I want to pose a simple question. Did Spore achieve what it set out to? Remember all the way back to 2005 when the game was first announced, and how amazing it appeared back then. Has the game reached you in the condition you were expecting and anticipating? I ask this after reading a lot (and I mean A LOT) of reviews saying the game is a dissapointment, and they are dissatisfied with the final product.

I like Spore, but like others, I have a niggling feeling saying it could be so much better...

It can be much, much more. It WAS much, much more in 2005.

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=8372603330420559198&ei=QBvNSN6FGoLOrgLDv-jXAg&q=Spore

Obviously two things have happened; both of which EA has admitted to doing on purpose.

1) The game was very purposely dumbed down. Really, really dumbed down. Remark from Will Wright specifically stated they rather sell more copies than make a lasting, challenging experience that might not appeal to everyone.

2) The game was sectioned off for expansion packs. A lot of expansion packs.

Think for a minute about the evolution present in game. The placement of the legs, arms, mouths, don't mean anything. Since all the parts were given numbered traits, they all have the same effect once placed somewhere on the body. That's completely against any type of thought and made that way so anyone without a brain in their skull could make a creature. It used to be, as shown in those videos, that the placement and body structure mattered and you would have to adapt your creature to its changing surroundings.

News-Flash- There are no changes in surroundings and your creature becomes COMPLETELY irrelevant only 40 % into the game. How is that supposed to be fun or rewarding?

Bad decisions have been made. The Tribal Stage (which I was most looking forward to) simply isn't attractive enough. I love the RTS genre, and Spore doesn't do it justice at all.

And don't get me started on the Civ Phase. When I evolve a creature from a cell, I finish tribe and jump straight into space... I simply cannot stand it.

I haven't actually played yet, but what I find most apealing about spore is the user content sharing, which so far I haven't heard any complaints about.

It can very much be better, but it set it what it was meant to do and is fun, charming and unique.

I'm having lots of fun with it and can't stop playing. Yet I am really disappointed with it and annoyed at knowing what the game was meant to be and ended up not being. So it's really bitter-sweet. I think that the fun I'm having will probably be short-lived and the disappointment more enduring.

Still, the user-created-content-sharing thing is GREAT and I think Spore will pave the way for other companies to build on the concept and make awesome games out of it. I mean, sure, user-created-content is not new, but the way it MAKES Spore is rather new.

1) The game was very purposely dumbed down. Really, really dumbed down. Remark from Will Wright specifically stated they rather sell more copies than make a lasting, challenging experience that might not appeal to everyone.


I have mixed opinions on this.

I'm a longtime stragegy gamer and have played the CIV series since the original edition. I've also played a few different editions of the Sim City games. I agree that this isn't as challenging as those games. The Civilization phase in Spore, in particular, is pretty bad--I can blitzkrieg the entire planet in a couple minutes, and it isn't that hard to do. From that standpoint, it is going to disappoint some of the traditional hard-core gamers.

However, I have two positives in return:
1) For the gamers: Sometimes simpler IS better. For example, take the Space stage. It isn't as challenging as Master of Orion (MOO) II, but it is about a billion times better than the disaster that was MOO3.

2) For the non-gamers: What I've been impressed with about Spore is its appeal to people who find a lot of games to be too complex. For example, my 9 year old daughter LOVES Spore. Can't get enough of it. And she has needed absolutely no "training" from me on how to play it. The interface is that intuitive and the game is that fun. Another example is my wife. She's never been interested in gaming at all. Period. And when she started seeing reviews of this, out of the blue she said "I'd actually like to play that."


So, yes, it is clear to me that they went for a broader audience that includes non-traditional gamers. However, if it serves as a way to introduce new players into the genre, that's not a bad thing, even if it seems "dumbed down" to us.

I also think that when you're reaching into new territory, it's sometimes hard to figure out what will stick and what won't. By that, I mean that v1.0 of Spore probably has some notable design flaws that were well intended but poorly executed. I think the key thing will be to see how the game evolves from here (no pun intended). Remember the train wreck that was the first release of CIV III? It was a major overhaul from CIV II on many fronts--culture, corruption, etc. It was a headache to play. It got better as the expansions came out and as the modding community fixed it. CIV IV was a further improvement over the new concepts introduced in III.

At the end of the day, I think Spore is still an innovative idea that has room to grow into something that can appeal to both types of audience, but I think it was probably always intended to have appeal beyond the hardcore gamer in the first place--that is typical for Wil Wright.

I don't see why it would have been so difficult to include a simple toggle switch for difficulty. It would have made a lot of more hardcore gamers a lot happier.

I think of Spore like the first SimCity. I'm betting Spore 2 will be more complex and Spore 4 will be so deep and complex we'll get Spore Societies until Monte Cristo makes Evolution Life and Evolution XL :D

Good example about dumbing down: I think that Spore is good, but not absolutely awesome. My little brother and mother love Spore. So Spore appeals to a really big bunch of people; not just the hardcore gamers, but also casual players.

The more and more I read about spore, the more I realize it's probably a good idea to not buy it... :(

I still give Spore about a 9/10. It's obviously not the mega-game that was in development for about 3 years, for the points that Soduka gave, but it's still a good game overall. I think part of the problem with it's reception is that it you have lots of breadth, some detail, but not tons of details, and a lot of the detail is semi-cosmetic with minor gameplay contributions. The other part of the problem is that beyond the novel cell-creature phases, it takes familiar game topics and tries to do them with novel game mechanics, while doing them in a way aimed to appeal to everyone (not just people who already game); That's two attempts to break the mold which doesn't quite please long-time gamers who already have played the evolution of RTS and TBS, strategy and sim games.

The saving graces of Spore are that it: 1. connects all the phases together so how you played each one makes the game which affects how they play and how you might want to win, 2. you can make and share the in-game models easily, and 3. your games and others' games interact somewhat, even failed games.

Having played it now a full week, I have to give the multiple phases a decent rating. Civilization is fun for trying different types of conquest, and grander strategies. Tribe is fun in that what you do influences the later stages, and you want to play it fast to get to the next phases, but you have to play it careful to get the final rating that you want. Space is fun as an rpg/tycoon game that ties it all together.

Space is not fun since the ultimate message seems to be that the "Grox will PWN u".


Things I do critique:
Creatures is sort of an evolution game, yet lots of evolution can't be represented because of the scoring system for parts. For instance the only reason for multiple legs is to mix and match feet. Giant scorpion parts are usually a better investment than arms for instance. The scoring system needs a rebalance so there are no worthless combinations, probably by extending the score of sub-categories to 10 points instead of 5. I think they should do something about the meaningless parts as well. They should make multiples of parts meaningful, and make the antenna and ears meaningful in the game as well.
I look forward to a cell-creatures expansion that adds water and more parts.

Tribes is pretty boring in itself. It's like an RTS designed for 8 year olds. It'd have been better with more of a sim city approach, or at least if late tribes was a city phase with a tech tree, and with more tribes and even other cities to fight. The leap to civilization is too quick and unbelievable. At least token researching/building leveling should be present, not just expansion by alliance/conquest.

Civilization is actually pretty cool when all the strategies and abilities are considered, same with the different approaches to vehicles. City balancing capture some of the flavor of say managing tiles in Sid Meier's Civilization. Taking an economic approach is interesting as well. And the variation between military and religious conquest is cool too (destroy the city or brain wash it). Having multiple vehicles per type was a good design idea, as was assuming the traits of the conquered.
Civ phase is still somewhat weak as an RTS though. I don't agree they need to go RoN or AoE with it, but they should have allowed for multiple units per type, and the trait vehicle abilities should have some variety that should be researched on a tech tree or by a power-up building.
Just adding one more vehicle type per trait type (e.g. so I could field both fast,weak military vehicles and slow, strong ones) would help. But they should have each line on the trait vehicle abilities be different from each other. E.g. there should be a rapid, direct fire gun line ; a long range artillery line; and an area of effect missile line). Adding fog of war and sensors would be a good idea as well.
Similar things for religion. Some items might have more of a city effect, whiles others might convert units faster, or have aura effects. I wouldn't change economics much, as the economic pathway is actually a little unbalanced and very easy to win with, especially with herbivore-social abilties.
Overall, I'd buy a tribes-civ expansion if they addressed those issues.

As far as I'm concerned the game would be "complete" if they gave you more to do in the tribe/civilization phases (something like Space phase but isolated to your planet)

Me personally, I'm over Spore. It's been two weeks of playing and I'm ready to move onto other games. :)

However, Spore will be a massive success. The casual gamer will eat this game up and the 10 XP's that are on the way.

Interesting to note, my mate runs a Game store, and he says that since they got Spore (1st Sep) they've had four deliveries and the game doesn't get to the shelf. And he says nearly everyone buying it he's never seen before and they don't have loyalty cards.......... casual gamers. He also said the game's only been returned by hard-core gamers.

So whilst there is a few thousand . .. .. .. .. .ing hard-core gamers, what about the millions of casual gamers who buy the game and like it? You'll never hear from them.

Anyways, I won't be buying XP's or Spore 2 (unless they really blast the game forwards in depth and longevity).

The easy, intuitive interface seems like it was made for preteens. The problem is that it will be too dumbed-down for competitive gamers who will get bored pretty quick.

I like Spore, I really do, but it was a disappointment for me. They made some design decisions that while I understand why they were done (to appeal to a more casual audience), have taken some of the enjoyment out of the game for me. To get a brief overview of how I feel about each stage

I liked the cell stage. It was generally what I wanted and expected.

The creature stage felt like a collection of mini games. I wanted it to be a tale of survival, I wanted to be thrown into the wild and hunt or be hunted. Instead what I got was a stage where I was essentially forced to dance and sing my way through in order for the AI to not be sycophantically hostile in the space stage (more on that in a second). It also felt like I was grinding my way through the creature stage. I wanted my creature to look a certain way and in order to achieve this look, I had to do the same tasks over and over until I found the parts I wanted. Not fun.

The tribal stage was okay. I didn't exactly like it, but I didn't hate it. The main thing preventing me from liking this stage is the lack of depth and strategy required to succeed. Easy mode, normal mode, or hard mode, it doesn't matter, I know I'm going to win, the game knows I'm going to win, but I'm still required to go through the motions.

Then we have the civilization stage. My feelings for this stage are about the same as they are for the tribal stage, although I did enjoy this stage slightly more.

Then, we have the space stage. Is it possible to love something but hate it at the same time? I love the sense of scale. If you ever thought we humans on Earth were important, spore helps you to realize that this isn't the case. It's pretty cool that a game is able to get people to realize this.

In any case, space is by far my favorite stage, I feel like the space stage is the actual game and the previous four stages were mere tutorials for space. There are a number of problems with this stage, though, and subsequently, while it's by far my favorite stage, it's also the most disappointing.

The biggest problem with Space is the AI. Let's examine exactly what happens here:

- Player goes out into space
- Player meets empire
- Empire demands money
- Player, having just started the game, has no money. Player rejects demands
- Empire declares war on player
- Empire invades a colony.
- Player rushes to defend colony. Ensue boring minigame in which player dies a great many times having to defend said colony because players ship isn't upgraded at all
- Player manages to kill off the invaders! Yay!
- Five minutes later, empire invades colony
- Player rushes to defend colony. Ensue boring minigame in which player dies a great many times having to defend said colony because players ship isn't upgraded at all
- Player manages to kill off the invaders! Yay!
- Five minutes later, empire invades colony . . .

You see where I'm going with this. It's impossible to dig yourself out of that situation because five minutes is not enough time to get anything done. If you ignore the alien attacks, the aliens will either capture or destory your colonies.

Remember before how I said that if your too hostile early on, you encounter hostility in space? I had to go back and replay the first four stages, essentially dancing and singing my way through (tons of fun :rolleyes:). I even chose easy mode this next time around compared to the normal mode I started with. Well, the same things still happened, albeit on a somewhat smaller scale. In the end, I did manage to break my way out of that ruthless cycle, I now have defense satellites that do an okay job at fending off attacks, but I'm still not enjoying the space stage as much as I could be.

The problem now is that you once again have to rush to the defense of colonies, but this time it isn't against alien attacks - it's against virus' that have the potential to destroy the ecosystem on your worlds. This is another boring minigame that you're forced to do. They aren't as frequent as the alien invasions, but they are extremely annoying. I expected the space game to be a sandbox game, not babysit your colonies by doing repetitive boring minigames over and over.

Finally, another major problem I see in the space stage - You have no incentive to owning a lot of colonies. You have to zoom in to each individual colony to collect spice, then zoom in to other colonies to sell that spice. This makes it so that you only need a handful of worlds to obtain the maximum amount of spice production. An easy fix would have been to make it so each colony gives you a small amount of spice automatically without having to zoom in and talk to the colony. The maximum amount of spice that you can hold could have then been removed and bam, you now have an incentive to having a lot of colonies. In my game right now, I would expand, but I honestly see no reason to.

Oh, and we need long range communicators. Having to scroll all the way in just to talk to a colony is silly. And while I'm complaining about space, the reward for getting to the center of the galaxy is lame.

So I guess to answer the question, yes, Spore was a disappointment to me in that there are a lot of things I dislike. There are a lot of things that could have been improved. I still like the game, though, despite all that stuff.

