LittleBigPlanet 2

Putting Sackbots into act mode allows you to assume control of them and record their actions to create cut-scenes. It makes for far more elaborate scenarios within your levels, and ties into the specialisation aspect that made the original LittleBigPlanet such a rich experience for some players.

There are now almost as many options for people who just want to craft cut-scenes as there are for people who want to build assault courses or make props. If you and your friends want to turn LittleBigPlanet into a cottage industry, everyone's going to have decent jobs this time around.

The final new addition the team is unveiling at the moment is probably also the biggest. According to the developers, it's the item that provides the key distinction between the first and second instalments in the series - the former being a tool for making platform games, while the latter is a platform for making almost any kind of game at all.

Direct control works a bit like the microchip. It takes the form of a little seat that you can stick on any object for Sackboy to then climb into, and it brings up another circuit board window - but this one allows you to reprogram the PlayStation 3's controller.

Think about that for a minute. More specifically, think about what that means for something like a car. In the world of the first LittleBigPlanet, cars had to rely on motors and pull switches. To make them functional, you had to wire things together to make sense with the game's universe, and then to get to drive them you had to move Sackboy around, yanking switches this way and that to get the desired effect.

Not any more. Now you just build the object that you want to work as your car, and then you stick on the Direct Control chair. Once Sackboy's sat down, depending on how you've reprogrammed your DualShock, you can steer it via tilt, via triggers, via thumbsticks, or even via face buttons.

See it in action, and it's clear how much this changes things. Cars are no longer wobbly to use, slow to respond, and prone to rocket-powered unpredictability. And why stop at cars? Direct control allows you to create vehicles you can use for sections that play out as racers certainly, but it also opens the door to scrolling shooters, and even RTS games (these will be aided by the fact you can now use a new neon material to create stick-on HUDs).

Combined with a much more flexible camera - LBP 2's version can come in close to lock itself behind specific objects, opening up the world of top-down racers, and it can even tilt during levels so you're scrolling vertically one moment, horizontal the next, taking you from R-Type to Space Invaders in a matter of seconds - direct control really expands the sort of things you can do with the game.

Expanding upon a game that is already as deep as LittleBigPlanet is a daring approach to take for a sequel, but it's hard not to applaud it. And while every new addition threatens to take a fiddly experience and make it even fiddlier, it's also worth remembering that Media Molecule's now done this once before, and has had two years to study what its players like and what they don't.