LittleBigPlanet team talks about Phil Harrison's 'influence'
Phil Harrison will be missed. His groundbreaking "Game 3.0" keynote at GDC showed Sony's exciting and innovative ways forward in the online community. After accusing Sony Japan of not being forward-thinking regarding the online sector, he left Sony and joined Atari.
Harrison's message wasn't simply the creation of marketing folk, however. He genuinely believed in online communities, and without his support, LittleBigPlanet wouldn't be the game it is today. According to Alex Evans, one of the co-founders of Media Molecule, "[Phil's] influence on the game early on ... was hugely useful to have." The development team was focused on the gameplay, but it was Harrison that talked about the online potential LittleBigPlanet had. "He was very instrumental in telling us to think about what it would mean to have user-generated content - to think about what that means for the community."