Well, I am a casual gamer, and I can say without equivocation: Spore is the best game I've ever played. Best as in most fun, anyway - it certainly isn't as polished or complex as Civ. But it's simple enough to be playable without getting overwhelmed (as I was by all versions of Civ), and so, as Dale said, it's going to sell well.

Cell is awesome. Creature is pretty good, although I'd like to see stacking bonuses for extra body parts, too, just so long as they were on a curve (i.e. you couldn't add twelve legs to your creature and dash across the entire map in four seconds). Tribe, IMO, is great, although it's the first time I've ever played that sort of game. Civ isn't as interesting as Tribe, but it's still entertaining enough to get by on. I haven't played Space much yet.

Another thing I would add is a harder difficulty setting or three. Not for my own use, but so competitive gamers could have a go too. Maybe then they'd stop chucking words like 'dumbed-down' and 'retarded' around. However much you may despise the casual gamer, remember this: there are more of us. :p

I faced this dilemma with Road to War (BtS mod).

Do I keep the mod at a certain level to appeal to 100,000 casual players, or do I add the complexity and difficulty to keep 1000 grognards happy?

I chose the bigger number of course, which earned me enough flaming in the RtW forums here. :)

It's just that when you're so passionate about gaming, and you are so engrossed by an upcoming product, and spend so much time thinking about it, reading about it beforehand, and you get disappointment due to designs made to please a greater mass of people who just heard about the game a week ago, you can't help but feel rather cheated. But then, what can we do against the power of PROFIT.

There are many disappointments with Spore
Space the bad.
-No way to save when you even get a hint of impending attacks or be able to start a new game until you finish the whole space game itself.
-Judging the height and level of your ship to attack other ships
-3 or more ships on 1 (when you haven't had time to build strength or more ships)
-the annoying "alien simish" you have a universal translator but that doesn't help we the players
-The colonies should be automatic.
Space the good
Its enormous and looks great.
some of the gadgets and finds along the way are charming.
In some way it reminds me of a semi 3d galaxion/asteriods and the game Sid Miers Pirates.
Anyway, yes I am annoyed and the let down by the lack of depth it could easily have been.and feel conned, glad I payed a lot cheaper than it was, even then it isn't worth that kind of money (as it is) shouldn't need expansions to get more parts or depths.
Glad I have a new whiz bang machine, but I could have battled on with the old one for a bit longer- but to play spore I needed heaps more power in CPU and graphics.
which is wrong for families having to spend the same $500 -$900.
Still I have enjoyed the simple play through of the game until space.and the creative self made parts.
Where I wanted depth but the freedom to do what I want without being hammered.
The space stage will not appeal to casual players the way it is.
I cannot see why Spore didn't stick to a realistic simulation of a creature.and evolution traits and actions that mattered. It would have been more rewarding even for children
to go back and think what their creatures needed to be stronger and survive.
The Spore we got is bubblegum, The spore that was envisioned and hinted at could have been awesome.

There are many disappointments with Spore
Space the bad.
-No way to save when you even get a hint of impending attacks or be able to start a new game until you finish the whole space game itself.


Press ESC to bring up the main menu and click SAVE GAME.

And you can start a new game whenever you want. Just click on a new planet in the main screen.

Well I tried options -main menu and the save part is blanked out, until after battle or you are restarted.
-from the main menu to start a new game on a new planet= CIV and Space are blanked out(even though I completed CIV?) will try the ESC key and see if that is different.

The creature stage felt like a collection of mini games. I wanted it to be a tale of survival, I wanted to be thrown into the wild and hunt or be hunted. Instead what I got was a stage where I was essentially forced to dance and sing my way through...

:dance::whipped: DANCE FOR YOUR MICROSCOPIC LIFE!!! :p

(just a little play on phrase of what someone said during a live video feed of the cell phase, except it was run instead of dance).

I cannot see why Spore didn't stick to a realistic simulation of a creature.and evolution traits and actions that mattered. It would have been more rewarding even for children
to go back and think what their creatures needed to be stronger and survive.
The Spore we got is bubblegum, The spore that was envisioned and hinted at could have been awesome.

I agree. 3 1/2 years ago, I would've rated this game a 10 in terms of how much I want it. It's been decreasing steadily (about 1 point a year) since. Anyway, from what I've seen in live video feeds of the game (I've watched maybe 10+ hours total)...

Cell - Seems to be the most fun stage for some reason. Although, I wouldn't have put a limitation on carnivore/omnivore/herbivore. For me, that really takes out 2/3rds of the experimentation in creature (i.e., switching from carnivore to herbivore - and being an omnivore at first doesn't count).

Creature - It just doesn't quite seem like what Wil showed us. Playing peaceful seems a bit boring (I think I was starting to fall asleep watching someone play peacefully by charming and dancing). If it were me, I would have kept in how creature size and limb placement affect the creature. I was hoping this would be included for experimentation. Now, a top-heavy 1-legged creature does just as well as a normal 4 legged creature. I don't think scaled mouths, limbs, wings, etc. do anything special, either. (i.e., a small carnivore mouth should not be as powerful as the same mouth that's scaled to the max). Creatures with 1 wing shouldn't even be able to fly, either.

Tribe/Civ - The two almost seemed similar in a way (I didn't get to see much of Tribal). I think it this could have been better had it been a bit more like Starcraft instead of Civ - rather, more Starcraft elements. Starcraft does well on having the player collect things (gas, basic mineral) on a small scale.

Space - I was really hoping this would be a sandbox more than it seemed like a Galatic Trade Wars game. Maybe I was hoping for the days of SimLife, SimEarth, and even SimCity. It seems Maxis has gone the path of simplicity with Sims. Now, instead of experimenting with creatures on a new planet, a planet feels more like walking through a zoo. There's no fun or challenge seeing if my top-heavy herbivore creature (maybe with some defensive weaponry) can outrun a small, sleak carnivore.

I just wished that I could play SimLife and SimEarth on a WinXP system (and have them use the several gigs of RAM max -- which would make the Desert to Jungle scenario (mainly, the seasonal timer) in SimEarth go really fast! :D).

It can be much, much more. It WAS much, much more in 2005.

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=8372603330420559198&ei=QBvNSN6FGoLOrgLDv-jXAg&q=Spore

Obviously two things have happened; both of which EA has admitted to doing on purpose.

1) The game was very purposely dumbed down. Really, really dumbed down. Remark from Will Wright specifically stated they rather sell more copies than make a lasting, challenging experience that might not appeal to everyone.

2) The game was sectioned off for expansion packs. A lot of expansion packs.

Think for a minute about the evolution present in game. The placement of the legs, arms, mouths, don't mean anything. Since all the parts were given numbered traits, they all have the same effect once placed somewhere on the body. That's completely against any type of thought and made that way so anyone without a brain in their skull could make a creature. It used to be, as shown in those videos, that the placement and body structure mattered and you would have to adapt your creature to its changing surroundings.

News-Flash- There are no changes in surroundings and your creature becomes COMPLETELY irrelevant only 40 % into the game. How is that supposed to be fun or rewarding?

That was a pre rendered video. And duh will would like to sell more copies, people are so evil when they do their job. If you don't like it become a critically acclaimed glme creator and make what you like.

Maybe W.W will make a Sim life/earth and everything- S.L.E one day.
Editors with place mountain,volcano, river, storm, clouds and swamp etc
planet size topography climate .
Creatures with brain size agility etc
I reckon he would be kind of feeling he has been stifled by EA.

That was a pre rendered video. And duh will would like to sell more copies, people are so evil when they do their job. If you don't like it become a critically acclaimed glme creator and make what you like.

The GDC 2005 video wasn't prerendered...

Well Spore has really failed on me now.
I tried to play space stage "friendly" and strayed on to just one wrong world (because I could not build up colonies or make spice or find spice for enough profit to terraform or build colony's .oe even outfit the 1 colony I had, couldn't add factories or even turrets to it? Got to commodore level.
Gained a couple of "finds" which did little good fought off a couple of home planet attacks which then became more ferocious, fought them off got blown up respawned 10x fought them off even gained "you can now build another ship" but no where in home planet to be able to make/buy or find this extra ship.
I thought well hey I earned it where is this extra ship to fend off 6 or more attackers all the time?
So I cheated -"moremoney "that didn't allow to buy another ship or anything.
So I tried to start a new space game -nope all blanked out except CELL Creature or tribe only options. So I then deleted my space stage and my planet blew up! Gone!

Can only start from cell and go through all again? well no, The sing/ dance/ Disney stuff has become old.I don't feel like going through all the stages to gain parts
at the moment. This time starting creature as an omnivore it can only sing not even pose or dance, huh?

There are many disappointments with Spore
Space the bad.
-No way to save when you even get a hint of impending attacks or be able to start a new game until you finish the whole space game itself.
-Judging the height and level of your ship to attack other ships
-3 or more ships on 1 (when you haven't had time to build strength or more ships)
-the annoying "alien simish" you have a universal translator but that doesn't help we the players
-The colonies should be automatic.
Space the good
Its enormous and looks great.
some of the gadgets and finds along the way are charming.
In some way it reminds me of a semi 3d galaxion/asteriods and the game Sid Miers Pirates.
Anyway, yes I am annoyed and the let down by the lack of depth it could easily have been.and feel conned, glad I payed a lot cheaper than it was, even then it isn't worth that kind of money (as it is) shouldn't need expansions to get more parts or depths.
Glad I have a new whiz bang machine, but I could have battled on with the old one for a bit longer- but to play spore I needed heaps more power in CPU and graphics.
which is wrong for families having to spend the same $500 -$900.
Still I have enjoyed the simple play through of the game until space.and the creative self made parts.
Where I wanted depth but the freedom to do what I want without being hammered.
The space stage will not appeal to casual players the way it is.
I cannot see why Spore didn't stick to a realistic simulation of a creature.and evolution traits and actions that mattered. It would have been more rewarding even for children
to go back and think what their creatures needed to be stronger and survive.
The Spore we got is bubblegum, The spore that was envisioned and hinted at could have been awesome.
That's why they're adding expansion packs :)

But yeah, I see your point. I watched some of the 05 demos, and it felt a lot more like what Spore could've been.

I haven't actually played yet, but what I find most apealing about spore is the user content sharing, which so far I haven't heard any complaints about.
This is one thing they did really well.

I want to pose a simple question. Did Spore achieve what it set out to?
You mean "teh best game evar"?
Nope. It's not good and I'd hesitate to call it 'above average'. The game is about as fun, deep and replayable as a coloring book. I guess you could enjoy it if you're 6 years old

It's gonna be a massive success, in that it will sell like hotcakes. It's just a shame that the game has so many flaws...

The only reason Spore will be successful is because it's the only game in town right now. There hasn't been anything new on the store shelves PC wise for a while. Four years ago it would have sunk under the competition.

I think spore is O.K. but they really missed an opportunity to make it a great first experience. I don't see myself bothering with expansions because I've lost faith in the process. It's too late to make this 'the best game ever' in my opinion. You really only get one shot at that.

I've played Spore for a full week now, I didn't come to it with a ton of expections as I only jumped on the bandwagon a few months before release. I think the game is good, but definitely not for the hardcore gamer, this is for casual play. It's dumbed down, at times frustrating (I'm in space stage, constantly having to go back to home planet to defend against attacks), but it's a good game. Just keep in mind that it's for casual play.

I agree with cephalo in that I probably will not bother with expansions.

Well, I've had the game for 3 days now, and it's still very engrossing. I enjoy it massively if I treat it more like a story and less like a game, which is how I usually play.

BTW, I'm planning to start an AAR at some point.

Anyway, I would say that Spore, while not all it could be, is still an amazing game.

I said in another thread a few days ago that when the "new game" feel wears off, I'd be able to give a proper opinion. The "new game" feel has now worn off and the review is not good.

The spore that we got is the same to what spore should have been the same as simcity societies is to a proper simcity game. It's been dumbed down to attract the casual gamer.

This kind of thing is one of the main drawbacks of Nintendo's successes with the Wii and DS. As a result of them, it is not the same world as far as gaming is concerned that it was in 2005 when Spore was announced.

The variety of gamers has changed so much that 99% of people who were gamers before the Wii and DS are now categorised (rightfully or wrongfully)as "hardcore" gamers even those who would have considered themselves casual in 2005.

Similarily anyone who goes onto forums to discuss games (i.e. everyone here) is included (again rightfully or wrongfully) under the umbrella of "hardcore" gamers by marketing divisions everywhere.

The one thing that they got right is that we want:

Games that are long enough to play for a while
Good graphics
Interesting Storylines
Interesting Decisions
Variety within the game
Online Multiplayer


However we are now far outnumbered by the new casual gamer who want:

Something that is cheap
Something that can be left under the telly
Something that can be played 30 minutes at a time.
4+ multiplayer at the same place


In fact we are so much in the miniority that we are often completely ignored. Spore was changed from targeting us (in 2005, the only market) to targeting casual gamers (now a much larger market than us) because EA values money and a new market more than the old market.

Apart from its dumbing down, my other major problem with Spore is the DRM. It is not okay to allow 3 installs only. Again this affects us (more likely to buy a computer every 2 years and probably have more than one anyway) more compared to casual gamers who buy a new computer when the old one breaks.
However because we all went out and bought Spore, EA will think that people don't care about the 3 installs limit and will keep using it in newer games.

I was so disappointed by Spore that I went out and bought myself a proper game, by finally replacing my broken Simcity 4 disc (it's broken 2 years at this stage) so that I'd have something I didn't have last week that's good to play.

