LBP2 dev hails fan reaction to delay

Media Molecule has hailed its community for the way it reacted to the high-profile delay of PlayStation 3 exclusive LittleBigPlanet 2.

Last month Sony announced that LBP2 would miss its November release date and instead come out in January next year.

"We know this will come as disappointing news for all you LittleBigPlanet fans, and believe us, we are disappointed too," wrote MM on its website at the time.

"We are a tight-knit team and we take enormous pride in our work, so to raise the bar we've set with the original LittleBigPlanet, a game that has been so embraced by all, we've agreed to allow ourselves a bit more time to deliver the experience that our great fans and community deserve.

"We are truly sorry, but hope you understand that we have to build the best possible game, as it is the foundation of our community."

Speaking to Eurogamer ahead of its Eurogamer Expo 2010 developer session this morning, Media Molecule praised its fans for the way they reacted to the announcement.

"It was disappointing about the delay," community manager Tom Kiss said, "but it's all good because it's going to be so much better. We can polish it it the level we want it to be.

"We wouldn't slip a game to make it worse," said fellow community manager James "Spaff" Spafford. "It's unfortunate, but our community has been really understanding. It's great because we all feared we would get shouted at quite a lot. But everyone was just like, fair enough, I'd rather the game is better."

"Our community is really awesome," Spaff continued. "The core community is creative at heart. All of them have got a basic level of creativity, which makes them really interesting.

"They're just really nice. They send us lots of art and make lots of cool things outside of the game even.

"They sent us biscuits, and they're like, I hope you're okay. Don't work too hard. Have some tea. We Tweeted we'd run out of tea once, and loads of people sent us tea, which was nice."

LittleBigPlanet 2 is currently in beta. Dan Whitehead went hands-on for Eurogamer.