It's actually called Kula World in UK/Europe while in the US it's called Roll Away, I do remember playing the demo for this quite well when I was younger but finding a copy of the game wasn't easy to find either brand new or used at a good price; but luckily in 2007 this was released on PSN at a small price of £3.99. I luckily managed to find a copy of the game from a local market on a Sunday afternoon.
Kula World is more of a puzzle game than a platforming game you control a beach using the directional pad or using the left analog stick. This was the first games to make use of the DualShock vibration function of the PlayStation controllers, which induces the feel of the ground breaking, the feeling of the Kula ball about to burst, or the shock of getting suddenly captured or spiked. You'll have an hourglass on the top of the screen telling you how much time you have left in order to complete the level, in order to complete the level you'll need a key to unlock to the next level. You can earn bonus points for collecting fruit if you collect all five fruits in various levels you'll unlock a Bonus level which requires you activate all the cubes on all platforms by rolling over them. Later levels will get harder and challenging making you to think more and finding an easier to complete the level you'll have obstacles like spikes block your way but you can press the X button to jump over them, the more points you lose it will be game over if you are not too careful.
Some levels you'll need to jump over across other parts of the structure level to get the key or fruit, Kula World does involves making ingenious use of the various types of platforms and surrounding objects from moving platforms and transporters to bouncing platforms and jumping pills which looks messed up when picking up the pills. The 3D structure is really impressive to look at a PS1 title that was released in 1998 feels like this could have been a really good launch title for the PS1 if the game was released earlier. The 3D visuals and effects look amazing to look when it comes to gameplay which is a shame we haven't seen many games later in the years that could pull something off like Kula World.
You can save your progress but however this feels more like an arcade game than a puzzle-platform game, you play two player in time trial mode called Copycat. In the time trial you take turns to determine who can complete each stage in the quickest time possible. This does feel like some kind of memory tester but it can be fun and addicting at the same time. If one player is starting off making two moves, and the next player then copies those moves and adds two of their own. The first player which can either be you or your friend then has to copy all of the moves so far and add two more moves at the end. This continues until one of you makes a mistake, after which the opponent is awarded a point ad pretty much win the game.
For any who is a fan of playing games on the PlayStation I would recommend this game if you like puzzles and a challenge including frustration it can be hard to put this game down. Its strong level design makes this game one of those titles that will still be talked about in the many years to come.