Is it just me or does this look way cooler than it has any right to be??

[gumby_trucker]

I'm waiting for some more in-depth reviews before calling final judgement, personally. According to comments on the IGN review the game is deeper than it seems at first, with additional modes of play being unlocked as you progress.
The reviewer did commend the open world elements, saying that traversing the island doesn't get old, the only bad thing she had to say about them were the lack of NPC interactions, so assuming the majority of mini-games are fun this still sounds like a good game to me.

Online was quietly canceled, just as I suspected (I'll update the OP later today when I get to a decent computer), but I don't think the IGN score should be seen as alarmingly low for this kind of game when both Wii Sports and Resort got similar scores from the site (7.5 and 7.7 respectively)

Sterling's review on DToid is admittedly rather scathing, but he says he didn't choose to review the game either. According to others I guess there is no getting around the fact that the controls to some of the games could have been better, and that the dead-eyed NPCs are a bit of a downer... Hopefully more information about the game's more positive sides is forthcoming.

OTOH it's possible Namdai will release a slightly upgraded version with some tweaks and enhancements later down the line, like they did with We Ski and Snowboard

but all in all I am beginning to understand what Keita Takahashi (Katamari creator) meant when he called the company "so so"... it seems they don't go the extra mile required to fulfill their games' true potential.