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Lately I have been playing the PS3 game, Little Big Planet. I am not a gamer. Until LBP my history of video game playing could be summed up with Myst, Brothers in Arms – Hell’s Highway,  Asteroids and Tank in the 70s video arcades, and a little bit of MS Flight Simulator. My digital obsession has been fractal art, not playing games.

LPB has levels, like you would see in Super Mario Bothers, but it’s not so much the level playing that sucked me in, it’s the creation. Like many games, you can play online with other players, and this game allows you to text chat and keep track of friends. It also allows you to create and publish your own levels and play what other people have created.

The game provides an amazing set of creation tools. It’s a 2.5D CAD system with prepackaged video game objects. When you create, you become a cross between an engineer and an artist. You can make complex machines or puzzles, or you can just make art by creating flowers, trees, architecture and creatures. You can control lighting, sound, color, shapes, water, and life and death. It’s very cool.

I published my first level last night. Publishing reminded me a lot of the art based social networking sites, like DeviantArt. Levels are rated and commented on by the community. Unless you are hooked in with the community, which I am not, your level quickly fades into oblivion. As of last night there were 2.1 million levels published. Around 7000 were published between the times that I had logged in, in less than a day.

Before it faded out I was able to play my level with a couple of online players. It was interesting to see that they didn’t think the same way that I do. The flaws in my layer became obvious. I am still not a gamer so I don’t know what good levels are supposed to have, but it was sure fun to create a level of my own and see other people play it.

If you want to check out my one level, I am segami1st.