A final comment:
Every stage has a game that does it better than Spore:

Cell - flow
Creature - The Sims?
Tribal - Populus
Civilization - Simcity/Civilization/Pick a RTS
Space - GalCiv

The more I see of Spore the more I think there's a lot of unrealized potential there. They need to completely do away with SecuRom and open up the game to a deeper level of modding so that you can drastically change the experience like how you can with CIV.

The reasoning behind getting rid of SecuRom is simple, it produces "bad vibes" and distracts developers from making a better game. Instead of worrying about piracy be more concerned about wowing your customers so much they're glad to pay you.

Open the game up to modding so that users can not only produce content but alter how the game plays. Unleash the creativity to the point where it has no restrictions.

Regarding Tonyf12's post. It's kind of scary. I hope you're not entirely right. I mean, before 2000-2003 or so, people who played games were all "hardcore gamers" by the modern definition, as you say so well. I hope that rising popularity in video games doesn't mean that people who have been playing them forever will have less and less quality products coming out, especially by the big companies. Sure, there will always be a company like Stardocks or I dunno what, catering to us, but we need big productions of quality, no? ...

I said in another thread a few days ago that when the "new game" feel wears off, I'd be able to give a proper opinion. The "new game" feel has now worn off and the review is not good.
...SNIP....


Excellent review, and largely how I feel about the game.

I however enjoyed cell phase quite a bit and love the simple "eat or be eaten" nature of the phase. And creature has a lot of charm but yes, could've been expanded in certain areas. But tribal, civ and space are just downright SH$T!

Was reading the "development of Spore" article on Wikipedia and found this:

"According to Wright, the Spore development team was broken into two camps, the "Cute" camp that wanted to skew the game's focus towards a The Sims-type of game, and the "Science" camp that wanted to keep the game as realistic as possible. The final version was more or less a compromise between the two; Wright stated, "We ended up with a very nice balance of the two factors.""

I'm pretty sure I disagree with Will Wright on the "nice balance".

Also, you probably know that "Spore" was the working title for the game and that it was supposed to be called "Sim Everything". Well I'm glad it's not called "Sim Everything" 'cause I can't think of very many things that feel like simulation in Spore.

A more appropriate title would be:

Sim Everything!
Well not really everything, only the linear evolution of the physical components of land animals disregarding intelligence, technology, chaos theorims, scatter algorithms, "survival of the fitest", and the Westernised representation of the last 100 years of human evolution disregarding ~10,000 years between simple hunter/gatherer tribes and modernisation, as well as the complete lack of any form of intelligence in the game whether it be as a model within the game or intelligence in the form of NPC actions.

But then I assume the box wouldn't be big enough to hold that. :p

Well, there's a lot of unused space on the Galactic Edition box. :p

But then again, Sim Linear Evolution of the Physical Components of Land Animals Disregarding Intelligence, Technology, Chaos Theorems, Scatter Algorithms, "Survival of the Fittest",and the Westernized Representation of the Last 100 Years of Human Evolution Disregarding About 10,000 years Between Simple Hunter/Gatherer Tribes and Modernization, as Well as the Complete Lack of any Form of Intelligence in the Game Whether it Be as a Model Within the Game or Intelligence in the Form of NPC Actions.

doesn't exactly roll of the tongue that good.

Um, so after the Spore DRM/not-as-expected-gameplay debacle, I think I finally understand why people were so scared of the EA Take-Two takeover. Aaaaah! I understand the extent of the freaking out.

Well I'll be......... it appears the DRM protest may have worked slightly.....

http://www.neoseeker.com/news/8809-spore-drm-protests-they-actually-worked-/

DRM for Red Alert 3 will be "eased". It's still there, but not as draconian as Spore's.

The GDC 2005 video wasn't prerendered...

Was tooooooooo.

Read my recent post:

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showpost.php?p=7248954&postcount=14

I did buy the game out of hype but considering it's flaws I wish I hadn't.

Seriously... it's not appealing enough.
You're also forgetting the HARDCORE gamers are more likely buy the game more than casual gamers.
I showed my mom (knowing she loves The Sims), and she wasn't interested.

They turned down Civ 4 (which is a hardcore game).

So the odds of those 100,000 causal gamers are 1 out of 16 of those buying a game.
That only leaves the hardcore gamers, and we as hardcore gamers are upset and disappointed.

Its a bit pointless arguing about hardcore and causal gamers as there are plenty of categories in between. Hardcore for me would be someone who buys plenty of games and spends plenty of time playing them. Causal gamers seem to be people who wouldn't normally buy computer games but happen to have one of two which would potentially leave moderate gamers as the biggest group.

This thread has basically put me off buying Spore although I might get it if its ever cheap or they release a bundle.

If 'hardcore games' means anyone who's been around before the Wii... how do we differentiate a typical specimen from one who spent years mastering their roguelike of choice, who can forget actually playing a game since crunching the numbers of the mechanics is as much fun, who balks at inelegant balance fixes even if they work, and who'd pay full price for some 15-year-old classics if only they came with the bugs straightened out and a decent AI?

I had high hopes for Spore because it could have become a game geek's dream, but it seems like it became the victim of rampant oversimplification. I'd have preferred a more organic approach, with placement of parts mattering and a ton more options (slower or faster metabolism for power vs. food economy etc).

Tweaking until you get it right is much more fun to me than grinding until you have the full set; apparently the latter seems to have become the norm: there's still a 'challenge' for people to enjoy but you don't actually need any skill or even to think about it.

Games used to be alot more complex and the targeted market were adults and "mature" kids (read "literate and inteligent" kids). Games used to be fun back then. Not only PC games, but other kinds also. Take for example the Warhammer (FB/40k) tabletop game. Its getting really dumbed down..

Now, as someone pointed out in other words, we are "those guys", the ones that always complain and bash half-baked moronic products that litter the gaming industry.. And suddenly we are not important anymore, there are others who bill buy crap and be happy about it, because they don`t know any better. And with each new game it gets worse..

If it was just me and my generation, I would think it`s a sign of me growing up enough to stop being interested in games. But there are plenty of people I knew who were in their late twenties 10 years ago, and who loved games with a passion. They still play them, and like me, they are getting more and more disappointment for their money.

I have been waiting for Spore since the very first announcements in PC magazines years ago, and again, like someone said in this thread, with each year of development I liked it less..

There will probably be spin offs, Mods or expansions- spore evolution and spore civ.
This is just the base game like sims 1 or civilization.
I hope...meanwhile it has fun aspects and creativity unheard of in any other games.
conquer the space stage and then say it is "oversimplified"

now now now. As long as paradox interactive is around, a lot of the audience here is going to have some fun. :D

How 'bout:

SPOREFor ages 3 and up

:mischief:

Games used to be alot more complex and the targeted market were adults and "mature" kids (read "literate and inteligent" kids).

'Literate'? Now come on, saying that the sort of people who would buy Spore are 'illiterate' is going a bit far, don't you think?

In order to enjoy Spore, you have to think of it as a story. Someone (Iggy?) already said it in another thread. Problem is, the game tries to get in the way of that as well - stages like Cell and Civ are pretty samey, no matter how you play.

I'm sure that Spore will get improved, probably through expansion packs unfortunately but it's better than nothing. For now, this thread's become a parody of what it was supposed to be. 'Literate' indeed.

I have been waiting for Spore since the very first announcements in PC magazines years ago, and again, like someone said in this thread, with each year of development I liked it less..

Then you should know by now games never turn out like they are hyped to be,even CIV4 is a 2d game, with a possible 3d attack pieces/city view.
I was extremely disappointed, but found it reminiscent of civ 1 and the game play good.
Spore is 3d and creatures are slowly evolving,maybe not accurate with all the nuances of real life, but what game ever fits real life?
Yes there was hype and promises and "sea monkeys" in a box.but we are not yet at that stage in computing power, I guess.
enjoy it or not for what it is, or wait until your 50 for something that approximates real life in a computer.

Civ4's "3d" almost killed the game for me because I could barely play it on my computer, and only after I bought a new top-of-the-line computer could I enjoy the actual game without the graphical slowdown making me hate it.


And the possibility of me buying Spore is zero, thanks to the extreme DRM, and the simplification of the whole thing.

"Spore is 3d and creatures are slowly evolving,maybe not accurate with all the nuances of real life, but what game ever fits real life?"

Evolution plays no role in this game, as everytime you want you can change everything in your creature. From wat saw it's more like a 3D tamagochi.

I have to say I was moderately disappointed originally with the game. I had much higher expectations for the civilization phase and imagined something like Galatic Civilizations for space and Civ4 for the civilization phase. In retrospect, that would probably be quite a lot to handle. I have been impressed by the creature and spore phases, which have been great fun. While I don't enjoy the game as much as I do games from Paradox Interactive, I've still found myself at 3 AM still playing after nearly 12 hours. I can't recall a single moment where I just sat back stunned by the game, but it's obviously been enjoyable the whole way through.

How 'bout:

SPOREFor ages 3 and up

:mischief:



'Literate'? Now come on, saying that the sort of people who would buy Spore are 'illiterate' is going a bit far, don't you think?

In order to enjoy Spore, you have to think of it as a story. Someone (Iggy?) already said it in another thread. Problem is, the game tries to get in the way of that as well - stages like Cell and Civ are pretty samey, no matter how you play.

I'm sure that Spore will get improved, probably through expansion packs unfortunately but it's better than nothing. For now, this thread's become a parody of what it was supposed to be. 'Literate' indeed.

I was talking about games in general...

This.. Generation "u" kids are the targeted market for almost all games. Children who, let me quote a siqnature I saw somewhere, "type out their damn words" have a higher probability of understanding and enjoying a more complex game.

Everything gets dumbed down for the kids, we say. Thats because kids today are alot more dumber - because the system lets them be dumb. The system is bad. It will ruin us. In other words, Spore is a herald of Armageddon, we are all doomed. :p

Or perhaps kids these days are playing games at a far earlier age than ever before? And gaming is becoming a far more prevelant form of entertainment for younger children and their parents have the cash to buy them?

Evolution plays no role in this game, as everytime you want you can change everything in your creature. From wat saw it's more like a 3D tamagochi.

The game would be pretty boring if you had to wait for chance mutations in order to do anything.

Earning and spending 'DNA points' is probably the closest you can realistically get to evolution while still keeping it as a game and not a 'science simulator' (unless you wanted to introduce some sort of Lamarckian system, similar to the way you earn badges in Space, but that'd be just as unrealistic).

The game would be pretty boring if you had to wait for chance mutations in order to do anything.

Earning and spending 'DNA points' is probably the closest you can realistically get to evolution while still keeping it as a game and not a 'science simulator' (unless you wanted to introduce some sort of Lamarckian system, similar to the way you earn badges in Space, but that'd be just as unrealistic).

It doesn't need to take forever. At least make the parts I get related to activities I performed.

Yeah, that's Lamarckian, if I've understood it correctly. Like, if a giraffe reaches and reaches for apples in high trees, over time it will evolve a longer neck?

Problem is, that's not how evolution works, either. You get the chance mutations, and the useful ones survive. That could technically be represented by your suggestion (because good mutations for frequently-performed activities would lead to higher survival rates) but it would be... guess what? Simplistic. Dumbed-down. :lol:

Your creature's body has basically no importance in the game. Pretty much end of the story there.

I was talking about games in general...

This.. Generation "u" kids are the targeted market for almost all games. Children who, let me quote a siqnature I saw somewhere, "type out their damn words" have a higher probability of understanding and enjoying a more complex game.

Everything gets dumbed down for the kids, we say. Thats because kids today are alot more dumber - because the system lets them be dumb. The system is bad. It will ruin us. In other words, Spore is a herald of Armageddon, we are all doomed. :p

That's right. You all better enjoy that space stage while you can, because that's as close as this species is ever gonna get.:cringe:

Evolution should have featured (more). IMO, there should be very few creatures plugged straight into the game (at least, not on your home planet). Things should start off simple like your cell/ceature, and evolve according to certain logical rules (certain responses to what is causing them most injury/deaths). The user content can act as 'targets' which creatures evolve towards, but the end result is something cross-bred with the conditions on your own planet, which can then be uploaded and shared again... Yes, the game should generate its own creatures! With much branching out in different directions, as well as mass extinctions...

I'd tolerate less freedom in designing creatures, in order to see this happen - a world that actually evolves as you play. Why not have the land surface gradually shifting, rising and falling too? The technology already exists in the game engine, as seen in the terraforming tools in the space age. All basic 'Parts' should be available, and you can buy more advanced parts in your next generation, instead of randomly searching for mystical skeletons. And needless to say, species should have populations that rise and fall also, sometimes swarming in huge numbers, and be able to migrate across the planet. And when you lay an egg, it should just be for increasing population. Only if you have gained enough new DNA and if enough time has passed should you be able to click on your egg to evolve the next generation. Maybe you’d be searching for a mate with some slight mutation you’d want for your offspring…

So many what ifs!!!

