Okay Geek Farm
PSP Game Review - LittleBigPlanet
Alex Tretrop
Summary
LittleBigPlanet is one of the most family friendly, cheerful and fun PS3 exclusives out there. There is infinite replayabilty with new levels being constantly uploaded by it's thriving community and being able to easily enjoy any of these levels with a friend locally or online.
This year Media Molecule has made an iteration on the PSP people who want to play LittleBigPlanet on the go. Will you be making amazing user created levels on the PSP or does this game lose the charm of it's PS3 brother?
Story
Storywise, LBP PSP has essentially nothing interesting or innovative. Provided that this is not the focus of the game at all, the creators of the game are essentially making you go around the world trying to find "Creators" for their "Creator Carnivals".
Put simply, this game has nothing interesting or memorable storywise. The only cool thing I can think of, is if you enjoy creating a story, LBP PSP, like it's older brother on PS3, has some great tools to help you get started in it's level creator.
Gameplay
Like it's predecessor on PS3, LBP PSP's biggest focus is on the gameplay and I'm happy to say that it makes the transition to handhelds extremely well, with almost nothing being in this one that you can't find in the original.
The imaginative and creative levels in the game's story mode are always interesting and fun, however some of the levels are a bit poorly made and they don't explain the objectives of certain levels very well. Considering this rarely happens, the majority of the game is extremely fun when playing through it. This game also removes the lives system that the console version, in favour of you just losing points (which don't really do anything in the game besides determine your highscore).While it's definitely an improvement over the console version where, if you were playing a long level, hit a part where you died a lot and had to restart, it takes away from the sense of challenge in the game, with you not even being worried if you die because you'll just reappear right at one of the numerous checkpoints in the level.
The game also suffers from the story mode being very short as well, but if you can find some good community levels, you're sure to have even more fun playing them, even with significantly less then the console version. While it kind of balances itself out, it's disappointing that there weren't more developer made levels, as they are some of the best so far in the series.
The biggest problem with the gameplay is the simple fact of there being no local or online multiplayer of any kind. While there's tons of great community and developer made levels, LBP PSP loses a lot of it's appeal when you can't play with a friend on a long car or plane ride because you just can't share the laughter or smiles you have when playing on the console version with 4 people.
The online portion of the game is pretty good for something on the PSP, with lots of tools to build your own levels. While it will take a while and may not be appealing to many people, LBP PSP does have an impressive amount of tools for someone who does want to make levels and you can do on the go this time around. Keeping in mind that this is on the PSP, there were occasionally slow downs and sometimes glitchy things but they didn't really detract from my enjoyment.
Once your done making your perfect level, you can upload it online for everyone to play, rate and share with their friends, giving this game essentially infinite replay value if you can find some good levels, especially considering your going to play it on the go.
The creaton and online tools are pretty impressive for a PSP game, but the game can start to slowdown with lots of things happening, making this a great, but not perfect gameplay experience and time will only tell if the community will start building as many great levels as the PS3 version.
Graphics
Media Molecule did a pretty good job at bringing the graphcal style and feel to the game, with LBP's trademark cute Sackboy along with some very vibrant and colorful graphics. Like the first game, it's great to see it's colourful art style in a world filled with tons of dark and gruesome games. It's also impressive that the graphics hold up under stress and are just plain cool to look at.
My one problem with the graphics is that Sackboy has little to no emotion in this game. While it's a relatively small feature, it's kind of disappointing they couldn't get this small feature in.
Audio
The first thing you'll notice in LBP PSP is it's soundtrack with memorable tunes that keep you going through the stages and have enough variety to not get annoying. Other then the music there isn't much else in terms of Audio to talk about considering this game has almost no voice acting but the music is so good that you probably won't even notice.
Who is this game for?
If you enjoyed LBP on the PS3, chances are you'll have fun with the PSP version but considering the developer levels are pretty short and it doesn't have any multiplayer, so you can enjoy this game with friends, for most people they won't come back to it again unless there are some very good community levels. Still if you enjoy playful platforming and colourful art styles, you'll probably have some fun, for a little while at least, playing around with the game.
Final Thoughts
LBP PSP brings the look, feel and sound of it's console brother very well and it definitely feels like LittleBigPlanet with you being able to create some excellent levels to share with people online, the developer made levels are some of the best yet but with no local or online multiplayer of any kind and an extremely short story mode, the PSP version probably won't get played for as long as the PS3 version. For me, LittleBigPlanet acheives a Buy because if the community makes some great levels, there is a potential to have tons more fun then the limited amount the developers give you and if your going on a trip you'll defintely want to consider picking this game up because you'll definitely have a great time......while the quality of the levels last.
