All of us here at WayIPlay are big fans of Katamari Damacy and its beautiful sequel. Over the weekend, I collected the last of the Prince of Cosmos’ cousins in said sequel, and then completed the cousin-collecting bonus stage, effectively “winning” the game again. This in turn unlocked the infamous “Million Roses” challenge.

For those not in the know, the million roses challenge involves playing levels in which the only things you can roll up are individual roses and bunches of 10. Play is untimed, and whenever you want to stop, your progress is recorded so you can come back later to work towards the ultimate goal of collecting one million of the damned things.

This level serves as a tough lesson in orders of magnitude the likes of which the average person never has reason to learn. I’ll put it this way: I played for about a half-hour, and rolled up 10,000 roses. At that point, I am only one percent finished. So I would have to do that 99 more times, or approximately 49.5 hours(!) to reach the goal. That’s longer than it reportedly takes to complete all the required missions in Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas.

As it is, I am satisfied with We Love Katamari without collecting a million goddamned roses. I have one present left, and a host of stages I could refine by unlocking the shooting star reward for quick completion. And to be able to roll up the King of Cosmos himself in the “Make a Star 5″ level would be infinitely more rewarding than the roses ever could.

All that aside, getting the last cousin allows me to move on to my next video gaming task: finishing Ico. Once I do that, then I’m allowing myself to start Shadow of the Colossus.

Where San Andreas, The Minish Cap and Advance Wars DS fit into this plan, I haven’t the foggiest idea.