Anyways, my actual main gripe is with the three stages after the creature phase. Today I had an epic session of installing and playing some old games - Rise of Nations, Ground Control II, Startopia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Startopia), Warlords III and Galactic Civilizations #1. Startopia and GC2 in particular had really nice 3D graphics without being too demanding on hardware (a breeze on my new PC). They really put the civ stage in Spore to shame in terms of detail on screen. And in terms of gameplay, I'm also thinking back to games that were out 10 years ago – like Settlers III and Populous: The Beginning (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Populous) (one of my favourite games of all, with people living on 3D spherical planets, just a shame it doesn't seem to work on any OS above Windows '98 :cry:). And nearly 20 years ago (when I was very little), those early Amiga strategy games like the Populous I, Warmonger and Mega Lo Mania (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mega_Lo_Mania), which had simplicity (out of necessity) but depth and replayability too.

From creatures to space, there's just so much out there they could have copied from - game concepts that have already been thought out and tested for decades - while still kept things relatively simple. Although I do enjoy Spore, it's really a shame to think what could have been. As other's have said, its bitter-sweet.

/rant

I am just guessing but EA probably saw what Nintendo was doing with their Wii. Which was targeting non-gamers and casual gamers because it is a bigger audience. Now the thing that really kicked me and some others in the *alls is that we thought after 2-3 years of waiting it was going to get more complex and "better" but it was dumbed down (I don't really care about the "cute" graphics as long as it had blood for added realism). So I don't think it was a failure but it was overhyped by hardcore gamers.

Well, I think once they got players emotionally involved with the creature phase, they could have pushed the boundaries a bit in the later game :)

Your creature's body has basically no importance in the game. Pretty much end of the story there.

I don't understand. Do you mean that the actual shape of the body itself (i.e. the spine part, not the legs/arms) has no effect? I'd imagine that's so the online Sporepedia doesn't end up with millions of the same creature, but you have a point. Does being tall allow herbivores to reach fruit higher up?

Evolution should have featured (more). IMO, there should be very few creatures plugged straight into the game (at least, not on your home planet). Things should start off simple like your cell/ceature, and evolve according to certain logical rules (certain responses to what is causing them most injury/deaths). The user content can act as 'targets' which creatures evolve towards, but the end result is something cross-bred with the conditions on your own planet, which can then be uploaded and shared again... Yes, the game should generate its own creatures! With much branching out in different directions, as well as mass extinctions...

That would be more realistic, but it wouldn't be fun. In fact, it'd be a chore. A game where the only way to win is by dying lots of times? Plus, it's exploitable, because dying is a very easy thing to do.

To be honest, I don't fully understand the criticisms of the Creature stage (apart from the lack of stacked bonuses, that could've been workable). It's not as if you click on a skeleton on the ground and voila! You have wings! In order to get the wings onto your creature, you have to get DNA points, and in order to get those, you need to complete tasks like alliance (proto-domestication/animal husbandry) and exctinction (hunting). These are the steps on the road to sentience. It's not very realistic, but it doesn't deserve accusations like '3D Tamagotchi'.

That said, it would be cool to see swarms of creatures migrating across the map. But we have to think about computer specs - is the average computer going to be able to handle that?

Well for a pseudo-realistic evolution game

1. you get Food points to increase your species population (the other members of your species wanders and gets food points too.. they will tend to follow your lead in terms of cooperating or competing with others for food)

2. Each species accumulates DNA points based on its total population, once a species has enough DNA points, it spawns a New species. If you control the species, then you can decide when the DNA points will get used to make a new species and HOW they will get used (there is a also a maximum number of DNA points that CAN be used in making a new species, the rest of the DNA points are left with the old species). If you make a new species, you lose control of the old species and need to get food points for your existing species.


3. Also You could select for a % of the DNA spent to be Random when making a new species. So when a new species is made, you can only spend a fraction, the rest of the DNA points are spent making other changes (although none that reverse the effect of the changes you made)

The Random % could either be a setting at the beginning of the game [Design v. Darwin] and/or things cost less when Random points are spent on them

Once the new species was made (with both Designed and Random characteristics) then you would chose whether to take control of the new species or the old one.

4. The division shouldn't be food/friend it should be competitor/cooperator. (so the interactions are ... fight with prey for food, fight with competitor to keep food for yourself, charm partner to share food)

5. If your species died, then you would take control of the nearest "relative" still alive



A similar model could be used for the other stages, each would have Evolutionary stages where one X developed out of another
so in Civ one government/Empire would develop from the breakdown of another and attempt to replace the previous empire (Greece, Rome, England, America, the various Dynasties of China, etc.)

so

Creature: basic resource=food, advanced resource=DNA
You control one creature and other creatures of that species act independently (but they follow your pattern)
creatures collect food for the species as a whole,
Food -> Pop size,
Pop size->DNA,
DNA-> New species
Parts unlocked would depend on parts you currently had... so redesign would be constant
[New species starts of with a pop of 1 creature]
Tribe level would be accessed when you built a species with the parts required for intelligence+tool use

Tribe....Basic resource=Labor, Advanced Resource=Social
You control one tribe and other tribes of that region act independently
Pop units of the tribe Either collect food or build tools
Food->pop growth
Tools->improve efficiency of activities, including increasing maximum population/number of territories a Tribe can control
Pop size->Social
Social->New Tribe
Tools unlocked for New Tribes would depend on Tools the previous tribe had and parts neighboring tribes had.
Social points must be spent to make "unlocked" tools "buildable" for a New Tribe
[New Tribes start off with 1 Territory, and the population of that Territory]
A Tribe has Territories and Population...
When a Tribe conquers or allies with a Territory that it cannot control, two new Tribes are formed. Each new Tribe gets a portion of the "foreign" Tribe's Tools unlocked for it
The population of a MultiTerritory Tribe is divided equally among its Territories
Civ level would be accessed once you have control of all neighboring Territories


Civ...Basic resource='Spice', Advanced resource=Ideas
You control all the cities + vehicles of an Empire
Vehicles/Cities (controlled by your actions) collect 'Spice',
'Spice'->Vehicles->Cities through conquest/conversion,
Cities->Ideas,
Ideas->New Empires

Buildings are the 'Parts' of cities, all cities in your Empire would have the same types of buildings giving the Empire its characteristics (social and technological) like the parts of Creatures.
Buildings would unlock based on the buildings you currently had in your cities.
Vehicle Parts would continuously unlock as Idea levels built up based on which parts were in use on your Vehicles.
[New empires would start with some fraction of the Old Empires cities.. depending on how many of the Old Empires Buildings were removed, so you if you want to remove the Old Empire buildings, you need to breakaway and fight them. If you are just adding buildings, then you will only have a few Luiddite cities to put down.]
Conquering/Allying with a new city would get some of its Buildings unlocked for your Empire.
Forming a New Empire would allow spending Ideas to design your cities by adding or modifying Buildings that have been unlocked, removing them requires no Idea spending, but it provides extra Idea points in exchange for less cities for the new empire.

Space would be reached once you unlocked certain vehicle and Building components

That does sound like a great idea Krikkitone!

They got it more or less right for the cell stage; here creature design actually makes a bit of difference. Shame it's only enough to fill a coffee break.

Here, design actually has a bit of an effect.for example...
Electrocution in the back, spike on the front, cilia somewhere for an agile little organism that can turn the table on any aggressor (stun, then poke)...
Fast herbivore with the mouths on the side so it can empty plant clumps while traveling at full speed... interestingly, the game suggested putting the mouth in the front of the cell when I did that. thinking discouraged?

it's possible to find your niche and adapt to it, even if it could have been better. For example, the position of flagellae etc should have influenced how you move - some very simple physics there and a missed opportunity.

***

In comparison, the creature stage feels totally off. There is no continuity; you can change forms like you would a suit and the game even encourages you to do just that. Decisions that have no consequences are meaningless.
Instead of beating up/brown-nosing anything and everything, I would have liked some incentive to pick some species to have symbiotic relationships with and leave others a danger.

Again, having an underlying system that makes sense would have been great (e.g. compact builds mean slower but sturdier organisms, more powerful limbs mean higher metabolic rate and therefore higher food intake etc) instead of a simply collecting stuff and putting it wherever it looks cool (or ridiculous...).

I think the too-friendly design philosophy limits the game. For a life simulator with a supposed emphasis on evolution, natural selection should have been a factor. It would have been fun to see how ridiculous you can make your organisms before they are simply too awkward to live...

I had looked forward to a deep and complex game with dynamic gameplay. Given what we got, I'm not surprised many people apparently find creating penis monsters is the most fun thing you can do with it.

I would agree with your critique, but I still think that the game is definitely worth playing.

Just a quick comment,

That would be more realistic, but it wouldn't be fun. In fact, it'd be a chore. A game where the only way to win is by dying lots of times? Plus, it's exploitable, because dying is a very easy thing to do.

@Catharsis, I didn't mean that. What I meant was, you could still evolve however and whenever you want, but when the AI creature evolves it uses those logical rules I mentioned in order to decide what changes to make to itself.

I thought Spore was enjoyable the first time I played it. The second time was fine, but I can't see myself playing it much in the future.

The fundamental problem as I see it is that the game lacks depth in each of its stages while at the same time encompassing a great deal.

I'm not really interested in "realistic" evolution because I think I think it would be less fun than might be initially conceived. But I felt that there was a missed opportunity for adding real depth particularly for the creature stage.

One of the most disappointing factors is the complete lack of environmental impacts on the course of evolution. I would've had a number of different planetary factors such as gravity, atmosphere, temperature, ocean levels, etc. You could randomize these things or customize your own... This would impact the flora and fauna that would develop... If you're on a cold world or at least a cold latitude, you might want a furry coat instead of a body of slick scales (so in this case textures might actually be important if it's tied into that).

I also felt that they should've included some options for the things that you can't see... such as lungs vs. gills. Of course, to justify such a thing, you'd need an interesting water environment to go along with it, which I felt was also seriously lacking. It seems though that they plan to add that in future expansions.

I would've also liked to see the creatures more scalable. The ability to increase the creature's size (unless I missed something) seemed pretty limited without simply lengthening the limbs to make them taller. Size should increase the ability of the creature to reach different food sources, protect against predators (or if it is a predator increase it's lethality), but the downside should probably be a longer growth period and a greater demand for food for each level the creature is scaled up.

I also thought there could've been some interesting possibilities for nesting/homes and social organization. Every species has exactly the same kind of nest and they all lay eggs (they even lay exactly the same kind of eggs). Nevermind the possibilities for aquatic homes, there could've been creatures that created burrows or nested in trees or on cliffs. Every species in the game uses small packs, but the level of social organization could've ranged from solitary creatures to large herds to bee or ant-like colonies with a rigid heirarchy. Each of these possibilities would come with their own strengths and weaknesses and would practical for animals depending on their food sources and size. A bee-like colony of elephant-sized creatures would probably have difficulty sustaining themselves for example.

Of course, I'm not looking for something that represents the full variety and specialization of nature because that wouldn't be possible. But I felt that for a game that allows you to create such varied creatures, they really don't have a variety of things to do or much variation in how they behave. If you went for combat, you're directed along a narrow line of part choices, and then you pretty much just hack and slash your way to the tribal stage. If you decide to go for social/herbivore, you have an even narrower set of choices and then wash-rinse-repeat those silly little dances for other creatures. And if you pick omnivore, you essentially get the opportunity to not be particularly good at either of those two things. Which is kind of a metaphor for Spore itself which, while beautiful and moderately fun is neither a very good RPG nor a very good RTS.

I also felt that the game was rather stingy with the DNA points. I rarely had enough to make the creature I wanted and instead had to settle on the one I could afford. (If I wanted to feel broke and powerless, I'd go outside! ;) ) But if I worked harder to get more DNA points, I only hastened my passing to the next stage and thus I couldn't really get a chance to enjoy the fruits of my labor... And I felt it was a little silly that parts that served a purely aesthetic purpose cost valuable and indispensible DNA points.

I think that the "mating" factor for initiating the creature developer was an interesting and good idea. That gets a thumbs up, but as someone said already, I didn't like the fact that you could walk into it with one creature and walk out of it with something completely different! I might suggest that instead of having DNA points affecting the total number of available parts, that instead you should accumulate points to determine how dramatically you can alter the creature from one evolution point to the next. It would not only make the game more realistic, it would make it more challenging as well. I felt that letting me jackknife from one strategy to another at will really made the game exceptionally easy. My choices really had no consequences because I could simply go back and overwrite them completely whenever I felt like it.

I won't get into the later stages too much because I think it's rather evident that they lack any real depth in spite of the great customability of the vehicles. Personally, I think if I were developing this game, I would've cut out the last three stages of the game and simply focused on the first two. I think one can reasonably say that it was excessive ambition with limited resources that killed this beast.

the thing is, spore is not even a groundbreaker or pioneer in it's genre. I remember an old game in which you could play with species that could evolve, and it was FAR more indepth then spore as chunked out by EA ever could aspire.

@Dom Pedro II, I strongly agree with your post. I think you said it very well. And I agree there should be limits on how much you can remove in one go, and how far you can move/resize a part that's already attached.

@Krikkitone, I agree that a population count should have figured in the game, with the possibility of going extinct! I wouldn't have you going straight to creature editor every time you laid an egg, I'd make it so the eggs just added to population, unless you deliberately clicked on it to 'evolve'...

