Little Big Planet review-me-do.

PS3 HOME is supposed to be the most amazing thing ever. It isn't. It is just a crass attempt to make you spend money instead of playing games on your games console. (Read : Media centre.) As a gateway to a world of new experience, it makes for an incredibly effective barrier. The whole community aspect is far too limited, and I can think of no logical reason why the bowling alley consists of 6 lanes that can fill. Yes, you read that right. I had to wait for a slot to become available to play a video game in a virtual space!

Sony have made a pretty huge mistake there, because despite HOME and its over-powering restriction, there really is the potential for a great community on the PS3. The proof of this pudding comes in the shape of Little big Planet.

That it is the best 2D platformer since New Super Mario Bros. is enough for me, I would buy the game on the strength of the single-player alone. Platforming, when done right, is still one of the most satisfying genres out there. And Media Molecule have gotten some of it EXTREMELY right! From pixel-perfect jumps, to timed chases, to seemingly unreachable rewards, all the required elements are in place. Things are made so much better, though, because of the style. Sackboy is such a simple idea, and yet is full of charm. The world in which he lives is a direct extension of this, and is all the more enjoyable for the enforced cartoonishness of things.

The real genius, though, is the clever usage of physics. Items can be moved, bounced, burnt, sploded, broken, and interacted with in countless ways. Some things are light enough for Sackboy to grab and drag in order to get access to areas he can't jump to. Sometimes, you need to find other ways past. So, you might grab a sponge on a string in order to swing across a chasm. Or, you might have to drive a rocket-powered car at it fast enough to smash through. Or, you might need to carry explosives toward it from a jetpack, through perilous rocky outcrops. All the kind of stuff you just don't do in more real-world based games.

And then, the piece de resistance. Or, more accurately, the first of two.

You get the opportunity to create your very own levels. In the past, this has amounted to some limited "Place one of these few blocks in one of these few places." Not so, here! Here, you get to create the very blocks that you are placing, as well as what they do, what they react with, along with where they go. You can create locales, traps, enemies, vehicles, even the very backgrounds. You define how they look, how they sound, how they are lighted, and how they react, along with what they react to.

Then, you get to upload it to the community. Which is quite possibly the trump card. I swear, rather than making adverts with generic Australian 'comedy', and stressing that you can play with anything, Sony should be showcasing the idea that ANYBODY can play with anything you made!

I came across a level called 'Vanessa Feltz in the Cheeky Temple', which speaks for itself. Even if the level is awful, somebody took the time to create something like that. Let's examine this for just a couple of seconds here.

Vanessa Feltz is ... there is no nice way to put it. She is a joke. Her short-lived career as a broadcaster is well and truly over, she only gets to appear on TV these days when they remind us annualy of her Celebrity Big Brother meltdown. Any aspect of seriousness she once held has been stripped away in a loop of reality TV and sitcom cash-in appearances. And, most people in Britain know this. She belongs to that special class of celebrity who exist these days because we like to laugh at those less fortunate than ourselves. To her credit, she does somewhat accept her fate, rather than try and act like she still has any kind of relevance.

So, when 'Divalicious' got his or her hands on the tools to make ANYTHING THEY COULD IMAGINE, they imagined a fat has-been for their ideal mascot. I have yet to play the level myself, but I don't need to. I can already imagine the level of hilarious it entails. Divalicious is clearly a person with whom I could have a great laugh. At time of writing I am unable to access the LBP servers, but as soon as I can I will 'heart' them (add them as a favourite creator of levels) without hesitation. Such is the potential of this title.

From my own point of view, I have in my hands a tool that will allow me to try out ideas, and test them on the public at large. By refusing to join in with any forum-based "Let's heart each other for the trophy!" shenanigans, and just releasing my own levels to see how they do, I will know that if I get enough people hearting me that I am doing things right. If I don't, then I am not. This is wonderful, publishing without the need to buy a license!

All of this goes without mentioning 1-4 player local play, and up to 8 players online! Replayability is built in due to the quite frankly scary amount of items to collect in each level, some of which are VERY well placed. Some require co-operation to get, and thankfully all players receive the reward when they reach these items.

