Media Molecule Ltd. is a British video game company located in Guildford, Surrey. It was started in 2006 by Mark Healey, Alex Evans, David Smith, and Kareem Ettouney. In 2010, Sony Computer Entertainment bought the company. Media Molecule then became part of SCE Worldwide Studios, which is now called PlayStation Studios. The company is most famous for creating the LittleBigPlanet series, the game Tearaway from 2013, and the game Dreams from 2020 for PlayStation consoles.
Before forming Media Molecule, the co-founders, led by Healey, worked on a game called Rag Doll Kung Fu while employed at Lionhead Studios. They left Lionhead in 2005 and showed an early version of LittleBigPlanet to Sony. Sony was interested, so in January 2006, the group received funding from Sony for six months, and Media Molecule was officially created. In June 2006, the studio signed a deal with Sony Computer Entertainment Europe. This agreement allowed Media Molecule to develop LittleBigPlanet for the PlayStation 3, with Sony owning the rights to the game’s ideas. Production of LittleBigPlanet began soon after, and the game was released in October 2008 and received praise from critics. Two years later, Sony purchased Media Molecule for an amount not disclosed.
In 2011, the company released a follow-up game called LittleBigPlanet 2. The LittleBigPlanet series later inspired other studios to create additional games, often working with Media Molecule. The studio also developed Tearaway in 2013 and its expanded version, Tearaway Unfolded. In 2016, Media Molecule opened a smaller studio in Brighton, East Sussex. Dreams was released in February 2020. The company has received many awards, including Studio of the Year from the 2008 Spike Video Game Awards. Media Molecule’s goal is to operate with as few workers as possible.
History
Four former employees of Lionhead Studios—Alex Evans, Kareem Ettouney, Mark Healey, and David Smith—started Media Molecule on January 4, 2006. Chris Lee and Mags Hardwick were also part of the founding team. Evans and Smith were technical directors; Healey was the creative director, and Ettouney was the art director. These roles changed as some members left the company in the early 2020s.
Before founding Media Molecule, Evans and Healey worked at Bullfrog Productions, where they met Peter Molyneux, a co-founder of Lionhead Studios. Evans and Healey joined Lionhead as early employees. Later, while working at Lionhead, Healey and others created a game called Rag Doll Kung Fu in their free time. Healey showed the game at the 2005 Game Developers Conference (GDC). Employees from Valve, a company interested in testing games on their Steam platform, attended the presentation. Valve wanted a game that was low risk and low cost to test, and Rag Doll Kung Fu became the first non-Valve game on Steam in October 2005.
Also in 2005, while at Lionhead, the co-founders worked on a game called The Room, which used clay tubes and portals. The game had similarities to Portal, released in 2007. The co-founders showed The Room at GDC 2005. Valve expressed interest in hiring them to develop The Room or another idea, but no deal was made. Evans later said that if Valve had hired them, Portal might not have been created. The co-founders left Lionhead in December 2005 and met with Sony Computer Entertainment (SCE) to discuss a game idea.
They pitched an early version of LittleBigPlanet, called Craftworld, to Phil Harrison, head of development for Sony Worldwide Studios. Craftworld was a 2D side-scrolling game with physics-based gameplay. Its main character was Mr. Yellowhead, who later became Sackboy. The pitch was vague, but Sony showed interest, partly because Harrison supported the idea. In January 2006, Sony provided funding for six months. The team started pre-production, incorporated Media Molecule, and moved to a studio in Guildford, Surrey. Siobhan Reddy, the studio director, joined around this time and is sometimes considered the fifth co-founder.
On June 1, 2006, Media Molecule signed an exclusive deal with Sony to create a game for the PlayStation 3. Sony would own the intellectual property, and LittleBigPlanet would only be available on PlayStation consoles. Evans said Sony was a perfect partner because they understood the team’s vision. Pre-production continued until August, when Sony executives, including Harrison, approved the game’s development. Harrison called the meeting the best he had ever experienced. Media Molecule began full development of LittleBigPlanet.
