LittleBigPlanet 3’s new characters detailed, plus a look at the guys that didn’t make the cut

With the game’s surprise announcement still making waves, XDev’s Pete Smith offered a closer look at the new characters coming to LittleBigPlanet 3 on PS4.

“We’ve spent a long time working on the characters,” he said. “Not just making sure they look distinctive but also that they each offer unique gameplay. That, for me, is the big thing. We want people to go ‘Wow, they really change up the game, and I can create totally new experiences with them’.

“Were we also keen to make sure that they were very iconic from a silhouette point of view, so that when you look at them together you can instantly tell them apart. Yet we still wanted them to feel like they were part of the Sackboy family, rather than just a watered-down version of the same character.”

Smith continued to discuss each character in depth:

“Swoop was the first one we came up with. He has a specific purpose – Swoop can fly, and he can access hard to reach places. One of the most useful things with Swoop is that he can pick things up – objects, but also the other characters, with the exception of ‘big’ Toggle.”

“Then there’s Oddsock, who’s a four-legged character. He’s not quite a dog; he’s more… well, he’s just an odd sock! Oddsock can wall jump and wall slide, and is really fast.”

 “Once you play the Oddsock levels and start nailing your jumps, it’s      really fluid and much quicker than the familiar LBP gameplay. It’s a      very different experience – we didn’t just want him to be Sackboy on    four legs, we wanted him to be his own unique character.”

“Finally we’ve got Toggle. Toggle can be big, or he can be small. Toggle started off as just one character – big Toggle – but it didn’t quite give you enough combinations, and that’s what LittleBigPlanet really needs.

“What we like in LBP is that we want everything to be very intuitive, so when he’s big he’s strong and heavy, and when he’s small he’s light and quick – it’s obvious. When you play the game it feels really natural – you’ll instantly know where to use him, and it brings in a nice puzzle element.

“He also brings with him a hell of a lot of gameplay possibilities, especially when you start using some of the customization features.”

There were also some characters on the initial drawing board that were scrapped for the final version of the game. “Sackworm,” for example, has not and never will be seen, but Smith is confident that Swoop, Oddsock and Toggle strike the balance between customization, belonging and personality.

LittleBigPlanet 3 will release this holiday season for PS4. Looking for more info? Check out our Preview for the littler bigger planet.

[PSBlog via DualShockers]