The real community consists of gamers, not customers. People are what they make, not just what they buy. HOME has been made by marketing executives, whereas Little Big Planet has been made by artists. I will leave it up to you to judge which one is more likely to be a success.

New year, new game.

It occured to me that I have not yet posted anything about the making of games in this thing. Which is something that I should do, as it will help to seperate the blog from all the other 'This is what I played today' blogs out there. Also, I don't expect there are too many other blogs out there in interwebland that are discussing games that I am making at the moment!

The plain brutal ugly truth is that at this precise moment in time I am not making ANY games. Or, to be more honest, not physically making any. I am working on several ideas, but none of them have gone beyond the theory stage. This has to change. It is 2009, and I think my New Years Resolution should be to have a completed game ready before this year ends. A completed NEW game, which will hopefully stop me from going back and just adding more to the games I have already done. Should anybody reading wish to see any of them, they can be found at the Wee Games website, although this concept has been put on hiatus for now. I do have plans, but they are plans. It turns out I am GREAT at planning, but fucking awful at putting them into action.

A perfect example of this displacement activity that I am World Champion of is 'Untouchable', and my treatment of it so far. It was an idea that I happened upon, expanded, and made into a game for a first year University assignment. It garnered me a first-class pass, AS IT SHOULD HAVE DONE, and I decided that there was almost certainly room to improve upon it. To that end, I spent some time thinking about additional modes, and even have a name for the sequel : Untouchable Retouched. Here is the plan :

1.) Convert Untouchable to Flash, and have it on the site.
2.) Make Retouched, and have it on sale.
3.) Get the free Flash game out there, so that people can play it and love it and hopefully buy the superior 'real' version.

Here is the action I have taken so far :

1.) Learn a bit of Flash.
2.) Think a LOT about Retouched.

Now, I know that a lot of the creative process is the thinking about it, but there has to be some action. This is the bit I am not so great at. Also, I suffer from inspiration. Or rather, I suffer from brief periods of enhanced inspiration, when every single thing I lay eyes or ears on gives me another great idea. At times like this, I find myself coming up with several themes, most of which are doomed to just remain as prototypes IN MY OWN BRAIN.

Right now, there are multiple ideas floating around. Some of them include :

• 2D platformer where the hero can temporarily affect gravity.


• Simplified strategy/boardgame where the units are geometric shapes, and combat is decided purely mathematically.


• FPS Robotron. (Best thing I can think of to call the idea for now.)


• Exploration based platformer set in the darker side of fairy tales.


• 2D top-down vertical shmup, with the gimmick that the game exists in more than one dimension at the same time, and the player can phase between them. Some enemies become weaker in some dimensions, and the scoring is affected by this.


• Forces of Nature. Puzzle game akin to The Lost Vikings.

This is on top of actually finishing 'Doodlebugs', making 'Untouchable Retouched', and finding some use for my blob engine. Oh, and converting 'Untouchable' to Flash. (And somewhere in there perhaps converting 'Doodlebugs' to XNA and releasing it onto XBox Marketplace as a Community Game.)

All in all, quite a busy little time I have ahead.

I think what I need most of all is a partner, or even a team of people to work with. I think 3 people would be enough, although ideally I would like to go as far as 5. Myself, a dedicated programmer or 2, a dedicated artist, and a dedicated musician/sound effects guy. Of course, this would bring with it additional headaches, but I have always found that having people to lead brings out the best in myself.

The main problem I foresee with recruiting a team is that they would bring their own ideas to the table. I am not saying that I am some kind of all-knowing facist who would refuse to accept the input of others. No, I am merely saying that I don't want to add even more ideas onto the 'Stuff I want to do someday' pile. I am trying to complete something, not give myself even MORE reasons to procrastinate!

For now, I need to work on my motivation, and set myself a timetable that I WILL STICK TO! If this means less time playing games, then so be it. A sacrifice must be made, as I do fully intend to live the dream.

I guess what I need to do is find someone to brainstorm with, or at least to get some idea of what would be the best thing to focus on from. This person could actually exist purely online, but I would rather it be someone I could spend face-time with. It just so happens that I now have some friends who may just have the time, so perhaps I should take advantage of circumstance.