LittleBigPlanet [PS3]

[Ish]

Chain - I checked out your volcano level last night. Nice. How long did it take you?

[Tig]

new ps3 owner here with nothing to play but LBP.

not that I'll want to play anything else for a while. possibly ever.


psn name name "Tig-W"

[Matt]

Chain - I checked out your volcano level last night. Nice. How long did it take you?

Thanks

Not sure how long it took off the top of my head, quite some time though!

[Ish]

I can believe it. I've started making my first "proper" level - good fun but takes time.

The more I play this the more the art direction astounds me. I'd say its beyond reproach but I'm sure there's someone out there got a bone to pick with it

[Matt]

It's very easy to be cynical, and some people round these parts love nothing more than being cynical. This isn't helped by the game being a PS3 exclusive.

As I said when the demo first appeared, anyone not enjoying this is Dead Inside. Even if you don't like the core platform element, there's so much to appreciate in this; the presentation is top notch (I said Truly Next Gen in my original post I believe) and the characterisation is sublime

I really need to play this more!

[TheForce]

played yesterday for the first time some users created levels, my god some are totally amazing , I remember an Indiana jones style, one which starts with an shark and you go underwater and one made like DeadSpace (and many more) !! some people have amazing skills (and free time I guess) ... haven't tried to create something for myself but knowing myself I don't think I have the patience for it

really loving this game, it's like platform heaven and the looks are nothing short of amazing !

[Ish]

Spent some time this morning going through random user generated stuff. Came across a level called Roll Over Beethoven. Well I say level. Its a piano. You can run along it to play it or pull a switch and sponges descend from the ceiling on rods and play a famous beethoven piece.

Spectacular.

Also very enjoyable is a level called Spring Time. Standard platforming level but just very very well done.

I'm truly in awe of what people are creating.

Sometimes LBP doesn't work - when its too fiddly. But when it does work man alive its one of the most joyous videogame experiences I can remember. I'm grinning like an idiot after playing it.

[Jashin]

Look for levels by Jaeyden and geosautus, both really good authors. Distress In Ocean and Anti Color are also brilliant, amonst many others.

[Tig]

for me, this is probably the only title of 2008 which has lived up to the hype.

amazing stuff.

[Ish]

Incredible isn't it!

I've spent a few hours today going through more and more user created stuff. The variety and quality is astounding - some of the stuff is already surpassing Media Molecules own IMO, bet they're chuffed to bits to see that.

I love the way people are sharing too. I've picked up some incredible community created objects for use in my own levels.

Wow, wow, a thousand times wow.

So yeah. I'm kind of blown away by this one

I really hope the magazines revisit this one in a couple of months time, I think its only now starting to really bloom and at this rate its only going to get better.

[Matt]

I really hope the magazines revisit this one in a couple of months time, I think its only now starting to really bloom and at this rate its only going to get better.

I too hope it gets prolonged media attention. It will be interesting to see where this game, and the community, are at in 6 months time. Console gamers are more fickle than PC games in my experience, and a large portion jump week to week to the Next Big Thing. Some games keep a loyal fanbase (Halo, Gears, SOCOM) long after the populist surge, and it would be great if this game went that way. Given it's not a competitive title (as such), I am intrigued to see how many "non creative" players will still be playing in the future.

Creatively, the game could last a long long time; no doubt many designers will be pushing the engine in 4, 5 years time.

[merf]

this has been the game of xmas for me and my son, playing thru tons and tons of user levels.

I suspect the media went big early on the review scores for this and have either been very insightful of lucky as for me the content now really justifies the hype.

yes its still a slightly shoddy platformer but brings so much else to the table I forget that (which seems odd for a platform game)

I'm really looking forward to see what develops on this as think there will be a core of people chucking out top notch levels for quite a while.

[Darwock]

I don't think this has been posted yet.. pretty interesting stuff...

The copyright infringement battles that have been raging over LittleBigPlanet just took an interesting new turn. We’ve all heard about Media Molecule’s rather ruthless methods in making sure that none of LBP’s user created, publicly distributed levels have a motif that represents or imitates an existing IP.

However, according to an interview IGN conducted with the founders of Media Molecule, not every company wants levels based on their IPs to be erased. Some are beginning to realize that there are potential benefits to having their property publicized and enshrined in a popular game.

"But then there’s been these two mad positives; one was the high quality of the levels, including the infringing ones," said Alex Evans, co-founder and CEO of Media Molecule. "The other point is the number of IP owners who came up to us and said please whitelist us – we’ll never ever ask you to pull infringing stuff. I can’t say who that is, but those two things really shocked me, I think it shocked [the IP holders], who were like, hang on, my IP’s being represented and it’s being represented really well."

Clearly some companies have decided not to act rashly in pulling their content from the LittleBigPlanet servers. Some are actually seeing a benefit in it. Kareem Ettouney, who was also interviewed in the piece said that he believes keeping these levels available is important not just for business purposes and advertising, but also for the purpose of creating an exchange of creative thought.

"The numbers are amazing, and we’ve got a system so that when IP holders get upset about anything we address it, but one thing about copyrights and IPS, there’s a dark side to it but there’s a completely awesome side to it," said Ettouney. "It’s like hip hop being completely about refactoring, and about classic art refactoring ancient art. And there’s an inevitable sort of relationship between creative minds that one must never try to kill."

Hopefully, in the future we’ll see more companies relaxing a bit when it comes to being emulated by LittleBigPlanet users. Some have obviously seen potential benefit to the process, and as Ettouney said, the more important issue comes when making sure that we are allowing ourselves a flow of ideas between artists.

As far as my own progress goes I've nailed all the MGS achievements now with the exception of publishing a level using the paintinator - I want to make sure I do a good one so it might take a while to get back to 100%. I'm working on a 2 player thing where peole shoot at each other's targets but without the benefit of proper testing it might not actually be any fun to play.

Oh yeah, another point is that this is now in 3rd position on the sales charts in Japanese stores (at least based on today's window shopping). It might actually be starting to gain momentum here!

[Matt]

The new filtering / search function is pretty much a revelation. Rather than a self-perpetuating Most Played list on the first Planet, you can now get to some really stunning maps. It's amazing what's out there, makes my little effort look like it was put together in 5 minutes!

A few mates are edging towards PS3 purchases on the back playing this, Wipeout HD, and Motorstorm 3. I need to give LBP some of my limited online time....

[doodledude]

Finally completed the single player story the other day, not done any of the 3 or 4 player sections yet, so if anyone needs or wants to do these again let me know.

The new search facility in the community levels is fantastic, although it was a fairly obvious omission even from the beta, so it should have been in from launch. Having said that I played a couple of great levels which I'd not heard of before which were brilliant, and is making my level creation attempt look pathetic!