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Sackboy's Prehistoric Moves Review - IGN

️Greg Miller
️Fri May 04 2012

LittleBigPlanet and PlayStation Move's lovechild comes to the PSN.

It was March of this year that the PlayStation Move made its grand debut, and one of the demos shown in an attempt to get us all jazzed up for the motion controller was LittleBigPlanet. Sackboy's Prehistoric Moves is the evolution of that snippet of gameplay we saw oh-so-many moons ago. Here, one player picks up the PlayStation Move controller to manipulate the world and the other player picks up a traditional controller to play as Sackboy.

Now, make no bones about it, this is simply a demo for what PlayStation Move can offer the LittleBigPlanet universe (the game even introduces itself as such). There's no story, it doesn't tie into your LBP save so you can't see your DLC costumes or create levels, and there's no online play. This is a standalone download that's not meant for solo journeys -- you can only play with another person. You should be able to best it in no time at all -- unlocking every level took about 30 minutes for myself and another Editor.

The mix is an interesting one. The PlayStation Move player can only interact with items that have a special pink material, so there are some points when the Move player is just sitting there and waiting for something to do. When the Sackboy player -- or up to four Sackboy players -- does find that material, the Move player needs to help out by extending bridges, acting as a torch, flinging the hero, and shielding him from falling, fiery debris. On the Sackboy side of the coin, the platforming wasn't all that challenging and I found most of my deaths were due to me not communicating with my partner.

That was a bit frustrating and I know she wasn't really enjoying her supporting role, but that's a pretty specific case. If you have a bud who is as into LittleBigPlanet as you are, you're going to have fun going through these levels and trying to Ace them (beat 'em without dying). Of course, it'd be nice if you could both earn Trophies to your individual profiles, but you can't; only the main player gets the rewards. Even if you don't have a friend ready to take on the world, Sackboy's Prehistoric Moves can easily serve as a "here's what the Move can do" example for visitors in your living room.

Do or die.

In terms of graphics and such, it's important to point out that this is running on the LittleBigPlanet engine. There's nothing wrong with that, but I don't want you downloading this and thinking you're getting a sneak peek at how slick LittleBigPlanet 2 looks. This is the cardboard pod and plush Earth you already know. The levels look good, but I would've liked to see a few more details in the game as some levels seem a bit simple.

Verdict

Sackboy's Prehistoric Moves is a demo of what LittleBigPlanet and Move can do together -- it teases to look for more Move stuff after LittleBigPlanet 2. Being a demo, it's a short experience that isn't very deep. If you're a PlayStation Plus member and get the game for free, you should download it without question. However, if you need to actually fork over money for it, you need to weigh the pros and cons. The game's solid and can be fun, but it's not all that exciting to be the PlayStation Move player and just move blocks for a Sackboy you're not controlling. I'm sure families and friends out there are going to have some fun with this, but the experience won't last all that long.