@philippe, I also agree, Spore isn't as innovative as most people think :)

Before I was talking about Populous: The Beginning. Thanks to a fan-made patch, I've got this old gem working on my Vista PC. Note this game was out 10 years ago (1998), with 3D planets, buildings, vehicles, hundreds of warriors at once, and dynamic terrain!

http://i28.photobucket.com/albums/c229/Daftpanzer/ptb2.jpg

http://i28.photobucket.com/albums/c229/Daftpanzer/ptb3.jpg

http://i28.photobucket.com/albums/c229/Daftpanzer/ptb4.jpg

http://i28.photobucket.com/albums/c229/Daftpanzer/ptb1.jpg

Before I was talking about Populous: The Beginning. Thanks to a fan-made patch, I've got this old gem working on my Vista PC. Note this game was out 10 years ago (1998), with 3D planets, buildings, vehicles, hundreds of warriors at once, and dynamic terrain!


PopulousTB is one of my favorite RTS's of all time. If you want tribal stage fun, forget Spore and give this a try. The armageddon spell was craaaazy.

I probably would have bought it if it wasn't for the DRM, I was looking for another game to buy and was thinking about spore, but when I realized the restrictions on the game I went for something else.

@Dom Pedro II, I strongly agree with your post. I think you said it very well. And I agree there should be limits on how much you can remove in one go, and how far you can move/resize a part that's already attached.

@Krikkitone, I agree that a population count should have figured in the game, with the possibility of going extinct! I wouldn't have you going straight to creature editor every time you laid an egg, I'd make it so the eggs just added to population, unless you deliberately clicked on it to 'evolve'...

@philippe, I also agree, Spore isn't as innovative as most people think :)

Before I was talking about Populous: The Beginning. Thanks to a fan-made patch, I've got this old gem working on my Vista PC. Note this game was out 10 years ago (1998), with 3D planets, buildings, vehicles, hundreds of warriors at once, and dynamic terrain!


If EA had the license to Populous why didn't they just incorporate that kind of gameplay instead of the crappy tribal stage they have now?

If EA had the license to Populous why didn't they just incorporate that kind of gameplay instead of the crappy tribal stage they have now?

Because EA is not a monolithic organization where everyone moves in lock-step but a corporation with lots of different people each with their own agendas, projects and points of view and those who made Populous probably had nothing to do with Spore... and probably because this game is ten years old and had long since faded from the collective mind of the gaming world in general.

Because EA is not a monolithic organization where everyone moves in lock-step but a corporation with lots of different people each with their own agendas, projects and points of view and those who made Populous probably had nothing to do with Spore... and probably because this game is ten years old and had long since faded from the collective mind of the gaming world in general.

I'm not so sure, the presentation here borrows heavily from Populous TB. I'm thinking they were using it as a template graphics wise. Too bad they copied only the looks, ignoring the fact that what made that game one of the greats was the gameplay.

Populous was designed by a team called Bullfrog, who did a lot of early strategy/god games. They aren't around anymore, some split off to make Lionhead studios which did the Black+White series. I'm not sure if any of them have anything to do with actually making Spore.

Populous was designed by a team called Bullfrog, who did a lot of early strategy/god games. They aren't around anymore, some split off to make Lionhead studios which did the Black+White series. I'm not sure if any of them have anything to do with actually making Spore.

Bullfrog was a great company. I can't remember a bad game coming from them.

Bullfrog was a great company. I can't remember a bad game coming from them.

Theme Park Inc (the third title in the Theme Park series).

That sucked!

But Theme Hospital was simply epic.

this thead makes me want to play populous again, after all those years. (i was so hooked on it when it came out for the playstation)

But Theme Hospital was simply epic.

It was quite fun for a while. That's the game I remember most from Bullfrog. Didn't they do Dungeon Keeper too? That was alright. I can't say many of these games had a very lasting appeal though. Once I'd seen people making puddles of puke in the hospital's hall for a few hours... You know... Populous was the better game.

It was quite fun for a while. That's the game I remember most from Bullfrog. Didn't they do Dungeon Keeper too? That was alright. I can't say many of these games had a very lasting appeal though. Once I'd seen people making puddles of puke in the hospital's hall for a few hours... You know... Populous was the better game.

Theme Hospital is one of very few games that I play over and over again.

I love the bloaty head treatment. :D

Reminds of the guy from men in black. :lol:

It was quite fun for a while. That's the game I remember most from Bullfrog. Didn't they do Dungeon Keeper too? That was alright. I can't say many of these games had a very lasting appeal though. Once I'd seen people making puddles of puke in the hospital's hall for a few hours... You know... Populous was the better game.

I seem to remember it getting insanely difficult past certain point, to the point where the amount of vomit was grotesque. I simply started again at an easier hospital and had a whale of a time! :D

Theme Hospital is one of very few games that I play over and over again.

Same here. I bought a budget copy for about £1.00. Best money I ever spent on a video game. :p

I love the bloaty head treatment. :D

Reminds of the guy from men in black. :lol:

Ah, yes. The bloaty head treatment. Don't forget the monkey man treatment... as I remember it you had to zap a person to remove the monkey hair...

I don't think spore is a failure,I am so enjoying the space stage since the patch.
It is incredible,the best space game I have played.
very much like going from planet to planet exploring and discovering things and even get
guilty if creatures need to be zapped for a virus!
I feel for their evolution.Having the god power of shooting down a terraforming effect is awe inspiring.

damn Will Wright and those money-sucking prostitutes at EA.

I just looked for "Spore replay value" on google.

The first results are somewhat quite bothering for me as i'm quite interested in this game. Plus all those comment about the lack of depth makes me thing that it's a lot like the sims. You enjoy only what you are capable of putting into it.

Basically, in the sims, it's a kind of rince and repeat avery game too. have a guy (or girl) and do what you want with it. The funniest thing for people being designing the house, put the guy into a career top, etc...

Did Spore achieve what it set out to?

Yes. Wright didn't over shoot his promise. I think the failure was the expectation that this was going to be "SimEverything".

Listening to Wright the past years and how he talks about design, this is exactly what he promised and in that regard, he succeeded in what he wanted to make.

Most games are rinse and repeat.
CELL- eat, swim, grow, mate and add parts,like pacman but better, a fish tank screen saver on steroids and interactive. 8/10

CREATURE- run, walk, find, eat kill "like the Sims 2 " and watered down for kids,
Dance, charm and sing spoil it, is also a little too catoonish,(with a little tweaking by clever modder's, Or an adults only patch or expansion.It could be more realistic and closer to the Spore many expected.
-It does have a "feel" to it that you are on another planet. With great 3D and with haunting forest noises,weather-storms/rain. sun cycles through day.And at night, stars and planets revolve in the sky.The ocean surf sounds good too.
added bonus- funny surprises ie: Large roaming mean creatures "Epics" UFO's buzzing and abducting creatures.8/10

TRIBAL- fight, fish, hunt 7/10

CIV -all out brawl but easy (if you are carnivore)6/10

SPACE- The awesome Spore galaxy, to explore and create in!
apart from the annoying pirates and eco disasters and unbalanced Warmongering races.
(the patch helps) I have found no other game where you can change planet climates,
creatures and explore as if you are in startrek,or feel like you have a galaxy at your feet to explore.
This too, with more patches could be much more awesome (with a CIVfanatic mod :)
9/10
THE Creator's are great! make a creature, a space ship, aircraft, vehicles/ boats and houses even factories.Then see them in your game, share and download other peoples.9/10
It will become the best game ever,It is worth getting. and No, it isn't Deep-Yet..

Most games are rinse and repeat.
CELL- eat, swim, grow, mate and add parts,like pacman but better, a fish tank screen saver on steroids and interactive. 8/10

CREATURE- run, walk, find, eat kill "like the Sims 2 " and watered down for kids,
Dance, charm and sing spoil it, is also a little too catoonish,(with a little tweaking by clever modder's, Or an adults only patch or expansion.It could be more realistic and closer to the Spore many expected.
-It does have a "feel" to it that you are on another planet. With great 3D and with haunting forest noises,weather-storms/rain. sun cycles through day.And at night, stars and planets revolve in the sky.The ocean surf sounds good too.
added bonus- funny surprises ie: Large roaming mean creatures "Epics" UFO's buzzing and abducting creatures.8/10

TRIBAL- fight, fish, hunt 7/10

CIV -all out brawl but easy (if you are carnivore)6/10

SPACE- The awesome Spore galaxy, to explore and create in!
apart from the annoying pirates and eco disasters and unbalanced Warmongering races.
(the patch helps) I have found no other game where you can change planet climates,
creatures and explore as if you are in startrek,or feel like you have a galaxy at your feet to explore.
This too, with more patches could be much more awesome (with a CIVfanatic mod :)
9/10
THE Creator's are great! make a creature, a space ship, aircraft, vehicles/ boats and houses even factories.Then see them in your game, share and download other peoples.9/10
It will become the best game ever,It is worth getting. and No, it isn't Deep-Yet..

How could you rate the annoying factor of space stage over the uniqueness of creature stage?
I would rather shoot my foot off with a shotgun and eat the entrails than play the space stage.
The space stage had the most potental in the world, yet it was the most disappointing stage of the game.
If I do have to rate I'd say:
Cell: 8/10
Creature: 8/10
Tribal: 4/10
Civilzation: 5/10
Space: 2/10
Creature Creater 8/10

Overall 45/60

1) For the gamers: Sometimes simpler IS better. For example, take the Space stage. It isn't as challenging as Master of Orion (MOO) II, but it is about a billion times better than the disaster that was MOO3.


May be joining this thread late and responding to an old post, but would like to comment that MoO3 is better than Spore Space in regards to complexity. Thing that sucked the most for that game was the AI, who was unable to do all out attacks, something Spore Space does, but only gives you single ship to take on their fleets. :/

They should have simply made Spore into two different games, one for actual gamers that prefers complexity, automation, intelligent AIs, detph, strategy and etc...and the other for casual gamer dummies.

-mellian

That would have been nice...

1) The game was very purposely dumbed down. Really, really dumbed down. Remark from Will Wright specifically stated they rather sell more copies than make a lasting, challenging experience that might not appeal to everyone.

2) The game was sectioned off for expansion packs. A lot of expansion packs.If all this is true then I can take Spore completely off my radar. I had enough of this with Civ4 (a franchise for which, at one time, no other game could compete for my attention). Even if EA resolves their malware issues, Spore is dead to me if it follows the Civ4 mold.

It is so dumbed down that it sucks. It sucks so much that it actually makes me depressed. Every time I turn it on I get my hopes up, and then get thouroghly enveloped by this soul eating emptyness after about half an hour of playing.
It makes me sick!:vomit:
I feel cheated!:cry:
I am actualy exchanging it for an other game today.:mad:

It is a game for kids. Kids that would gain more by playing with Lego in stead.

The Cell stage is simple fun, where your choices actually matter!

But after playing a few creature games, trying to play it different ways, I've found its all pretty much the same. 'Basic' creatures appear near your nest, but after you kill or ally those you meet tougher ones, and you always need to use the same 'parts' if you want to actually kill/impress anything else. The way things currently work, it simply doesn't matter if you have a one-legged blob or a multi-limbed monstrosity. You have the right kind of part, you get the points. It doesn’t matter how many parts you have, one will do. It doesn’t matter where you place them, either. Body size and shape doesn’t alter anything except visuals. As things stand, the game actually punishes you for adding extra limbs and trying out different things, due to the cost in DNA points. I had a very tough time getting through the creature phase with a 7-limbed creature, because each pair of limbs (you can merge a pair into one central limb) costs 50 DNA points, and hands/feet cost extra ontop of that, while 250 points would have got me a top-rated ‘part’ for attacking or impressing other creatures. I then didn't have the DNA points to spend on the parts you need, in order to achieve things, in order to get more DNA...

Your first game is 'special', when you can believe that the game is evolving due to your input. The graphics are also amazing, if you have a reasonably high-spec machine (I have 3gig ram, quad 2ghz, but lower-end graphics card that struggles with the highest settings of shadows+lighting), and I found my first planet to be very rewarding visually. There is more fun to be had in another couple of games, perhaps trying out carnivore or herbivore routes for the first time, or spending points of wings for flying around instead of walking. But after that, I've found myself losing interest and not really discovering anything new.

Even in the Space stage, after the initial joy of being able to explore strange new worlds and see your homeworld from space, along with all the places you explored as a simple creature, there's only so much variety to be found – probably, less than an hour’s exploring will show you all the main types of planets - and not a lot you can actually 'do' on other worlds. Sure you can terraform them, and seed them with life-forms, to be able to plant more colonies. But it simply doesn’t matter what life-forms you use, so long as they are from the right ‘category’ (small plants, big plants, herbivores, omnivores, etc). And sure, you can change their colours and alter the terrain, if you spend hours doing mini-games and flying around to find all the terraform tools, but that’s purely cosmetic. As is the design of your spaceship, buildings, vehicles…

I’ve yet to find the ‘hologram’ thing that lets you talk to life-forms on planets. But I guess even with that, most of the time, you will just see the random creatures moving randomly from their random spawn points, and running away when you fly too close. You can’t land or get out of your spaceship. I’ve yet to make a large empire and fight in wars, because my first experiences of combat have been pretty depressing – you basically fly, click to fire, fly, and then probably explode. If you’re on your homeworld, you then launch in a new spaceship, to carry on the cycle of pointing, clicking and exploding… Admittedly there is some skill involved, and you can learn to swoop around and dodge incoming fire, but its hardly up to the standard of any decent combat game (same goes for combat in all stages).

