LittleBigPlanet 3 experiment: It’s like Twitch plays Pokémon but with a robot

Become a member of GB MAX to gain exclusive access to the industry and to the most influential global B2B leadership community in the business of gaming, entertainment, and tech. Join now and also get a VIP ticket to GamesBeat Next (Nov 2-3, SF).

Here’s a little something odd to start your week, courtesy of Sony.

The PlayStation 4 creator has hooked up a robot to a DualShock 4 controller, which the machine is using to control LittleBigPlanet 3. Don’t worry, Sony hasn’t created an android smart enough to play a 2D platformer (which is obviously the first step in a human-exterminating revolution). Rather, the robot is submitting inputs sent by observers from this site.

The whole thing is kind of like Twitch plays Pokémon, the live-streaming phenomenon from earlier in the year where viewers played the role-playing games together by voting for which button to push next. Of course, it’s a bit easier for a committee to beat a turn-based game where speed isn’t really necessary, whereas a 2D sidescroller requires reflexes.

Still, it’s certainly a weird little thing Sony’s got going on. Maybe someday we’ll all be having robots playing our games at home for us while we’re away. Or we could be practical and use cloud-streaming.

Eh, the robot thing sounds more fun.