Following last night's Home presentation, Phil Harrison invited a few developers to the stage, Media Molecule's Mark Healey and Alex Evans. Harrison reminded the audience of their previous work on a fighting game by the name of Rag Doll Kung Fu, created while at Lionhead Studios and distributed over the Steam platform.

What they showed was a game that drove home the point of Sony's Game 3.0 theory, one where enabling users to aid in the creation of game content will help drive the console gaming industry.

The game they showed was LittleBigPlanet, a user designed playground, a make-your-own-platformer tool, an actual game with deep physics that looks beautiful and shockingly fun to play. If you really need comparisons, the game is like Line Rider meets Garry's Mod meets Super Mario Bros. meets an orgasm.

Healey and Evans fired up the game, demonstrating how simple the editing process can be. A grid of objects, from which was pulled a large block of wood, appeared over the player's avatar. The block was tethered to the avatar to give the user a sense of position. It was resized, reshaped and dropped into the world. Decals were applied, over and over to all areas of the burlap decorated sandbox. They added a large spinning cog, to which the avatar attached itself. It hung on, seemingly for dear life, as it spun around the cog. When the avatar released its grip, it was flung to the other side of the playground using the game's physics model. They added soccer balls, fruit, flowers, glowing stars, and stickers to the field and even to each other.

It was clear that two, or three, or four players controlling LittleBigPlanet could turn into a frantic build and design free-for-all.

Phil and another Sony Computer Entertainment producer picked up two additional SIXAXIS controllers and joined Healey and Evans for a run through a pre-built level. It highlighted the possibilities of running and jumping through a dynamic, physics driven platformer, one where the simple concepts of Mario-esque platforming, combined with the ability to sticky your adorable voodoo doll to almost any object (including other players) led to wide-open gameplay possibilities.

Did I mention there were jetpacks? Oh. There were jetpacks. And they were cool.

LittleBigPlanet also features a photo option for capturing your more memorable platforming moments. Sony also plans level sharing over the network, along with strong community features for rating and commenting on player designed worlds. If there's any justice in the world, this gorgeous game will be a massive hit and really should make PLAYSTATION 3 owners very happy.

According to Harrison, LittleBigPlanet will hit the PlayStation Network "later this year" and on Blu-ray disc early next year.

You'll see how awesome it is. We'll have video up in just a moment. Until then, check out the first six screen shots below. Michael McWhertor

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