I must say I've found tribal stage to be more enjoyable and repayable than most people seem to think. But even that isn’t exactly thrilling in terms of gameplay. Whereas the Civ stage can be pretty horrifying, especially if you are forced into a total war against a military power, while not being a military power yourself, as has happened to me most times. The religious and economic options do add variety, but I’ve rarely been able to make use of them for long, before everything is taken over by military powers. This is a stage you can lose - if you save at the wrong time, you can be stuck in a non-recoverable situation. When you lose, you go back to your last save, potentially to lose again straight away, and go back to your save… That almost happened to me on my first attempt. It’s tempting to spend hours designing vehicles and buildings on your first go, until you realise they display poorly in-game, and vehicle designs don’t actually change the way they behave except for sound effects. All ground vehicles fire blue cannonballs, all aircraft fire lasers, etc. All do roughly the same amount of damage with every shot. All shots hit.

I’d also hesitate to compare it to The Sims 2 – I’ve also played that game, and I see some major differences. The Sims is completely open-ended, and potentially never-ending, rewarding you in some way for any path you choose, and always having something else to aspire to. Whereas, Spore leads you towards a certain goal all the time, and - before the Space stage at least - it doesn’t reward you at all if you deviate from that. In the Sims you can actually have generations and inherited traits, and you also have responsibility - the youngsters need help to gain skills and happiness for later life, and the things you purchase depreciate in value over time, so you need to plan ahead, etc. The design of your house, the value of its stuff and the state that its in all effect all kinds of things.

But there is basically none of that in Spore, no real evolution and hardly any responsibility – in the cell and creature stage, you can totally reshape your lifeform every time you go into the editor, sell all your parts for their original prices, change body shape and emerge with something completely different - anything you can pay the DNA price for. The species ‘traits’ you acquire over time are limited in number and basically impossible to miss if you aim for them. Your only real long-term responsibility is relations with other empires in the space stage, which take time to develop. But again, its simply a matter of paying demands / doing mini-games to raise your standing with them.

In the Sims, you also get to see your different people and families doing things together, and potentially cross-breeding! You can build a whole neighbourhood if you have the patience. You absolutely don’t get that in Spore, as your planets/games cant interact, each has its own version of the ‘galaxy’. And nothing actually ‘evolves’. You might see other creations of your own or your friends in game, but its randomised and you have very limited interaction anyway.

It’s true to say that you’ll get out of Spore what you put into it. If you enjoy making things for the fun of it, and enjoy telling stories, you’ll gain something from this game, but it won’t be from any enthralling gameplay. It will be from your own mental effort. I can’t say I regret buying Spore at this point, but that’s just me. Nothing does what Spore does all in one game… but Spore doesn’t quite make it all work, even in reduced form. Again, it’s a bitter-sweet experience, seeing the engine behind Spore and knowing the possibilities of what could have been. Its still early days to talk about long-term appeal.

/rant (wow)

-----

Short version = I’d hesitate to recommend it to others, especially with the potential DRM issues…

Here’s hoping for better things from Spore 3 when its released in 2014!

After Civ4 BtS I took a stance to now wait to buy a game to see what the games community has to say, and to see how how the company supports the game. Spore was my first real test of this new paradigm. Thus far I think I am on the right path here. The logical conclusion of this path leads to me filling my PC gaming entertainment void with something else entirelly.

What was so wrong with CIV 4?
anyway It s probably best not to get Spore if you complain about it before even buying/playing it.
There will always be faults with games, NONE have ever delivered exactly what is made out on the box or the "reviews" every player gets some good and some bad from a game.
Its like life really YOU GET Back what you put into it.
SIMS 2 was like having a morgue to engage in,great 3D, but dull houses and furnishings slow on loading etc,with expansion and users mods/items it was much much better.
At present Spore needs imagination and creativity and suspension of what it should be.
It is Not David Attenboroughs documentary game-" life of a cell to real life animal " and physics and biology.
With time, player mods and maybe expansions, it will be what people wanted to some extent.
Don't want to buy it? fine,Wait or buy something else. Stick by your conviction from what "others say" instead of complaining.

I've discussed my problem with Civ$ and its expansions in this forum enough already.. I make mention to put things into context for that which I've established a history with. I said too much already and will not research to provide links. Its all OT if it isn't already understood.

As to judgeing a game before I play... well thats why I'm here to read the opinions of people I've learned something about over the years... people whos judgement I have some limited understanding of. After Civ4 I am shy to invest into a game which may be a cheesy pay per quarter scheme. Thus far I see Spore heading the same direction as my once beloved Civ game has. Then the DRM issue is enough to just forget about Spore altogether. I came back to comment once again because my email notifications brought me here and I had a little more to say before the...

[/END]

I could not even exchange the blody game for an other one because the game store deemed it worth ten cents in exchange value due to the complication of it having a limited amount of instalations.

It should be sold with a warning, "Once bought this game depreciates in value to almost nothing!"

Excrement!

I could not even exchange the blody game for an other one because the game store deemed it worth ten cents in exchange value due to the complication of it having a limited amount of instalations.

It should be sold with a warning, "Once bought this game depreciates in value to almost nothing!"

Excrement!

That sounds like a swindle.

I could not even exchange the blody game for an other one because the game store deemed it worth ten cents in exchange value due to the complication of it having a limited amount of instalations.

It should be sold with a warning, "Once bought this game depreciates in value to almost nothing!"

Excrement!

That's going to happen with a lot of new games. I don't see how I could sell any PC game, even dating back to games with CD-Keys that were used to play online. Who would want to buy a used version of WarCraft III when you can't play online due to your CD-Key being in used by a previous owner who sold the game but kept a burnt CD or something. Selling PC games has always been touch and go. Singleplayer games should be easier to resell. I think the gaming industry loses a lot of money to resales (EB Games, Gamestop..) and will put an end to it in some way. Already killing it for PC games, they might find a way to encode console games so that they can only ever be played on the first 2 or 3 machines they are inserted in... Who knows..

That's going to happen with a lot of new games. I don't see how I could sell any PC game, even dating back to games with CD-Keys that were used to play online. Who would want to buy a used version of WarCraft III when you can't play online due to your CD-Key being in used by a previous owner who sold the game but kept a burnt CD or something. Selling PC games has always been touch and go. Singleplayer games should be easier to resell. I think the gaming industry loses a lot of money to resales (EB Games, Gamestop..) and will put an end to it in some way. Already killing it for PC games, they might find a way to encode console games so that they can only ever be played on the first 2 or 3 machines they are inserted in... Who knows..

Trying to kill the resale of use games is evil and greedy. Imagine if there were no used cars. A lot of people would be left out because they couldn't afford it.

I want to backtrack a bit on my rant the other day. With Spore trying to do so much, its easy to complain about what it gets wrong, and focus on that. If it wasn’t for all the hype leading up to the release of the game, I think more people (including me) would be more thankful for what it does get right, which IMO is still more than many other recent PC games achieve. It’s very original, one of the only new games I’ve been interested in at all in the past few years, and I’m sure there are some great technical achievements behind the scenes.

I played some today, just messing about in the creature editor, then playing some of the tribal stage with it. It was relaxing and also rewarding, to play for a little while with no big expectations. Its still not mind-blowing fun, but I got more out of it by not expecting so much :)

I can imagine Spore being a permanent feature on my HD… never being played obsessively again like in my first game, but played for short periods when I feel like creating or exploring something. And there’s also the issue with the scary DRM which makes me afraid to uninstall it :lol:

I got bored with it after 10 minutes of creature stage. the cell stage is fun, but after that it just gets soooo dull and repetitive. I mean come on, I'd rather play super mario bros on a NES emulator. it's way more fun. spore was nice in the video previews but it has been dumbed down way too much. I'm all for streamlining and I hate micromanaging and I think that games should be as simple as possible. but simple shouldn't mean "made for 6 yrs old" imho. simply put, spore is the most "commercial" game I've ever seen. I hate the sims, but the sims is about 1000 times more complex than this, which tells the whole story I guess :lol:

Shame, Spore is for the child in us all, can't reconnect that is a shame.
well in time Spore will be macro adult, come back then?

I would agree with Daft- there are lots of obvious problems with Spore, but I think that they are outshone by the successes of the game.

I wish the Angry Video Game Nerd would review this game... he'd be sooooooooooo pissed off :lol:

I've discussed my problem with Civ$ and its expansions in this forum enough already.. I make mention to put things into context for that which I've established a history with. I said too much already and will not research to provide links. Its all OT if it isn't already understood.

As to judgeing a game before I play... well thats why I'm here to read the opinions of people I've learned something about over the years... people whos judgement I have some limited understanding of. After Civ4 I am shy to invest into a game which may be a cheesy pay per quarter scheme. Thus far I see Spore heading the same direction as my once beloved Civ game has. Then the DRM issue is enough to just forget about Spore altogether. I came back to comment once again because my email notifications brought me here and I had a little more to say before the...

[/END]

I rather play a million bad Civ 4 games than play one good Civ 3 or earlier games.

Maybe you're just not a civver.

The issue is the fact of a game being put out broken and incomplete

and any player needs to spend Time (waiting for patches) and money (buying expansions) to get "the full game"

Now I am quite satisfied with BTS as it is now... but I would not buy CivV until 1-2 years after it is released [although that is somewhat irrelevant as I would probably get it as a gift.. but]

And I would generally advise anyone that has a good working Civ version that they like to do the same... If you currently enjoy Civ3/Civ4 stick with it and about 1/2 a year after the second expansion for CivV is out, come look at it and consider if you want to buy it [by then they should have most of the patches for it.] Not to mention it will be cheaper.

As for Spore I'm thinking the same thing.... If I ever do buy it, then I'll probably wait until about 2012 when they are working on Spore 2. At that point I'll see if Spore I + expansions seems like a Game I want, and then buy... If not, and if the hype on Spore 2 is good... wait till about 2020 and see if Spore 2 +expansions is what I want.

Side benefit, won't have to worry about upgrading your computer too much to play the game.

Spore: A Failure?

No, Spore = Epic Failure!

The spore that we got is the same to what spore should have been the same as simcity societies is to a proper simcity game. It's been dumbed down to attract the casual gamer.
It is dumbed down to what we play, but we are in a way hardcore gamers who want to have complexity, the majority of people (i know and probably world wide) don't want to play a game that goes for hours, they don't want something they need others people to play, EA is just putting it to a larger market, which is why it is still topping the charts (http://sporedum.net/2008/10/07/uk-spore-regains-chart-dominance/).

This kind of thing is one of the main drawbacks of Nintendo's successes with the Wii and DS. As a result of them, it is not the same world as far as gaming is concerned that it was in 2005 when Spore was announced.
Making a game simplier does not mean it is bad, it will just suit others instead of you, we were told Spore would be aimed at the casual gamer and it was, bad luck to you if you didn't listen or read reviews, and the space stage is not simply which is the main reason why Spore is positive for me, also the constructors have so much complexity to them i probably could spend weeks just making stuff if i didn't have school.

However we are now far outnumbered by the new casual gamer who want:

Something that is cheap
Something that can be left under the telly
Something that can be played 30 minutes at a time.
4+ multiplayer at the same place
Casual gamers don't always want something which is cheap, for example the sims, costing about $80AU at release and $30AU now it still is not cheap, then you have all the expansions (5-7 for sims 2) which cost about $20 each which is over $200 for basically one game.

Apart from its dumbing down, my other major problem with Spore is the DRM. It is not okay to allow 3 installs only. Again this affects us (more likely to buy a computer every 2 years and probably have more than one anyway) more compared to casual gamers who buy a new computer when the old one breaks.
You will be able to install on 5 computers soon (http://sporedum.net/2008/09/21/spore-installed-on-five-computers/), and also be able to unistall it and de-authorize that install (http://sporedum.net/2008/09/17/ea-to-loosen-drm/).

Every stage has a game that does it better than Spore:

Cell - flow
Creature - The Sims?
Tribal - Populus
Civilization - Simcity/Civilization/Pick a RTS
Space - GalCiv


Nothing is like the creature stage, never before do you go around and interact with other human made creatures and at the same time have the ability to create your own totally unique creature. Space stage is simple combared to some other space games, but compared to Astro Empires which both me and you used to play it is easily better then it, also creating your own buildings, cars, planes, boats and spaceships is something no other game has EVER done and it is something many people love, maybe it is not for you, but everything there was known before the game come out (well the tribal and civ stage did suck apart from the buildings, but i was expecting more in the civ stage due to my love of Civ)

Gekko;7293985']I got bored with it after 10 minutes of creature stage. the cell stage is fun, but after that it just gets soooo dull and repetitive. I mean come on, I'd rather play super mario bros on a NES emulator. it's way more fun. spore was nice in the video previews but it has been dumbed down way too much. I'm all for streamlining and I hate micromanaging and I think that games should be as simple as possible. but simple shouldn't mean "made for 6 yrs old" imho. simply put, spore is the most "commercial" game I've ever seen. I hate the sims, but the sims is about 1000 times more complex than this, which tells the whole story I guess :lol:

I didn't like the cell stage and loved the creature and space stage. We are all different, and anyway Spore wasn't primaraly for its game play but for the actual creation of creatures, vehciles and buildings. I know many people who just play the sims to create people, over and over again, i don't see how they do it but they love it. It is those kind of people that will totally love Spore. The reason why the CFC Spore forum is more anti spore is because we are lovers of complex games (ie Civ 4), but many people, more then the complex gamers just prefer a simplier game, which you can jump in at any time and does not drag on for hours. This is something spore does, and it does it well.