In 2007, Phil Harrison announced LittleBigPlanet at the Game Developers Conference in San Francisco. Healey and others were surprised to learn they were part of the keynote. The presentation included a demo of the game’s core features, such as a level editor that allowed players to create their own levels. Sony considered LittleBigPlanet a key example of their "Game 3.0" concept, which focused on user-generated content. Harrison initially suggested making the game free-to-play with downloadable content and a system to reward creators. Kenneth Young joined the team in 2007 as the audio and music lead after being inspired by the game.
By 2008, LittleBigPlanet was released globally and received over 90 awards, including the Artistic Achievement Award at the British Academy Video Games Awards. In 2009, Media Molecule had 34 employees and announced a version of LittleBigPlanet for the PlayStation Portable. SCE Studio Cambridge worked on the portable version alongside Media Molecule. In 2010, Sony purchased Media Molecule for an undisclosed amount. Shuhei Yoshida, president of SIE Worldwide Studios, praised the team’s innovation.
In 2010, Media Molecule announced LittleBigPlanet 2, released in 2011. In 2012, the company spent £4.1 million on research and development for new games to reduce reliance on the LittleBigPlanet brand. In 2011, development of Tearaway began. At Gamelab 2011, Reddy announced that Media Molecule would shift focus from LittleBigPlanet to new projects. However, the co-founders remained involved with LittleBigPlanet 2, including the PlayStation Move level pack. Healey compared the transition to a child leaving home, and Evans noted that developing similar games repeatedly could become stale. In 2012, LittleBigPlanet PS Vita was developed by other studios instead of Media Molecule.
Philosophy
Media Molecule aims to have as few employees as possible. In 2006, Evans stated that the company wants to stay small while still creating a AAA game, with a goal of keeping employees below thirty. Healey said, "I want to keep our team small and focused. I have had enough of working on large, overstaffed teams, where too many people do not contribute much. Every person at Media Molecule is important." Healey also noted that tensions can arise among team members during development. However, when the team becomes too large, these tensions can grow, similar to those seen in a soap opera. In 2023, Media Molecule had 135 employees before layoffs occurred in October.
Other game developers have followed a similar approach, including Hideo Kojima of Kojima Productions. After visiting Media Molecule in 2016, when he was rebuilding his company, Kojima used Media Molecule as a model for his new studio. He wanted "a small, intimate type of studio." Kojima praised Media Molecule for having a high number of female employees and a relaxed, family-like environment. He set a limit of one hundred employees at Kojima Productions, similar to Media Molecule’s approach.
Games
Media Molecule created the first two games in the LittleBigPlanet series: LittleBigPlanet (2008) and LittleBigPlanet 2 (2011) for the PlayStation 3. They also helped develop the PlayStation Portable version of the same game in 2009 with SCE Studio Cambridge, the main developer. The games are puzzle platformers that follow a character named Sackboy, a small, brown, fabric creature with a zipper and button eyes. Players can create their own levels and share them online. The three games in the series sold a total of 8.5 million copies. Sackboy appears in every LittleBigPlanet game and is a symbol for the PlayStation brand. In 2011, Media Molecule stopped working on the series, but they helped other studios make later games, such as Sackboy's Prehistoric Moves (2010), LittleBigPlanet Karting (2012), and LittleBigPlanet 3 (2014).
Media Molecule also created the Tearaway series. They developed Tearaway (2013) for the PlayStation Vita and worked with Tarsier Studios to make Tearaway Unfolded (2015), a remade version for the PlayStation 4. Tearaway is a platform-adventure game where players control a character named Iota or Atoi in a paper world. The game uses features of the PlayStation Vita, such as the touch screen, rear touchpad, and cameras, to interact with the environment. Both games received mostly positive reviews from Metacritic.
Dreams is a game creation system that lets players make and share their own games, similar to LittleBigPlanet. Players can create games in different genres, such as point-and-click adventures, puzzle-platformers, and shoot'em ups. They control an "imp," like a mouse cursor, to build new items and characters. Released in February 2020, Dreams received mostly positive reviews from Metacritic. In April 2023, Media Molecule announced it would stop supporting the game in September 2023.