LittleBigPlanet was one of the most anticipated games of 2008. First debuting at GDC 2007 it has caught the attention of the industry and has been heralded as the "killer app" for the PS3, but is it worth that claim?
LittleBigPlanet is a do-it-yourself platformer. Typical actions such as jumping and moving left the right is seen, but is broken up by the ability to grab certain objects. There are three different planes of movement that you avatar can move in; background, middleground, foreground. This new element dubbed "2.5D" changes some aspects of typical platforming game play. Changing planes is as easy as tilting the directional stick up or down, but most of the time the game automatically does it for you. This can be convenient, but it is also an annoyance. Sometimes your avatar doesn't change planes and you fall to your death. Jumping is affected by the physics engine, so precise jumps can be iffy. Controls are okay for a platformer, but it can be refined to be a lot more precise.
Story isn't important in LittleBigPlanet. The basic premise is to encourage the creation of your own levels. There are items to be collected in pre-made levels from stickers, costume parts, to material to create with, so there is incentive to go through all the levels before hitting up the level creator. Many rare items require multiple players or completing a level without dieing.
The graphics are tight and realistic. Different materials of cloth material, wood, metal, glass, and cardboard have incredible textures, especially the cloth materials. Music perfectly suits every pre-made level. The soundtrack oozes with variety and style.
The most important aspect of the game is the level creator. Materials can be easily created. Tools have incredible depth to create almost anything you want. When you first enter the level creator it is recommended to complete all the tutorials (which can take almost an hour) before starting you own levels. Stickers can be applied to materials to change the color and add some style. When your level is complete you can then publish it online.
Online is fun, but sometimes laggy. When finished with an online level, you are able to rate the level then slap a suitable tag on it to give other users an idea on what the level is like. Comments are also enabled on levels to give the creator feedback. Obscene levels can be flagged by using the "Good Grief" menu to alert moderators.
Overall LittleBigPlanet is a fun game, but the fun of the game lasts depending on the player. Creative people will find the game very hard to put down when creating your own levels. Average gamers will enjoy the pre-made levels and some online levels.
It turns out that many moons ago, Microsoft once had its eye on the Sony published LittleBigPlanet series.
Microsoft in a nutshell. Always tried to poach Sony employees, games, 3rd party games and devices like the depth camera that was turned into Kinect but was running on PS2 before Xbox 360. Wouldn't be surprised they wanted LBP. Just like they worked behind the scenes pushing the MLB to bring Sony's baseball game to Xbox instead of making their own.
https://www.playstationlife...
They didn't spend years trying to develop their own baseball game. They wanted Sony's game.
They're scum.
"However, Healey said Media Molecule wouldn't have felt right doing that, adding it would have been "morally corrupt"."
Major kudos to Media Molecule for being an upright studio with principles.
Great, more stories like this please. Show the last of the zombies holding the line what we've been saying for years: Microsoft is anti competition, anti industry and has no interest in making games at all.
But hey, at least there's an Xbox Games Showcase to look forward to, right?
Well considering SONY just killed the series, LBP would've been dead by now either way. Though MM probably wouldn't exist by now either, so I'm glad they stayed with SONY, hopefully they don't get shut down any time soon or ever honestly.
Times are changing, and these games would have never been made in today's climate.
Every single time someone uses this phrase whether it's music, movies, books, comics, video games, etc it's always the same claim.
The ubiquitous "they" won't allow it to be made. And every decade these claims are made the claimant completely ignores all the "offensive" material that is published when the claim is made.
In ten years, you can write a new article about how you can't make games like Helldivers 2, Resident Evil VIII, Mortal Kombat I, Dragon's Dogma 2, Alan Wake 2 etc etc etc any more.
Dead Island: "The early PC version of the zombie game swapped the playable character Purna’s Gender Wars skill with a prototype name, which shouldn’t be mentioned directly. The skill name made fun of both Purna as a character and feminists."
"Feminist Whore" lmao
ill add one more to the list.
drakengard 1.
its ridiculous tho, especially since they'd still be able to find their place in alot of places in the world. except america of course ha. and maybe Australia.
ppl are so sensitive these days. ha. but it is what it is.
They're not offensive.
And we need another Fat Princess. Fantastic little game!
Some people just have no sense of humour if this sort of thing offends them. They need to lighten up and stop taking themselves so seriously.
Alex DS. from Link Cable Gaming writes: "Is the PlayStation 3 retro? This is a surprisingly hard question to answer as the system definitely has the age to be considered retro, having launched in 2006, over 15 years ago now. But with it being home to so many massive games, many of which still hold up today and in fact were released for the PlayStation 4 when that console was released, make the PS3 a retro console that doesn’t feel retro."
Typically, the term retro is given to items which are at least 20 years old (but not yet 40 years old).
Quick google search
No the PS3 is not yet a retro console. But if you're gonna put 1 game from a series in this list, then LBP2 should be there instead of the original, Motorstorm PR is also an overall better game than the 1st game and to put Tools of Destruction over A Crack in Time is a blasphemy when ACiT is the best game in the series.
I don't entirely agree with your review, but I understand where you are coming from.
I totally agree about the controls. Can be annoying at times. Other than that, a really good game.
I'm waiting for offers to kick in at my local store because they have some every first wednesday of the month to buy it, but a friend of mine that was waiting and overhyped for this game and ended up disappointed. I don't know his exact reasons, some are lame, he says he bought a game to play it not to make the levels himself. He also said the controls were horrible but I heard media molecule was patching that (though how could you get something so obvious that wrong).
The same guy hated Halo and the fact that he bought it because 10s were raining on it. It seems that reviews are mostly corporate bought bullsh1t or simply attention whores. The same guy says MGS4 is one of the best if not the best game experience he ever had. Perhaps that's why he doesn't like LBP, since he likes to be told stories and not to tell them himself.
i see your review and i understand but i dont believe it should be an 8. the lowest should be 9. The graphics are very very good for the what the game is suppose to be. The sound is great, matches with the pace of the game. The controls, i would take .5 because my gf has trouble with it, but for me it is fine. The fun factor is good for what it is meant to be, because its always gonna depend on the player. The online had some problems, but thats almost every online game nowadays. It is laggy sometimes but not all the time. so I would deduct some points off for that also. So overall I believe the game should deserve atleast a 9. Most of my games are shooter games, I dont have many platform games but this game makes me wanna try like ratchet and clank and other platform titles. Just my opinion though. :)
does this game get bring after a while??