is, with crayons, records, batteries, tires, toy knives and more of all things collectible (human excrement's about the only thing you can't cram together to form ever-more-giant spheres) -- though not much more, we do have to admit the series' kitsch value's beginning to wear a little thin.

Harkening back from a fundamental gameplay standpoint to virtually all of its predecessors, longtime franchise fans won't have trouble getting in the groove. But for those of you unfamiliar with prior outings, here's the scoop in a nutshell. Once again, you're the Prince of All Cosmos, a green, cylindrically-headed sprite tasked with cleaning up after your father, the mega-powerful, but oh-so-vain and air-headed King of All Cosmos. This time though, the old bean's gone and knocked a black hole in the sky during an especially heated game of tennis.

Your goal: Traipsing about Earth, using a sticky ball that attracts more objects as it hurtles over them, replace the stars, moons and satellites that were sucked down through the black hole, thereby repopulating the heavens. Wholly ludicrous and illogical, thankfully the background tale (which you can forget shortly after learning it) is also right on par with the candy-colored presentation and whimsical, if admittedly pointless, hands-on action. Basically, it's just an excuse for you to man both of the Xbox 360 controller's analog sticks and -- now in pastel-hued, but hardly attention-getting high-definition splendor -- roll your collection of bric-a-brac through candy shops, fast food outlets and other everyday settings, acquiring more random junk as you go.

Handling couldn't be simpler, however, as you simply push up on both sticks, pull back on the pair, or alternately move them up or down at the same time to turn, manipulating the ball (aka a 'katamari') around goofy, but pleasingly childish 3-D environments. And really, that's all you need to understand to begin sucking up increasingly larger items, as you start small (sushi, milk cartons, mice, coins) and eventually work your way up to bigger targets (cars, people, buildings and so forth). There's a catch: You'll pretty much have to find a way to grow your katamari to a certain size within a set time limit at every turn, knowing that you'll have to build it by set degrees, since tinier objects must be absorbed before you can start ingesting those of relatively larger magnitude. And, naturally, even for the hyper-caffeinated teens and twenty-somethings the title is squarely aimed at, this is bound to prove a surprisingly challenging task.

On a positive note, the setup works as well as ever, assuming you're one for madcap sprints and bubbly J-pop soundtracks. (Not to mention the ridiculous one-liners your all-powerful papa spouts, e.g. 'We love Uranus!' and senseless strings of text he spits out during loading screens.) Then again, to play devil's advocate, it's also one you've potentially experienced several times before, with little in the way of meaningful twists added since the concept first debuted. Granted, this time around you get to experience the pleasures of the 'Princedom,' a living backdrop/level hub populated with buildings and celestial relatives from which you can access new stages, enjoy collectible gifts, take pictures, and otherwise fart around. And with single-player mode over so swiftly -- expect to be finished with the title in as little as two days -- newfound online battle options do extend replay value, even if co-op play is still limited to two players sitting in the same room, inexplicably controlling the same katamari. (Seriously... confusing as the process is, and as unsatisfying compared with features that let you compete to snag certain items while bumping into buddies and shaking stuff loose from their spheres, why even bother giving gamers the option?)

Nonetheless, additional extras like leaderboards you can access by drifting through the cosmos that let you compare stats worldwide over Xbox Live (and give added incentive to improve your katamari-constructing skills) are hardly awe-inspiring. Four-man head-to-head play over a broadband connection is likewise a welcome bonus, but in all honesty not that huge a boost for the franchise, given a general dearth of further core design improvements. Sure -- if you're a certified OCD case, there are plenty of reasons to go back and retry previously-completed levels, whether it's your smack-talking father's put-downs or the desire to outshine fellow geeks around the globe. But with its incremental gameplay gains and bland visuals (seemingly straight out of the PS2-era, save for minor upscaling), does Beautiful Katamari really look, feel or play like a truly next-generation title, let alone a meaningful leap forward for the franchise? Meh... Not so much. Think of it more as a predictable, relatively nondescript series expansion.

No disrespect intended: If you haven't kitted out a katamari before, or simply aren't a hard-partier and still want to experience the magic of hallucinogens, by all means, give the game a shot. It's fast, it's simple and, of course, it's mostly nonviolent, unless of course you finally lose it and throttle a pal after a carefully-planned collision knocks a versus-mode victory from your grasp at the last possible second. Just be warned: If you can't handle a cheery techno-babble soundtrack; constant barrage of low-fi, modern-art-style weirdness; periodic bouts of flow-interrupting graphical slowdown; and a curiously last-generation aesthetic, it's best to bow out early. A total guilty pleasure (and one optimally experienced in short, 20- to 30-minute spurts), let's be honest: Every brain cell lost here is guaranteed to have disappeared in the dizzyingly frantic interactive equivalent of a 'Yellow Submarine'-style (Google it, young 'un) haze.

Regardless, it's worth reiterating that those who've already enjoyed the series on alternate platforms shouldn't consider it a definitive purchase by any stretch. The real question to ask yourself here is whether you're actually hungering for more of the same, only with a quick-n-dirty new paint job as well as support for Internet-powered antics. At a $40 retail price, that remains a pretty tough call for the average fan to make. Various niggles aside, though, we will say this: Even jaded sorts can't help but acknowledge that Beautiful Katamari's basic formula remains outlandish and engaging as ever. Besides, look at it this way: If you do choose to spend your spare time getting high off the title's infuriatingly addictive charms, well...at least 20 years down the road, it won't mean having to deal with pesky flashbacks.

This review was based on a retail copy of the game provided by the publisher.