LittleBigPlanet

LittleBigPlanet launched in 2008 from the British studio Media Molecule under Sony's banner, bringing a platformer built on the philosophy of "Play, Create, Share" to PlayStation 3. Players controlled the fabric character Sackboy or Sackgirl through hand-crafted levels full of physics-based puzzles built on an engine that cared about weight, friction and rope, all narrated by Stephen Fry. The main draw, though, was the built-in Popit editor that let anyone build and share their own levels with the whole community and dress Sackboy in thousands of costumes unlocked by finding collectible prize bubbles hidden across the levels. That emphasis on creation over mere consumption made LittleBigPlanet one of the defining brands of the PS3 generation.

The sequels carried the concept to further platforms – LittleBigPlanet 2 (2011) added tools for building custom minigames and even whole custom genres, PS Vita received its own entry tailored to touch controls, and PSP got the spin-off LittleBigPlanet PSP. LittleBigPlanet 3 (2014) then expanded gameplay with new characters offering different abilities alongside Sackboy, and beside the main line came offshoots that stepped outside classic platforming, such as the racing spin-off LittleBigPlanet Karting and the more accessible Sackboy: A Big Adventure from 2020, which dropped the editor in favour of more traditional level design. The series is still valued above all for its enormous volume of user-generated content and for the influence it had on later games built around sharing and creating levels.