Katamari Damacy is a third-person puzzle-action video game that was published and developed by Namco for the PlayStation 2 in 2004. The music in the game was widely hailed as imaginative and original, and was considered one of its top selling points. Its eclectic composition featured elements of traditional electronic video game music, as well as heavy jazz and samba influences. The tracks were composed by multiple composers, with Yū Miyake composing the most at seven and acting as the sound director; other composers for the game were Asuka Sakai, Akitaka Tohyama, Yoshihito Yano, Yuri Misumi, and Hideki Tobeta. Many of the tracks feature vocals from popular J-pop singers such as Yui Asaka and anime voice actors such as Nobue Matsubara and Ado Mizumori.[1] Yū Miyake has stated that they chose the artists by looking for "Japanese singers who were well-known in Japan but nobody had heard from in awhile [sic] for whatever reason".[2] Miyake wanted to use vocal songs because he felt that they were necessary "to make music that only Katamari Damacy could do, really fun music".[3] He has said that game director Keita Takahashi did not give detailed directions on the sound design of the game, allowing Miyake and his team to instead create whatever they felt would fit best.[4]