After its initial announcement at E3 this year (albeit a pretty brief announcement that didn't really tell us very much about the game), the creative bods at Guildford based studio Media Molecule have let us have a peek under the bonnet of their new title, and spiritual successor to their creation themed platformer Little Big Planet, Dreams - a game about exploring a cute, yet surreal-looking dream world - and making your own. So here's what we know so far:
This is your character - the imp!
We now know you a bit about your character in the game, and what you can do. You control a character known as the Imp, a fuzzy little fellow that allows you to interact with the dream you're in - move objects around, placing them, and even possessing characters (although in a thoroughly family friendly, non-exorcism way). Media Molecule's Creative Director, Mark Healey, refers to it as a "posh, fluffy, squishy cursor." that's also fully customisable - you can draw him a new mouth and eyes by simply scribbling with your finger on the PS4 controller's built in touch pad. Sounds adorable! After you've possessed a character, you then take full control of them, too, and can animate them using the controller's gyroscope (to lean around corners), or move their arms with the right thumb stick - kind of like on Little Big Planet.
*Drool* that's our sort of dream! That thing that looks like a blob of ice cream on the right is actually your character
As with the studio's past game, Little Big Planet, creation is a huge part of Dreams, with players able to make their own objects, worlds and creations. Each dream is either a level, or a chunk of a level in and of itself, and as you play through the game, you can experience the dreams already made by Media Molecule or the game's community of players - or, you can have a go at making your own. Imagine Nintendo's recent Mario Maker, but turned up to 11, and you'll be on the right track.
When playing from one level to the next, you create 'links', seemingly by using objects that contain doorways, or anything that could be conceived as a portal, like a window or a well. The idea is that it'll then feel like an actual dream, where one moment you're minding your own business, then *poof*, you're somewhere completely different (falling off an escalator, or being chased by Hitler, or... something)!
This one looks like a Monet-inspired dream?
And the choice of where to go next is up to you! You can search for an existing dream using specific tags, like a jungle theme made by one of your friends, then choose from the options found and continue your journey.
As you'd likely expect from a game that places so much emphasis on user created levels, characters and objects, though, Dreams has a few ways of making things a bit easier for creators to find their niche. If you're the sort of person who loves crafting intricate objects, you can do that - but if you just like fitting things into levels, you can bring up a search window, and search everybody else's creations to find the bits you're looking for - like a door with a lock, or some other sort of logic based object. As logic was one of the things that some people fell down on with Little Big Planet, the idea that you can effectively pinch (borrow?) other people's creations sounds like it'll make things a lot easier.
Of course, you don't have to create things on your own, either. While no upper limit has been mentioned, several players will be able to collaborate together over the internet (and hopefully on the same console) to make their own dream levels, so anything that doesn't quite work for you can be instantly changed and tested again.
While many questions still remain, we now know enough about Dreams to be incredibly excited. There are so many questions swimming around our heads about this game, full of seemingly endless possibilities, and we can't wait to see more gameplay footage - and find out how it all actually works.
Luckily, we may not have to wait that long to get our answers. A beta for the game is due to take place at some point next year, and it's been stated that more news about the game will be announced in the coming months. For now though, why not take a look at some of the gameplay footage in the Paris Games Week demo video walkthrough, led by the developers themselves, complete with some of the most relaxing music you'll ever hear:
