The LittleBigPlanet 3 Injection Rabbit Hole

[DaBigJ]

Or; 'How I learned to stop worrying and love the LittleBigPlanet Community'

So, I went on a bit of a journey yesterday/last night involving the third mainline installment of the LittleBigPlanet franchise, and I didn't really plan on making this a topic, but I find the subject really interesting. So think of this as a little documentation on top of a topic.

It, like any weird tale, all started on Twitter, where this interesting little tweet popped up on my feed.

It had been a while since I played LittleBigPlanet 3 (or a LBP game in general. Thanks, Minecraft) but I know a thing or two about a thing or two, and I know neither costumes on display are official. (aside from the rather fine 'stache) 

My curiosity took control over me and, for the first time in years, I booted up LittleBigPlanet 3 in a search for costumes like this.

Now, I should mention that I briefly indulged in this type of thing before, back when this was "new", with unused costumes and glitched DLC. But despite this, I had no idea what I was getting into upon searching for these modded costumes.

The screenshot above comes from unmodded hardware, on a completely regular PS4. Featuring modded costumes, such as PS3 Sackboy, Parappa, and an early design for Sackboy (far right next to the portal) alongside Sonic stickers. The items in the pod itself (Sackbots, portals) come from an odd glitch where you can become a custom character in the pod, but that's besides the topic at hand.

Even the pod background is modded. All of this can be acquired by simply finding the right levels and just...playing and getting the items. For free.

This is some form of asset injection that takes advantage of an odd exploit. I was informed how this works from the owner of the LittleBigBeyond Discord Server, a server dedicated to LittleBigPlanet modding. To quote them here:

Quote

people figured out how the game works internally. in simple terms, see, an lbp profile can store basically any type of file in it. this includes files that would usually be stored in the gamefiles itself, rather than inside than ones profile; this fact can be abused to put whatever anyone wants in it. since early 2021, people started to figure out more and more about how this game works, til we got to this point. anyone can do it, and i'm happy about that"

Essentially, the game treats the modded content as if it was made within the game itself, so it gets saved to the modder's LittleBigPlanet profile like everything else they own. Because of this, people use this to mod in whatever they want. From costumes, to pod backgrounds, to stickers.

Above is a notable example of this in action. This is an unofficial pack of Sonic costumes and stickers featuring Super Sonic, Shadow, Metal Sonic and a few other characters. This requires the OFFICIAL Sonic DLC to use, but this is very impressive work done by the creator, and is one of the best examples of what can be done with this exploit.

And that's the end of my little journey. I'm sure this is only the beginning of the big modding craze this game will no doubt experience, and if anything interesting happens I'll be sure to inform everyone about it.