Kareem gave a talk recently at Learning Without Frontiers, an international festival of learning and technology. It focusses on LBP as a tool for learning, something we are always really interested to hear about! The new tools in LBP2 could lend themselves towards teaching things such as electronics, logic, physics, or music - so if you have any stories let us know!

Check out Kareem’s talk below!

Some incredibly talented folk who appear to have (wel deservedly) won The Escapist Film Festival 2010  have recreated LittleBigPlanet using real cardboard, glue, scissors and Sackboy dolls. We heart you.

Woohoo! Today is the UK launch day for LittleBigPlanet 2 - a hugely exciting day and to celebrate this momentous occasion, we’ll be heading down to our nearest video game store, GAME in Guildford.

If you fancy joining us, we’ll be there chatting to fans and signing whatever gets shoved under our little noses. It’ll be a moment of sheer joy and happiness for us all to see LBP2 sat there on the game shelves and see some excited faces snatching it off the shelves.

We’ll be there from 1pm at GAME, North St, Guildford and we’ll be there for about an hour. Or two, depending on who turns up.

So come along and say hi! :)

As I’m writing this, the World Record Team are approaching 39 hours of straight gaming, as they try to set 5 new world records. The live feed of the team and everything happening around them has been really quite entertaining so far, currently you can watch them building Kevin Butler’s Office for instance, and with the final day of the event upon us there are some more great things to tune in and watch.

Here is the schedule of events for today, all times are in New York time!

Wednesday 19th January
Hosts - Jeff Rubenstein & Veronica Belmont

10:00AM–10:20AM - FanCam goes live.

10:30AM-10:45AM - Mm answers questions tweeted in

11:00AM – 11:20AM - Jeff with LBP Podcast introduce special design guest

11:30AM-12:00AM - Media Molecule tutorial with Dan & John on Direct Control

12:00PM - 12:30PM - Media Molecule tutorial with Dan on LBP.me

12:45PM – 1:15PM - Media Molecule for a Tutorial with Naomi on Cinematics

1:30 PM– 2:00PM - Meet Annika Valacic & her dad

2:30PM – 2:45 PM - Jeff interviews Elliot from ESRB

3:00 PM – 3:30PM - Media Molecule Tutorial with Chris and Naomi on Sackbots

3:30PM – 4:00PM - Media Molecule Tutorial with Naomi on the music sequencer

4:30PM – 4:45PM - Veronica talks to LBPodcast

5:00PM – 5:20PM - Veronica talks to Marvel & Martin from Media Molecule about DLC

5:30PM – 6:01PM - Veronica, Jeff, GWR, Media Molecule countdown to 50hrs

6:01PM - 6:35PM - How many records were set? Time to find out!

You especially don’t want to miss those live create tutorials, they’ve been really fun! Go team!

With LittleBigPlanet 2 launching this week, we thought now would be a good time to talk in more detail about the backwards compatibility between the new game and your current creations.
We’ve worked tirelessly to make sure LBP2 is able to play all of the LBP1 levels, and we’ve managed to assure that 99% of all physics, electronics, logic and character handling are fully backwards compatible.

However, testing all 3.5 million levels and finding ways to support all the awesome crazy techniques and things you guys have created is a sadly impossible task! So whilst all levels will play, some might need tweaking to make sure they work absolutely correctly.
We’ve put together a list of things to look out for that we know might affect a level, and also things to try if you find your level isn’t working quite how it used to. If you are worried about your level, or come across a problem, have a read all of the information below and you still can’t fix it, we suggest seeking help in the official LittleBigPlanet forums, or one of the many awesome fan sites out there.

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Did you know that LittleBigPlanet is about to set some Guinness World Records?  In New York City? Live?

From today and over the next three days, a team of Molecules and community members have taken over the PlayStation Lounge in the Sony Style store in New York City. You can pop by and say hello if you’re in the area, here’s the address…

PlayStation Lounge at the Sony Style store
550 Madison Avenue
New York, NY 10022

Whilst there, the team will be trying to set some world records, which will be officially monitored by the Guinness Book of World Records staff. Here’s what we’re going for…

The Guinness World Records to be set include:

• Longest marathon playing LittleBigPlanet 2
• Longest marathon playing a platform video game
• Most video game genres played in one video game in 24 hours
• Most user-generated video game levels played in 24 hours
• Most user-generated video game levels played in a marathon

LittleBigPlanet 2 will also be recognized for the following records:

• Most gaming genres in one video game
• Most player-created levels in one video game

If you’re not in New York and able to pop by, you can watch the event live over the internet, no need to go anywhere, much more convenient! - here’s Sony’s Eric Levine to tell us more….

If you can’t make it down, no worries, we’ll be LIVE streaming our World Record Event online on the PlayStation Blog. Stay tuned for our unprecedented schedule of LittleBigPlanet 2 goodness hosted by Veronica Belmont from Qore and our own Jeff Rubenstein.

Check in and watch the live action, interviews from anyone and everyone who loves Sackboy, and behind-the-scenes access with Media Molecule, plus tons more. You can even help us decide on which games to play next or tweet in your questions to anyone at the event.

Whether it’s watching our fans staying up playing LBP2 into the wee hours of the night, checking out the Subway lunch break, or enjoying the back and forth banter of our LIVE event, we promise a good time. Want more details? Click here.

So whatcha waiting for - buy a plane ticket to new york and join in right now!
Or just check out the live stream and send some messages of support to the team!

We’re about to give birth to our second baby, and we are some seriously proud parents right now. I hope you don’t mind if we gush uncontrollably for a little while?

LittleBigPlanet 2 is nearly upon us. By the end of the week you should all be able to walk into a store and pick up a copy! we’ve poured a lot of time, love and energy into it, and we think you are really going to like it.

Reviews have been popping into existence all over the internet recently too, a really positive response, check out some of the wonderful things people have been saying.

“With this sequel, Media Molecule gives players a bottomless toybox, and I can’t remember the last time a game had such a relentless grip on my imagination.”

- Game Informer 9.5/10

“LBP2 represents a dazzling new opportunity for creating deep, diverse and ingenious play”

- Edge 9/10

“This isn’t just a superbly presented game that incorporates multiple genres and comes packaged with a powerful creation suite, it’s your doorway into a wonderfully charming, vibrant, and ever-changing universe where almost anything is possible. “

- .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) 9/10

“We can’t wait to see what LittleBigPlanet 2 has evolved into in a month or three, when we can truly measure the impact that these tools will have had on an already ultra-creative community. We predict that it’s going to be like setting off an atomic bomb. LittleBigPlanet 2 will see an explosion of hobbyist game creation that could – in an even bigger way this time – send shockwaves around the industry. Duck and cover people, Sackboy is back. And in a world obsessed with identikit sequels, that is something worth believing in.”

- GamesTM 10/10

We’re so, so very excited that you’ll all get to play the game soon, and cannot wait for all the amazing creations we know are just around the corner. Please feel free to blow our collective mind to smithereens.

Here are those release dates again folks… write the appropriate one down with a massive pen somewhere you will see it, like on your fridge door, or right in the middle of your TV screen…

• Tuesday 18th January - Americas & Korea
• Wednesday 19th January - Mainland Europe
• Thursday 20th January - Australia and New Zealand
• Friday 21st January - UK and Ireland
• Thursday 10th February - Japan

Our blessed QA dept have been working their little fingers to the bone this year, keeping up with our demanding development cycle, finding all the bugs they could, and eating a lot of Nandos. With the game finally gold, they had a little bit of ‘free’ time on their hands, and so I asked them to pick some of their favourite beta levels of the year for a little MmPicks roundup.

Some of these you may have played already, perhaps you haven’t seen them though, and with Christmas coming up, now is the perfect time to kick your shoes off and check out some of the weird and wonderful creations on the LittleBigPlanet 2 Beta. Have a great Christmas!, see you all in the New Year!

Read more to see these Mm Picks

This year has been a very full on one here at the Molecule. Not only have we spent many long days and nights here designing, creating & finalising LittleBigPlanet 2, the Molecule family has also grown -  celebrating four marriages,  two engagements, four babies, and one more baby on the way. It’s lovely to see our small team grow :)

We have tried our best to attend as many shows as we could this year, and it was exciting that so many of these were also community events, giving us the chance to meet some of the incredible and creative people that love LittleBigPlanet!

This week is especially emotional for us, as LittleBigPlanet 2 has ‘gone gold’, meaning the game is 100% finished!  We also just received our very first review score - a very pleasing 10/10 from the Official PlayStation Magazine in the UK, and on that note, It’s our pleasure for me to announce that LittleBigPlanet 2 will be out on the following dates around the world…

• 18th January - Americas
• 19th January - Mainland Europe
• 20th January - Australia and New Zealand
• 21st January - UK and Ireland

Needless to say we have opened champagne & smoked cigars in the snow :) We are so proud of everyone here, and we’d especially like to thank all of our team for all the incredibly hard and brilliant work that they have put in this year, and to take this opportunity to thank our families and friends for being wonderfully supportive throughout the whole process.  Our team at Sony also deserve special mention - THANK YOU :)

Lastly, thanks to all of YOU. The Media Molecule & LittleBigPlanet communities keep us motivated, inspired and excited. Thank you for your all of your efforts and participation, it’s been a lot of fun so far, and we are VERY excited about you getting your hands on LittleBigPlanet2. You are sure to blow our minds with your creations even more than the first time round!

That’s it from us! We hope everyone has a wonderful end of 2010 - and enjoys a happy, healthy and deliciously brilliant 2011.

Lots of Love,
Siobhan, Alex, David, Mark & Kareem
xxx

We managed to grab whoever was willing for a quick, embarrassing session of SingStar. Here for your viewing pleasure…

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