The LittleBigPlanet pre-release Saga

[RenegadeRocks]

Incredible sense of speed and inertia on this demo level looks like loads of fun to:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t688DOPCIi4

That is so..o.. CooOOooL!

 

[-tkf-]

Incredible sense of speed and inertia on this demo level looks like loads of fun to:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t688DOPCIi4

How big can these levels be, that is like a .. huge level

 

[Terarrim]

I agree LBP calafornia games or old olympic games (comdore 64 days) anyone???

 

[Gradthrawn]

In some of the preview videos there appears to be a brief introduction for the level. The princess rescue video (up on PSN) immediately comes to mind. I'm curious if that is just video editing or can "the stage be set," so to speak, at the start of a level? With the player(s) being shown the goal, obstacles, etcetera via a pre-set creator controlled camera.

Speaking of the princess rescue stage, would that even be possible to recreate? I suspect not if NPCs cant be SackPeople, unless the princess is, in fact, one of the player controlled characters. Which makes me wonder if PCs can be set to start at entirely different points in a level.

EDIT

Don't know if this has been shared before, as it's a little old. But its new to me! MTV Multiplayer Blog about enemy AI, music, and other things. Not a lot of new detail, but I didn't know about the 5 AIs before.

 

[tirminyl]

That was a pretty cool video Terarrim.

How big can these levels be, that is like a .. huge level

You are pretty much limited at harddrive space on your PS3 and limited to the amount of space they give you on the network when you upload.

 

[Gradthrawn]

That was a pretty cool video Terarrim.



You are pretty much limited at harddrive space on your PS3 and limited to the amount of space they give you on the network when you upload.

I recall hearing about a set limit to the number of objects that can be added to any one level (memory constraints, I would guess). That level tkf was referencing seemed to spaced out, but sparsely populated (as one would expect in a fast paced level like that). Not to mention its used vertical elements to maximize space as well.

 

[patsu]

Another hands-on impression from Edinburgh Interactive Festival

http://darkzero.co.uk/game-articles/littlebigplant-hands-on-ps3/

The goods:

Having played a four-player game with complete strangers and having a great laugh, I can state that LBP will arguably be the most entertaining co-op experience of the year. The physics-based puzzles and obstacles are varied and interesting. The physics themselves are slightly exaggerated versions of reality, but each particular material behaves just how you would expect. Even the Fluff obeys the rules of gravity, and rather than hanging in mid-air like Mario Coins or Sonic Rings it’s to be found resting on another object, or hanging from a string.

Wonderfully, a recently revealed feature is the option to lip-synch your SackBoy when using a USB/Bluetooth headset with the PS3, making it appear as though your character is the one doing the talking.

The bads:

Firstly a glitch saw SackBoy’s become trapped against some objects, and even when standing still the avatar would just stop responding to controls until they died and respawned whereupon the issue was resolved. This happened infrequently but so interrupted the flow of the gameplay that it was a huge irritation.

The other issue was that of the game’s camera. There seems to be no rhyme or reason to which player the camera focuses on during gameplay. Most of the time this isn’t a problem as all players will be trying to stick close together anyway, but any player that is off-screen is only given 5 seconds to get back before being ruthlessly murdered. Checkpoints are in the form of little doors and are fairly frequent, which helps.

The worst incident occurred when the camera randomly decided to change focus from a cluster of three SackBoys to follow a lone SackBoy who had gone too far ahead. This resulted in the death of all three SackBoys. Needless to say, this was devastating.

 

[obonicus]

The camera thing sounds like it's on purpose, part of the whole 'cooperative race' thing.

 

[Arwin]

It's basically the way Micro Machines c.s. worked I think?

 

[morlock]

I dont't know if they have changed it, but a while back they said a level could be up to 100x100 meters. A sackboy is 10cm for reference.

Then there is a limit of how much unique stuff you can put in a level.

 

[patsu]

I have read on GAF that the limit is 100. Don't quote me on that though.

 

[-tkf-]

New video?
http://gamersyde.com/news_6958_en.html

With a few of angle camera shots..

 

[Shifty Geezer]

A recent article stated dimensions were unlimited vertically and very, very large horizontally. This contrasts with early descriptions of set levels sizes for small, medium and large.

I recall hearing about a set limit to the number of objects that can be added to any one level (memory constraints, I would guess).

I've looked carefully at the rate the thermometer fills up to show resource use. Seems to me each new type of object takes a chunk of thermometer to load, but next to nothing to place. And if you think about it, that makes total sense. How much memory do you need to say 'place the wooden block at these coordinates in this rotation'? A couple of vectors. So 128 bytes per object? I think multiple blended/sculptured objects may take up more capacity depending on how they're created. If they're actually built from CSG like primitives in realtime, they'll still take negligable RAM. Regardless, if you keep your design pretty minimalistic, I imagine you could go on for miles!

 

[Shifty Geezer]

Those over-shoulder camera views are now confirmed as marketing license and not in game.

Hi guys - Sam from SCE here - in answer to the original question, not it's not possible to do an over-shoulder/3rd person viewpoint in the game. Some of the videos we've put out so far include unusual angles in order to better show off the expressions and characterisations of Sackboy which were done with a development version of the game.

Naughty! First time I think that the LBP presentation has deviated from what end-user creators can include in their creations.

 

[Arwin]

Maybe something for a replay mode that can upload replays to youtube? (just putting the idea out there)

 

[patsu]

I think the single most important feature they need to include at launch is the feedback channel.

I have seen so many requests that its mind boggling to track. Camera view control, in-game object creation, PS Eye support, etc are all interesting ideas. I hope Media Molecule can be like Warhawk. Those guys churn out new capabilities in patches like there is no tomorrow.

 

[obonicus]

This is insane: http://uk.playstation.com/games-med...ttleBigPlanet-demonstration-video:-Sackzilla/

There seems to be an 'edit as you go' thing there, though of course maybe they're just fooling in an editable level.

 

[Cornsnake]

That looks absolutely great. It think this is just 4 people in create mode. That's way he's able to add fire to the monster at the end. The expressions on the Sackboy's are very funny.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

See?! It's a great platform for creating silly films. They need to develop that side of it as well.

 

[patsu]

For story telling, I think the creator will need more camera control for him/her to accentuate emotion better. Let's see how people get around the camera problem in practise. I am sure some will try when LBP is launched.