I just looked for "Spore replay value" on google.

The first results are somewhat quite bothering for me as i'm quite interested in this game. Plus all those comment about the lack of depth makes me thing that it's a lot like the sims. You enjoy only what you are capable of putting into it.

Basically, in the sims, it's a kind of rince and repeat avery game too. have a guy (or girl) and do what you want with it. The funniest thing for people being designing the house, put the guy into a career top, etc...

Spore is a game which is very different for every person. Civ 4 is the same game over and over again (but always good) while spore has 6 different games in it. 3 are bad in my opinion (cell (which isn't to bad), tribal and civ), 2 are good and replayable (space and creature) and the last is the creator, which is something NO OTHER GAME HAS EVER DONE, and in Spore it is what will wright set out to do and it worked perfectally, it is what i love about spore and so do many other people. Some people don't like that part of the game as they prefer action not careful construction, that is fine, but they choose to get Spore and it was very clear what Spore was so they shouldn't start complaining about it.

Spore is a game of creation, if you like action and action only, you shouldn't get it, if you like complexity you shouldn't get it. I like complex and simple games, just depending on what i feel at the time, so i like both Spore and Civ 4.

It is dumbed down to what we play, but we are in a way hardcore gamers who want to have complexity, the majority of people (i know and probably world wide) don't want to play a game that goes for hours, they don't want something they need others people to play, EA is just putting it to a larger market, which is why it is still topping the charts (http://sporedum.net/2008/10/07/uk-spore-regains-chart-dominance/).


Making a game simplier does not mean it is bad, it will just suit others instead of you, we were told Spore would be aimed at the casual gamer and it was, bad luck to you if you didn't listen or read reviews, and the space stage is not simply which is the main reason why Spore is positive for me, also the constructors have so much complexity to them i probably could spend weeks just making stuff if i didn't have school.


Casual gamers don't always want something which is cheap, for example the sims, costing about $80AU at release and $30AU now it still is not cheap, then you have all the expansions (5-7 for sims 2) which cost about $20 each which is over $200 for basically one game.


You will be able to install on 5 computers soon (http://sporedum.net/2008/09/21/spore-installed-on-five-computers/), and also be able to unistall it and de-authorize that install (http://sporedum.net/2008/09/17/ea-to-loosen-drm/).



Nothing is like the creature stage, never before do you go around and interact with other human made creatures and at the same time have the ability to create your own totally unique creature. Space stage is simple combared to some other space games, but compared to Astro Empires which both me and you used to play it is easily better then it, also creating your own buildings, cars, planes, boats and spaceships is something no other game has EVER done and it is something many people love, maybe it is not for you, but everything there was known before the game come out (well the tribal and civ stage did suck apart from the buildings, but i was expecting more in the civ stage due to my love of Civ)

I never said that it was a bad commercial move for EA. I said it was a poor game as far as hardcore gamers (e.g. me) are concerned.

The slight loosening of the DRM has happened since my post but I'm still against any form of DRM as intrusive as secuROM, especially considering it didn't stop piracy (Spore was pirated 3 days before release) but only hurt people who paid legit money for the game.

Also @Sims2. It's not $200 at once and people don't have to get all the expansions. Most game stores here have offers for Sims 2 and all expansions which average around €100 for the lot. That's only €40 more than Spore with no exps.

We'll have to agree to disagree about whether Space stage is better than AE as I still play AE and you don't. So obviously I have a better opinion of AE.

I can't believe that the creature phase is being called great and replayable. I thought the creature phase was extremely flat and without depth.

It can be much, much more. It WAS much, much more in 2005.

Soduka (right from the beginning of the thread), it's seldom that wachting a video nearly made me cry. Out of frustration and anger about those decision by EA to dumb down the game.
I played Spore for three weeks casually and sold it last week on Amazon. After waiting years for its releae. I do rather stick to Sim Earth. This is more of a demanding and satisfying evolution game. By Will Wright. So go figure.

Add will be added back in with x-packs

Soduka (right from the beginning of the thread), it's seldom that wachting a video nearly made me cry. Out of frustration and anger about those decision by EA to dumb down the game.
I played Spore for three weeks casually and sold it last week on Amazon. After waiting years for its releae. I do rather stick to Sim Earth. This is more of a demanding and satisfying evolution game. By Will Wright. So go figure.

I want that game (SimEarth), Spore made me want to play it, but I can't find it! I have a crap SNES version of it. But SNES controllers are definitely not the way to go to play this.

I want that game (SimEarth)

You can find it both on Amazon and Ebay for a reasonable price. But beware (really! ;)) that it is considered a rather dry game with waaaay old EGA graphics. But it terms of diversity, strategy, options, realism, ... it beats Spore downright.

I still consider Spore to be a casual games remake of Sim Earth. It even has the same goal of reaching the stars.

You can find it both on Amazon and Ebay for a reasonable price. But beware (really! ;)) that it is considered a rather dry game with waaaay old EGA graphics. But it terms of diversity, strategy, options, realism, ... it beats Spore downright.

I know, I've played it... Long ago. I wonder if it still easily runs on modern operating systems and multi-threading computers, hehe.

The magic word is "DOSBox". Works like charm, especially with legally obtained games :D

BTW, I have been running an evolution forum game for the last year and a half, if anyone wants to check it out :)
*NESLife3* (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=223596)

The magic word is "DOSBox". Works like charm, especially with legally obtained games :D

I love DOSBox, and I played SimEarth for the first time recently! And Tyrian and Colonization. The only game I can't get to work is Battlecruiser 3000AD - though I never really got into that game when I had the chance, back in the days when I had a 100mgz PC...

"Who to Tar and Feather?"

For people who feel betrayed by the changes in the game from 2005 game-play videos to final release, this is a pretty interesting thread started to examine the design decisions since 2005.

http://forum.spore.com/jforum/posts/list/8555.page

BTW, I have been running an evolution forum game for the last year and a half, if anyone wants to check it out :)
*NESLife3* (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=223596)

I recommend this game.

"Who to Tar and Feather?"

For people who feel betrayed by the changes in the game from 2005 game-play videos to final release, this is a pretty interesting thread started to examine the design decisions since 2005.

http://forum.spore.com/jforum/posts/list/8555.page

I'll check that out.

"Who to Tar and Feather?"

For people who feel betrayed by the changes in the game from 2005 game-play videos to final release, this is a pretty interesting thread started to examine the design decisions since 2005.

http://forum.spore.com/jforum/posts/list/8555.page

I just stumbled onto that thread a few hours ago. For some reason, I can see Wil Wright walking around going, "HEY!!! That looks REALLY cool!". :)

^Thanks for that link. Very interesting...

Does anyone have a convenient link to these videos with all this cool stuff that's not in the finished game? I've only found videos that seem to show more open landscapes, and some graphical changes in the interface etc, but nothing actually 'new'...

^Thanks for that link. Very interesting...

Does anyone have a convenient link to these videos with all this cool stuff that's not in the finished game? I've only found videos that seem to show more open landscapes, and some graphical changes in the interface etc, but nothing actually 'new'...

A flashback to SPORE of 2005. (http://www.joystiq.com/2008/02/13/todays-most-retrospective-video-spores-gdc-2005-unveiling/) Take your pick.

Not really a failure, but obviously the "original" game has been taken apart and will be reassembled as multiple micro-transactions (part packs and expansions).

I am disappointed.

:crazyeye: Wow, Will Wright just weighted in on this topic, as MaxisWill:

http://forum.spore.com/jforum/posts/list/11211.page

"Who to Tar and Feather?"

For people who feel betrayed by the changes in the game from 2005 game-play videos to final release, this is a pretty interesting thread started to examine the design decisions since 2005.

http://forum.spore.com/jforum/posts/list/8555.page

Well, if, as he says, they've been listening to the community to know what they wanted for the betterment of Spore, why the hell is the first thing they create to expand the game a lame "cute and creepy parts" expansion that's not even worth 5$.

I don't really see the "I want new parts!" threads overwhelming the "I want deeper gameplay" ones... On any forum.

Still, a rather good gesture of him to show up and defend his team mates.

EDIT: Will says "While I was officially on the science side at the same time I always saw this as a crucial tension that I wanted to foster, in other words I didn’t want the science side to win, I wanted to make sure both sides were represented in the game to some degree."... Someone commented about this by saying "Okay so how come science wasn't". Well he's got a point.

It can be much, much more. It WAS much, much more in 2005.

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=8372603330420559198&ei=QBvNSN6FGoLOrgLDv-jXAg&q=Spore

Obviously two things have happened; both of which EA has admitted to doing on purpose.

1) The game was very purposely dumbed down. Really, really dumbed down. Remark from Will Wright specifically stated they rather sell more copies than make a lasting, challenging experience that might not appeal to everyone.

2) The game was sectioned off for expansion packs. A lot of expansion packs.

Think for a minute about the evolution present in game. The placement of the legs, arms, mouths, don't mean anything. Since all the parts were given numbered traits, they all have the same effect once placed somewhere on the body. That's completely against any type of thought and made that way so anyone without a brain in their skull could make a creature. It used to be, as shown in those videos, that the placement and body structure mattered and you would have to adapt your creature to its changing surroundings.

News-Flash- There are no changes in surroundings and your creature becomes COMPLETELY irrelevant only 40 % into the game. How is that supposed to be fun or rewarding?
Thank you for this video and the review. I am not getting this game as a result.

I think the problem is they aren't looking at forums for their 'community feedback' they are looking at marketing teams who are (probably correctly) telling them what their consumers as a whole want. I hope I'm wrong, but... I think we will see more candy planets before any actual evolution.

Yes, there seems to be a distinctive lack of listening to community feedback... very disappointing, frankly.

I saw Will Wright demo Spore at the S.F. Apple Store over the summer (he graciously autographed my SimCity 2000 box :) ) and was really excited about the game. Then I played it...not so much. Frankly, I don't think EA was aiming for the Civ/GalCiv/long-term SimCity fans. At the same time, I don't think it'll have the same mass-appeal as The Sims. The latest expansion, if you can even call it that, is egregiously overpriced and offers little to change the game.

I am instantly turned off by "drug" games. One or two expansions is the maximum I am willing to tolerate.

It seems like an idea that can be improved upon by a better-planned sequel.

It seems like an idea that can be improved upon by a better-planned sequel.

Yeah, because 8 years of development was really not enough time to plan Spore well.

I think (hope) Spore has lost all credibility now. It will take some serious work on Maxis' part to create sequel what they can succesfully promote now.

I think (hope) Spore has lost all credibility now. It will take some serious work on Maxis' part to create sequel what they can succesfully promote now.

I kind of hope you're right. But I'm wondering if that's only true of us, gamers who actually take part in online discussions about games. AKA at best 10% of people who bought the game.

EA will have to make a game which actually makes significant strides towards the original ideal of Spore before I even consider ever buying anything from them again.

I think Spore is in my book as one of the biggest disappointments of all time. I blogged about it a few weeks ago (link in my sig - I don't feel like re-writing it all).

The game has huge potential but after a few plays, I completely lost interest in how linear and redundant the game was.

Not to mention the fact that it's killed my anti-virus program's automatic updating system.

Sad to say I don't play it now,dabbled with the creators very rarely now too and when I opened sporepedia to see new creatures made with the C+C expansion and not able to be viewed or downloaded without the expansion,It was like the final nail!
The CC expansion is $30 AUD not $20 and that was even too much.
Even "casual gamers" will lose interest eventually.
There is just so much lacking or taken out for later ,that could have been there to sustain an interest.

Sad to say I don't play it now,dabbled with the creators very rarely now too and when I opened sporepedia to see new creatures made with the C+C expansion and not able to be viewed or downloaded without the expansion,It was like the final nail!
The CC expansion is $30 AUD not $20 and that was even too much.
Even "casual gamers" will lose interest eventually.
There is just so much lacking or taken out for later ,that could have been there to sustain an interest.

I guess you know a game is bad, or has low replay value when the best part about the game is the free (give or take) editor.

Spore is a great game and you can spend ALOT of time in it.

Space is cool. The great thing about it is the beginning. in the MOO series all races started out the same. You start out BEHIND. You play catch up. I play aggressively and i am fighting battles with the little laser. Space is MASSIVE. Pulling a MOO2 and having every planet under your control would be painstaking and a pain in the but with ecodisasters and pirating. It is also very benificial even for me, playing aggressive, to have races around that i can use to buy certain things cheaply from or to sell that lucrative type of spice to. So in the vastness of galaxy. It is unecessary to control all. There are too many stars anyway. Hundreds. Maybe thousand(s).

Civilization phase is neat with several ways to play it out. It is no Civ4 but was never meant to be. its a straight diplomatic, convert, or conquer. You can make a pluthera of customized vehicles and buildings. Like in dune, spice governs and must flow. :) Take as much as you can, as quick as you can.

Tribal is fairly linear. Music to unite, weapons to conquer. I found counter attacking after you are assualted will typically annilate them.

Creature stage is the coolest. You have dinasours (called epics) You gather "piecies" such as a type of leg or mouth in the form of bones or alpha leaders of the other creatures. You get DNA from befriending or killing creatures.

Cell stage is just fun. Like pacman on steroids. You get to eventually eat the things that terrorized you earlier.

-----

It is obvious they are trying to create another "Sims" game. That is to say they can make tons of money on the expansion packs. Too many things left undone.

