Last week on the super secret Infendo internal communications network (read: gmail), I fired off a email to the crew about this new game coming out in 2008. It’s called LittleBigPlanet. People love it. Heck, even I found myself watching the keynote trailer a few times.
Jack, Infendo fanboy:
How ironic that, in 2008, the “Killer app” for the PS3 [will be] a platformer. A simple, 2D side scrolling platformer. With “cute” graphics to boot. “Been doing that for years with my NES and Wii,” I’ll say, while sippin’ Cristal.
That was March 8. This is IGN’s Levi Buchanon yesterday:
For the last five or six years, people have crapped on Nintendo for making these kinds of playful, colorful games. I have read “Ninty is teh kidy!!!1!” on more than one rueful occasion. Sony busts out a sweetheart platformer at GDC and then suddenly reaps the praise? Wha’ happened?
I’m not trying to take anything away from LittleBigPlanet here. After being consistently disappointed with my PS3 since its November purchase, I wanted something like this to look forward to. I like video games that rejoice in looking like, well, video games. Nintendo has done this for years. Crackdown manages this with aplomb, even though it’s still quite violent.
The hypocrisy of the gaming “industry” these days is maddening. But I tell you what. Given the choice between the original, Nintendo, and some platformer due out in more than a year’s time, I’ll take Super Paper Mario in heartbeat. I’ll use the money I save with that approach to buy some Cristal.
Hypocrisy aside, I really think that the LBP presentation was a homerun for Sony and major blow againts Nintendo and it's Wii strategy.Now that Nintendo successfully played its "Next Gen should be about fun and innovation, not about graphics" card for months, along comes Sony, all of a sudden pulling LBP out of their sleeves, a game so irresistibly pretty and seemingly all about casual fun (Look, it's not yet another generic FPS!), that it seems to singlehandedly render the whole argument obsolete. Sony didn't even have to lose many words about it, because every second of their presentation on screen left no doubt about the fact that the Wii will never be able to put out something as pretty (graphics-wise) or complex (physics-wise) as this. You can't help but imagine an audible "click"-noise during the presentation of LBP, when the people suddenly realized: "Wow, so gorgeous HD graphics and plain, simple fun aren't mutually exclusive after all? You CAN have it both, AND online multiplayer on top!?" (Well, at least for $600 that is…). Really, LBP oozes that much charm, that some of it seems to rub off on Sony as a company, almost making them seem like nice guys again!I own a Wii since day one and I love it very much… And actually I'm not even sure of LBP's killer-app capacities in the whole run. I just think that, considering the lukewarm offerings of Nintendo at GDC (stock situation and all…), pychologically, Sony may have well turned the tide, and gained the upper hand again.We Nintendo gamers can "bitch" all we want about Sonys me-too-strategy or "kiddy"-hypocrisy and so on… I know I'm seeing some worried faces in our lines!
Worried faces with plenty of cash left over after their purchase. The NEO GEO was the same situation. That's the bitch about economics — you can have a killer app that's not *really* a killer app if the buy in price passes a certain "magic point"You say worried faces? I say I see people who know they can get relatively the same thing (plus motion control) for a price point that's 3 times less. Oh, and they can get it NOW with the release of Paper Mario, etc. What I think we all saw at the GDC last week wasn't Sony "owning" anyone. What we saw was a desperate PS3 fanbase seeing something that wasn't absolute shite coming out of the Sony camp, and reacting as such. It works for the President too… when the bar is set so low BEFORE you make a big policy announcement, it looks that much better when you actually make it, even if it's only a mediocre announcement to begin with. How else do you explain the fact that a handful of screens and footage from a 2D platformer (with physics!) was able to garner so much attention? Was it really because it was a GREAT game, or that Sony didn't f something up for once?Of course, this is said with A LOT of assumptions: How many times has a game looked/performed exactly as advertised when it's finally released?
So, the PS3 has one fun game coming out in a year.Yeah, they've really blown the Wii out of the water.
Wii owner here, no other consoles. LBP looked irresistable. Hopefully the PS3 comes down in price by the time LBP comes out. Yeahr, I would buy a PS3 for a single game. (Especially after just picking up a 42" Visio just to watch LOST and get 16:9 for my Wii.)
Jack, everyone: I think you all missed the real BIG point about LittleBigPlanet…This is not an out-of-the-box platformer, like what Nintendo (and everyone, including Sony) has done in the past. The point of the presentation was that it was regular people, not a developer studio, that creates the game! LittleBigPlanet only includes the basic elements, and YOU, the gamer, create the platformer!THAT is why this "game" is so important.
It's not hypocrisy. LBP won't be PS3's killer app for 2007. MGS4 or Heavebly Sword will fill that position rather well.People complain about Nintendo games being so stylistically "kiddie" becacuse EVERY SINGLE game they release is so styled. Sony have a good balance with it. Like, with 360, it's nice to have a game like Viva Pinata every so often, but when every game looks like that, then it's not so good.
$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$. Works wonders to change someone's opinions.
Sony still has $600+ worth of shiny plastic to sell.
Little Big Planet is not what Sony customers want. Mind you most people who check out video game sites like this aren't the average Sony customer. Just like Resident Evil 4 did very little to persuade average gamers to buy a cheap purple box, LBP will have a share of diehards that love it and the regular PS3 owner won't ever notice it sitting on the shelf. Sony has taken a lot of pride in establishing their customer base and they're throwing that all out the window with the PS3 offering too much competitive play-alike games and concepts that go against what has sold well for them before. Just like the PSP can't sell movies or games, the same will probably be said for the PS3, especially if they spend time and mony making games that are more geared towards the Wii fanbase.
Err… Did anyone get the fact that LittleBigWorld is NOT a platformer?This "game" is whatever the "players" want it to be: it is a construction set, like a playful Second Life, to build games. The characters look "kiddie" if you want them to be. It is the player that builds the character.
In case they missed it, I-man, say one once more with feeling.