Top 10: Ideas for LittleBigPlanet 2

LittleBigPlanet is one of the best games available for the PlayStation 3 and one of the best games of 2008, but it’s not without its flaws and omissions. With a game this ambitious there were always going to be a few things that didn’t make the cut, so we’ve put our heads together to figure out just what we want to see in the inevitable LBP sequel. Read on for our thoughts on what needs to be changed to the core gameplay and what would make the level creation tools even better.

10. PSP integration

What use are all these tools if you have to stop whenever you leave the house or the TV is in use? With the PSP version of LittleBigPlanet (if Sony has any sense this has to happen) we want to be able to move our PS3 game and creations over to the handheld, allowing us to keep creating wherever we might be. It won’t be simple, seeing as the PSP has only a fraction of the power of the PS3, but we really hope Media Molecule and Sony can pull it off. This would not only help out the PS3 sequel but give the PSP a much needed shot in the arm.

9. A story

Stephen Fry provided a wonderful voice over for LittleBigPlanet, but the actual story was rather weak, with levels feeling like they had been designed to work individually with tenuous links quickly crafted afterwards. We don’t expect a story so epic it wouldn’t seem out of place in the next Square-Enix RPG, but something to go hand in hand with the presumably rather jolly adventure your sackboy will be going on would be more than welcome. Perhaps Media Molecule would be better off creating a series of short adventures, with each level a story separate from the rest. Some ultra cute sackboy cutscenes wouldn’t go amiss either.

8. Painting tools

If you’re really clever you can layer stickers so that you can essentially paint things, but it’s an awful lot of hassle and can go wrong very easily. We’d have loved the ability to enter a paint shop that let us paint using brushes. Considering what people have been able to create using the tools offered in the likes of Microsoft’s Forza 2 decal editor, a similar tool in LBP2 would give creative types even more freedom to customise levels and characters.

7. Weapon pick-ups

We’ve already seen the paint gun in the Metal Gear Solid 4 pack, but we reckon some more weapons would work really well in LBP2 and increase the fun you can have when playing with friends. By shamelessly ripping off other games, we’d be pleased to see a flame thrower, a freeze gun, a hammer and a gravity gun. Moving things around in LittleBigPlanet did cause problems from time to time, so stealing Valve’s iconic gun from Half-Life 2 would eliminate this problem and allow Media Molecule, and users, to go to town with level design.

6. Larger customisable home and pets

Customisation is one of LittleBigPlanet’s core ideas, and this was evident in the pod in which you’re placed each time you start the game. This gateway to the rest of the game could be customised with stickers that you’d found in the game or those that you’d taken using the PlayStation Eye, but after a while we longed for something more – something far, far bigger. In LBP2 we want a home, perhaps starting small, but eventually becoming a mansion, with each wall and room fully customisable. We also want user created pets that follow you around and play, even if it’s a simple case of putting a dinosaur mask sticker on the head of a sackdog.

5. Machinima tools

With the user creation element of LittleBigPlanet being so strong it seems tailor made for machinima. The problem with the original game is that there’s no way to create movies using the software. We want video recording tools and the ability to create sets and put on performances, using Sackboys of course. With four friends as actors (with perhaps a few more able to join in to operate any mechanical objects) LBP2 could be the ultimate virtual film making tool. As with the current level creation, we’re sure most efforts would be terrible, but in the hands of the right people we’d get some excellent productions.

4. Better checkpoint system

Were we the only ones that wanted to take a sackboy and jab its cute face with needles after repeatedly falling foul to LittleBigPlanet’s cruel checkpoint system? During the harder levels (which should have been the most fun), we regularly had to replay the entire thing over and over again, each time failing at the same point. We understand why Media Molecule put a revive limit on checkpoints, but forcing the player to replay almost an entire level just to fail at the same point towards the end isn’t our idea of fun. If the really hardcore want to keep this soul destroying system, that’s fine, but please give the rest of us an option to at least have mid-level permanent check points.

3. Tighter controls

By the time we’d got around to writing our review for LittleBigPlanet we’d got used to the floaty, almost slippery physics, but we’d still prefer Media Molecule tightened things up ever so slightly for the sequel. We’d be all for levels with different gravity, but the sackboy running and jumping controls should be precise enough so that you don’t spend a lot of the time overshooting a jump or sliding off the edge of platforms. This would also allow for more complex level design – an area in which the original game certainly dabbled but came unstuck due to how hard it made the game.

2. Level creation within the core game

We don’t deny that user created content is a good thing, but we really wish that the original LittleBigPlanet had taken the level creation tools and built them into the game. The underrated Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts isn’t nearly as ambitious when it comes to user generated content, but it makes it the focus of the whole game and is all the better for it. Imagine levels in LBP2 in which you need to create something in order to progress. Whether it’s a large chasm that seems impossible to cross or a crazy king that wants a car in the shape of a duck, placing the user created content as a central part of the core game would not only introduce you to level creation in a more exciting way, but probably make you more willing to make entire levels yourself.

1. Insert custom audio and video

We’re 100 per cent certain that any level uploaded to Sony’s servers that features copyrighted music would be pulled down before anyone so much as had a chance to listen to one note, but using your own audio would still be a great addition to LBP2. Budding musicians could record their own sound tracks and your characters could be fully voiced. It would make for some terrible levels for sure, but it’d also allow the best level creators to really go to town and make something quite special. Imagine a level in which you used voice samples of friends and family, sneakily recorded without them knowing – the possibilities for hilarity are immense. Add video integration to that mix and you’re bringing user generated content to a whole new level.

What do you think of our ideas? What would you like to see in LittleBigPlanet 2? Let us know in the comments section below.