LittleBigPlanet 3 Servers Shut Down: All We Know, Official Statement and Future Prospects?!

Thousands of players of the PlayStation 4 classic LittleBigPlanet 3 logged on only to see their beloved game cut from its servers. This left everybody shocked, as it might lead to all non-locally stored content disappearing overnight. Find out the official statement from the developers and more in this article.

Table of Contents: 

• What is LittleBigPlanet 3?
• LittleBigPlanet 3 Server Issues
• Are the Servers For LittleBigPlanet 3 Coming Back? Official Statement

What is LittleBigPlanet 3?

LittleBigPlanet 3 was originally released back in 2014 for the PS3 and PS4 platforms. The game is a puzzle platformer set in the Imagisphere. With beloved characters like Sackboy, Oddsock, Swoop, and Toggle, players and fans have formed a real connection to this game over the years.

Apart from its offline story and gameplay, what really made fans stick to the game for 10 years is the immense community built around the online features. In LittleBigPlanet 3, players could participate in Online Play, Online Co-op play, Versus Multiplayer, and, most importantly, the user-generated content and community levels. With more than 10 million community levels as of 2021, this game boasts a huge library of player creations on its online servers.

LittleBigPlanet 3 Server Issues

The issues with servers failing started back in September 2021 when the 1.27 update caused a prolonged server crash. This issue ultimately led to the permanent shutdown of online support for the original LittleBigPlanet, LittleBigPlanet 2, the PS3 version of LittleBigPlanet 3, and LittleBigPlanet PS Vita.

In January 2024, ongoing technical server issues caused a temporary shutdown of online services for LittleBigPlanet 3 on PS4. Although the developers were able to restore the game, it seems that the core of the problem couldn’t be resolved.

This brings us to today, April 2024, when thousands of players logged on to the game only to find all of the online services unavailable. This came as a surprise to everyone as there was no prior notice of server maintenance or shutdown.

Are the Servers For LittleBigPlanet 3 Coming Back? Official Statement

On the 20^th of April 2024, an official statement came out on the game’s Twitter account and PlayStation Support page.

"Due to ongoing technical issues which resulted in the LittleBigPlanet 3 servers for PS4 being taken offline temporarily in January 2024, the decision has been made to keep the servers offline indefinitely. All online services including access to other players' creations for LittleBigPlanet 3 are no longer available. User generated content (UGC) stored locally on your PS4 will remain available. Any new UGC you create can be played on your PS4 but not shared. Offline features such as the campaign will remain playable."

From this announcement, it seems like online support for LittleBigPlanet 3 is not coming back anytime in the foreseeable future. A massive library of millions of user-created levels is gone for good.

This follows the inevitable trend of many old games having their online servers removed, as numerous technical issues accumulate over time, and companies cannot maintain them profitably. We saw the same happen with GUNS UP!, MLB® The Show ™19, MLB® The Show ™20, and Gran Turismo Sport.