Um Jammer Lammy Review

Not long after PaRappa the Rapper (PtR) was released, a pseudo-sequel by the name of Um Jammer Lammy (UJL) came out for the PlayStation. Um Jammer Lammy stars a new character, a female teenage lamb-person known as Lammy. The goal of this game is the same as PaRappa: the player must accurately play along to lines sung by each stage’s “leader” in order to pass the stage and move on.

Lammy is a very shy and awkward girl in person, but behind her guitar, she is confident and doesn’t mind playing to a crowd. Lammy wakes up and discovers that she only has 15 minutes before her gig starts, and has to hurry so that she doesn’t miss it. As luck would have it, everything in the fucking world is out to stop her from making it in time, and Lammy must use her guitar in order to overcome her low confidence and rock her way to the gig.

The game is told through cute, cartoonish cutscenes just like PaRappa that are once again illustrated by Rodney Greenblat. The animation is even smoother than PaRappa the Rapper, however the plot is much worse. I seriously think the story writers of this game were on LSD, while the animators were on cocaine. The situations Lammy gets in are just so fucking absurd, the animation so sporadic and random, that I struggle to put it into words.

Unless you’ve played this game, you don’t understand how insane it is. There’s a scene in this game where Lammy eats a bunch of pizza and gets a big stomach because of it. A caterpillar nurse mistakes her for being pregnant and drags her to a hospital to give birth, telling her that they’re having an “after-school sale” (the fuck?). Upon discovering that Lammy is not pregnant, the caterpillar then yells at Lammy that she must make up for it by putting the babies to sleep. Also, the caterpillar has some kind of bowel problem and constantly spits shit up all over Lammy.

There’s another part of the game where Lammy falls out of an airplane and straight into Hell (replaced by a tropical island in the US version, because only American kids can’t handle a harmless cartoon variation of Hell, apparently) and has to play in front of a bunch of demon people. I kid you not. If anything, I’m making the story make too much sense by explaining it. It’s not even funny; it’s just extremely stupid, weird, and it feels like my brain is being molested.

For a general overview on how Um Jammer Lammy is played, check out my PaRappa review, as it’s pretty much the same thing. Lammy doesn’t sing, instead playing guitar riffs in response to her “mentor’s” singing. You have to press the right buttons in the command prompt in order to get a Good ranking and pass the stage.

One huge improvement UJL has over PtR is how the command lines scroll as you pass them, instead of in PtR where they only change after they’re complete. This makes it way easier to see what is up ahead, not only making your timing more consistent, but also making freestyling less frustrating.

Freestyling is done differently in this game, as well. There are no stars anymore, and the player has to properly fill dead space (where there are no button icons) by improvising and pressing the right buttons. How this is done, I basically have no idea. One time I got frustrated and mashed buttons, which gave me a shitload of points after for freestyling. Once I figured that out, it made the versus battles a breeze.

Not only is UtL one stage longer than PtR (due to a tutorial stage), but it has substantially more replay value. There’s the main stages, of course, but on the stage select screen, there are also a variety of other stages to choose from. There’s the co-op mode, where Lammy plays in tandem with her rival, Rammy. This mode is much easier than the standard single player mode, making it good for practicing. If you have a friend, they can play as Rammy in a co-op fashion.

In contrast is versus mode, where you compete with Rammy to see who has the most points by the end of a song, determined by how well each player matches the inputs and freestyles. Each stage has three levels of difficulty, and you can play against a friend or the AI. After beating the solo main game, you can play remixed versions of the stages as PaRappa, who has his own mode and storyline (though the cutscenes are much shorter). Lastly, there’s the co-op stages which pair PaRappa up with Lammy, and the versus mode where you’re Lammy up against PaRappa. You can only play as PaRappa when he’s solo, but it’s still a nice touch.

It should be obvious by now that Um Jammer Lammy has PaRappa the Rapper beat on content and game mechanics. But the game falls very short on the music, which is obviously an essential part of a rhythm game. To be honest, I thought the music of Um Jammer Lammy was terrible. The songs aren’t catchy at all, the lyrics are complete nonsense—not in PaRappa‘s silly, quirky way, but in a “we’re really desperate to fill up space” way. It seems like they weren’t even trying.

It blows my mind how bad the music is compared to PaRappa—or anything, really. They just could not write a decent song for this game. The best song in this game by far is the one sang over the credits, and you never play it anywhere in the game. What the hell? I’d also like to note that NanaOn-Sha released a promotional album of original songs from the game performed by MilkCan (Lammy’s in-universe band) titled Make It Sweet. I’m like one of 10 people to have ever listened to the album apparently, and it was pretty cute. Worth it just for the credits song, “Keep Your Head Up!!”

Personally, I find Um Jammer Lammy to be more fun than PaRappa, as I kept coming back for the bonus content. PaRappa can’t even touch Um Jammer Lammy for replay value, but because the music and story are far better, PaRappa the Rapper is a more impactful experience. I still recommend Um Jammer Lammy, but more so for the addictive gameplay. Too bad about that, really, but it’s still pretty fun. Also, the game’s name is pretty terrible. The “Um” is because Lammy nervously stutters in conversation. Har har.