I’ve been spending quite a bit of time with the LittleBigPlanet beta, and I think it’s safe to say that this is going to be something totally new.  Certainly, we’ve seen user generated levels before – but this is perhaps the first time that has been in a game that is also extremely cute, fun, and family friendly.

User Generated Content is something that many games are now starting to include as a way to spice up the length of the game.  Once something that was thrown in to FPS and RPG games as a throw-away (Neverwinter Nights or Doom or Baldur’s Gate or Quake’s editors, for example), now some serious thought has been put into the editors, the resources given to those editors and the support for the Mods thus generated.  For instance, every so often (Usually around the release of a new Unreal Tournament), Epic runs the ‘Make Something Unreal’ competition, where $1,000,000 worth of prizes is given away.  Indeed, some of those Mods were so good they were made into full games in their own right.

This, however, is the first time that we have seen a way to make User Generated Content that is easy, end-user accessible, easily distributable, family friendly and extremely well made.

• Easy

Designing a level is as easy as drag and drop.  Even advanced connections, complex trigger conditions and intricate linked logic can be made with simple, easy to understand controls.  The game does its best to keep out of your way – you think of what you want to do, and because of the controls, you can then do it.  Maybe you’ll get lost in what you need to link together to make things work exactly as you want, but you won’t get lost in how to actually link them together.  Including completely user-generated content is also easy – be it images on your PS3’s drive, or taken on the PS Eye, it’s just a drag-drop away.

• Accessible

Linked in with the ease is how accessible the whole process is.  You make a level, drag and drop.  You name it (And this is probably the hardest part of the process, as unless you have a spare USB keyboard lying around to plug into your PS3, the on-screen keyboard will take a while for a novice to get used to).  You upload it.  You later tweak it, and re-upload it.  You take it offline if you wish.  You only keep it for you and your friends…  or release it to the world.  It’s in your hands what you do with it.

• Easily Distributable

Despite this being mentioned in Accessible, it’s worth noting again.  It’s very easy to Distribute LBP content.  It’s very easy to find LBP content.  You know your mate, who goes by the name of MadeUpName1832 (not a real name) has generated a cool level?  Find it by their user name.  You know there’s a cool level out there?  Find by words in the level name.  How about if you don’t know what the name is, or who it’s by?  Here’s the clever bit – people who play the level can Tag it, in a whole Web 2.0 Flikr/Digg sort of way.  Search by the tags – maybe you like Dragons, or you know there was something about Tetris, or perhaps you want to see the Binary Computer?  A quick search, and there it will be.

• Family Friendly

While some of the User Generated Content is going to be adult in nature, an apparently robust filtering system should keep the majority of this material away from eyes that shouldn’t see it.  Couple this with a game that isn’t oriented on the destruction of millions of space aliens with big guns, and you have a game that will appeal to all ages (Except maybe the 13 year old spotty oik who wants to make/see that questionable content).

• Extremely Well Made

Beta.  Software that is not complete, not finished, not ready for the prime-time.  Such descriptions really did not fit LittleBigPlanet.  Never did I think, “This really could do with tweaking”, or “I hope that bug/issue/niggle doesn’t make it through to the finished game”.  I’m sure the finished product will be more polished, but I’m not sure how as it currently gleams like a trophy cabinet.  Little touches amuse you constantly, like the way your sack-person will lean against an object when they are next to it, or how fire will realistically blow and gust as objects move over it, or how things bounce, jostle and move solidly and realistically.  This is not something that will cause you to throw your controller down in frustration, but rather cause you to drop your controller as sleep finally claims you, three days after you started playing ‘for five minutes, honestly’.

There hasn’t been a game yet that has had everything LittleBigPlanet has.  Wide-spread appeal, a large marketing budget, a large target market (All gamers – no matter age, gender, location, preference – they’ll find something they like), a powerful system that can be shown off by the game, easy of content creation and distribution, ease of finding that content by consumers…

Viva lá LittleBigRevolucion!

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