1.Evolution stops in tribal phase. Can we not evolve into cybernetic, energy, or machines? This one bugs me the most.
2. The co-op sharing is a double edged sword. You have lazy people that often throw three unpainted boxes in there and call it a building.
[to those who havent played: It would amount to you opening a civ 4 mod and find found in using a white cube as a unit. A white cone for a building. A cylinder for a fighter] This bogs down the beauty of the game and hampers game play experience. As of now there is no way to filter out "crap" creations. If you have a young child playing: some players feel the need to make buildings look like people doing inappropriate things. Or they use cuss words for the names of their creations. You can report these easily with a click but its like a hydra.
3. Space is the climax but you are limited. I wont give anything away to those who have not played it through, Once you do the main stuff, its kinda like, what now? You spend alot of time getting a creature there but then you done really.

-----
Now having said all of that, the game is worth it. Its a game that is fun for a long time, you put it down and play civ4 for a while then go back scoff at civilization phase and repeat.

Its great for kids. Great for adults. Combat isnt bad really. Simple is better in a game of this scope. It is alot of fun earning achievements like "Epic Killer" and "devourer" or "Everyones BFF"

I dont think it lived up to the hype "yet" I hate the idea of having to buy 15 expansion packs to get to what a game should of been originally. (Like the sims 2)

The game as it stands: Its worth it. Buy it. Play it.

Spore is a great game and you can spend ALOT of time in it.

Space is cool. The great thing about it is the beginning. in the MOO series all races started out the same. You start out BEHIND. You play catch up. I play aggressively and i am fighting battles with the little laser. Space is MASSIVE. Pulling a MOO2 and having every planet under your control would be painstaking and a pain in the but with ecodisasters and pirating. It is also very benificial even for me, playing aggressive, to have races around that i can use to buy certain things cheaply from or to sell that lucrative type of spice to. So in the vastness of galaxy. It is unecessary to control all. There are too many stars anyway. Hundreds. Maybe thousand(s).

Civilization phase is neat with several ways to play it out. It is no Civ4 but was never meant to be. its a straight diplomatic, convert, or conquer. You can make a pluthera of customized vehicles and buildings. Like in dune, spice governs and must flow. :) Take as much as you can, as quick as you can.

Tribal is fairly linear. Music to unite, weapons to conquer. I found counter attacking after you are assualted will typically annilate them.

Creature stage is the coolest. You have dinasours (called epics) You gather "piecies" such as a type of leg or mouth in the form of bones or alpha leaders of the other creatures. You get DNA from befriending or killing creatures.

Cell stage is just fun. Like pacman on steroids. You get to eventually eat the things that terrorized you earlier.

-----

It is obvious they are trying to create another "Sims" game. That is to say they can make tons of money on the expansion packs. Too many things left undone.

1.Evolution stops in tribal phase. Can we not evolve into cybernetic, energy, or machines? This one bugs me the most.
2. The co-op sharing is a double edged sword. You have lazy people that often throw three unpainted boxes in there and call it a building.
[to those who havent played: It would amount to you opening a civ 4 mod and find found in using a white cube as a unit. A white cone for a building. A cylinder for a fighter] This bogs down the beauty of the game and hampers game play experience. As of now there is no way to filter out "crap" creations. If you have a young child playing: some players feel the need to make buildings look like people doing inappropriate things. Or they use cuss words for the names of their creations. You can report these easily with a click but its like a hydra.
3. Space is the climax but you are limited. I wont give anything away to those who have not played it through, Once you do the main stuff, its kinda like, what now? You spend alot of time getting a creature there but then you done really.

-----
Now having said all of that, the game is worth it. Its a game that is fun for a long time, you put it down and play civ4 for a while then go back scoff at civilization phase and repeat.

Its great for kids. Great for adults. Combat isnt bad really. Simple is better in a game of this scope. It is alot of fun earning achievements like "Epic Killer" and "devourer" or "Everyones BFF"

I dont think it lived up to the hype "yet" I hate the idea of having to buy 15 expansion packs to get to what a game should of been originally. (Like the sims 2)

The game as it stands: Its worth it. Buy it. Play it.

I fail to aknowledge this foolhearty, yet completely inaccurate review.
Someone should spend time to play other games more often before standing by a clearly horrible one.
Or maybe he hasnt read the history on Spore and it's true potential, which turned out to be a disappointment.
However, your review is an insult to hardcore games worldwide.

@Voltron81, may I ask, how long have you been playing? How many games have you started?

When I was playing my first game, I would have readily supported Spore as being a worthwhile purchase. I role-played it, I took my time (I thoroughly explored my home continent in the creature stage), I took about a gigabyte's worth of screenshots :) and I could believe that I was having much more impact on the game-world-thing than was actually the case.

As I started other games on other planets, I came to realise its all pretty much the same no matter what you do, and no matter what you create. And then, there was nothing to look forward to.

I've only gone the whole route into space twice, and I never felt like playing much after that. The most fun for me was just going off exploring, letting your homeworld get attacked etc, but going as far as you could before your money ran out. Then quitting without saving. I've never found the will to play through all the mini-games to get the terraforming tools. Still, I feel like I've already seen 99% of what Spore has to offer.

I don't touch Spore now, except rarely to play with the editors, play some of the cell stage and explore some planets. I WANT to like it more but I just can't.

The only thing that makes it a worthwhile purchase for me is that I would have been constantly wondering about it, if I hadn't been playing back in September. I saved myself some stress in that way. And I did have a fun and unique experience in my first game for which I have to thank Spore.

Its a great technical achievement, but it seems they backtracked on the real potential. I hope future expansions/sequels get closer to the original vision that so many wanted to be realised. I count myself fortunate that I didn't really follow Spore's development until the last few months, or I would have been even more disappointed.

I should add that I don't play much PC games in general these days, except nostalgia trips and customisable things. Shadow Warrior, Tyrian, Battlefield 1942, Age of Kings and Open Transport Tycoon Deluxe recently. And of course Starcraft which I can play online with a 56k modem :)

I fail to aknowledge this foolhearty, yet completely inaccurate review.
Someone should spend time to play other games more often before standing by a clearly horrible one.
Or maybe he hasnt read the history on Spore and it's true potential, which turned out to be a disappointment.
However, your review is an insult to hardcore games worldwide.

Umm... Spore is NOT made for hardcore gamers. Spore is a game that everyone can play, you don't have to play a long tutorial or read a huge manual to learn how to play Spore. Spore is something that you can just take out of its package and start playing.

I have Spore. It's an easy game for me when I get bored or tired. It's not a complete failed game, just, a nice, slow, family-friendly game for everyone. That's all. Their websites also starting to thrive also so it makes as a good, strong community as well.

I fail to aknowledge this foolhearty, yet completely inaccurate review.
Someone should spend time to play other games more often before standing by a clearly horrible one.
Or maybe he hasnt read the history on Spore and it's true potential, which turned out to be a disappointment.
However, your review is an insult to hardcore games worldwide.

I followed spore for quite awhile actually and while I respect your view on this game I disagree. Something is not inaccurate because it differs from your view or experience. As stated, this was meant to be something different and broad, not for the hardcore gamer.

As for how much i played it. A lot. It is a good game and worth it, if you do not mind the limits i stated. Its true that i was disappointed in it. Somethings were too simple and other things tedious. Yet, it is game worth playing and challenging if played on hard. There are different routes and different bonuses that make each path unique and fun.

I think, the problem here, it is too broad. They are wanting the next Sims 2. Riddled with expansion packs and extras. There were a hundred ways to make the game better. Any game is like this. Yet, it is not a bad game.

@Voltron81, may I ask, how long have you been playing? How many games have you started?
I am uncertain really. I have over a 100 hours i know because of i got that achievement. I started over several times, I have had about 5 cell to space games.

It varies as you take on different traits. Herbavoire, carnivore, herbivore, agressive, etc... IT does make a lot of difference in your abilities but as far as making alot of differences later on, you are kinda right.

The difference is about on your civilization has to play more than affects, which i dont think was whole heartedly the intention. Yet, i have find being aggressive makes war easier but diplomacy a pain and vice versa.

Dispite the limitations it is still a good game. Like Daftpanzer said hopefully the expansion packs will bring out what it originally was meant to be, but i will not like it on levels as i stated before 15 expansions pack does not equal 1 inspiring game. I too have not touched it since i came back to civ4 but it doesnt change that i might go back or that it is a failure.

It is the first of its kind really. the civ1 perhaps of its era. Or it could be a flop. I say give it its due, try it for what it is, not what you want it to be, and you will have fun.

Only Civ 1 was a really excellent game. Spore is just an excellent concept.

@Lord_Iggy, is it possible that all those who love to hate Spore (including me) have finally altered your opinion of it?

You're supposed to point out the good parts, while I criticise it, and we both win :p

I haven't played Spore. The initial joy of the game has been dulled by my distaste for their 'Creepy and Cute' parts pack. I'd play it if I had spare time, but I don't.

Anyway, I am increasingly regretting the 'what could have be', and have a rather large article on what needs to be done to restore what could have been.

I'm also faced with a moral quandry about asking for Command and Conquer: Red Alert 3 for Christmas- it looks like a very good game, but I don't want to break my goal of not buying anything more from EA. I suppose I'll make a judgement call after I've tried the demo.

Anyway, yeah, I feel kind of down about the game- its repetitiveness, where there should be none, has gotten to me.

I kind of liked the cell phase. It would've been nice for it to have been expanded a bit more.

I agree.The cell phase is easily, to me, the best part of the game. I used to like this game, but like everyone else has said it just gets old quick. I was very excited when I first got it, and told my friends about how cool it waas. I have lost all credibility now...

I liked it but I expected it to be like thrice as good. Seriously it took no thought to make the creature, and they gave you no freedom with how the body parts looked. The worst was you could not be an amphibian, fish, or a bird. That just ruined it for me.

The only thing that made Spore a failure IMO, is it's restrictive protection program which limits the number of times you can install Spore.

Ok, so first off, I haven't read all 9 pages of this thread. Just wanted to pop in with my short and sweet thoughts.

I played Spore for two weeks or so and then got pretty much bored with it.

My five-year-old son has been playing it since I bought it (like right when it came out), plays it for like an hour a day, would get up at 5am to play it if we let him and would play it for 6 or 8 hours a day if he could. He can't get enough of it.

That probably says it all right there. (Also probably says I'm a bad, bad parent. Oh, well. ;P)

Ok, so first off, I haven't read all 9 pages of this thread. Just wanted to pop in with my short and sweet thoughts.

I played Spore for two weeks or so and then got pretty much bored with it.

My five-year-old son has been playing it since I bought it (like right when it came out), plays it for like an hour a day, would get up at 5am to play it if we let him and would play it for 6 or 8 hours a day if he could. He can't get enough of it.

That probably says it all right there. (Also probably says I'm a bad, bad parent. Oh, well. ;P)

It's sort of like the Jar Jar Binks effect I think. Adults think it's awful but kids can't get enough.

I played some Spore today. I decided that, above a load of other things, I have two main problems with it:

#1 is the lack of continuity between phases. Every time you move on to a new stage, everything is wiped out, and you can't ever go back to re-play it. A whole new set of creatures appears on your planet, and of course there is no real evolution (see point #2) which adds to the randomness. Aside from your city plans continuing from the civ stage into space, there's absolutely no way to leave your mark on 'your' planet. You get your basic species traits, but there's no sense of epic-ness. I really miss that after playing games like civ4, EU2, and NES forum games here on civfanatics, where worlds evolve over time and have layers of history to them.

The Sims and Sim City also that have continuity, the sense that you were building something up over time, not just accumulating X points so you could skip to a whole new scenario.

#2 is the AI competition. IMO, Spore puts itself in an awkward position with regards to this. In the Cell and Creature stages, you are 'special', nothing else can evolve or do the things you do. Tribal seems is impossible to lose. Civ stands out as being challenging, where other civs can defeat you (although I've yet to see anything other than brute military force achieve final victory, and it seems odd that your whole game ends just because your chosen faction didn’t win :p). In space, the fact that you play catch-up has fairly been called a refreshing change from other games, but in this case it also means the rest of space is pretty much stagnant. The other empires do slowly expand and fight, but again you are the only one with the special ability to expand rapidly, and the special spaceship and its special gizmos doing the special quests. Basically, its just a matter of perseverance/reloading before you get what you want. If you want anything at all.

In Civ4/EU2/Moo2, etc, things are more dynamic, you have rivals at different times, who do the same kinds of things you do. You compete for territory and influence, and new technologies can change the way the whole game works. You aren't the special chosen race and its not a linear progression - if you want to be the top empire, you have to struggle throughout history to get there, else others will overtake you. Or you can set yourself your own personal goals instead. I like the fact that you can end a game as 2nd or 10th in overall ranking, perhaps as an ally or vassal of strong AI players, and still feel like you had an interesting game.

On the other hand, in the Sims/Sim city, the only things you don't control are random disasters and briefly-encountered things. You don't compete with anyone except yourself, to create the kind of city/neighbourhood you want, or perhaps to match the achievements of some other player in another game. That is fun in its own way.

My point is, Spore has AI competition that basically just makes up the background, which could work well for an open-ended 'god' game, but in Spore's case the player is quite limited in action and has a linear set of goals set out for them, so the whole thing is quite unrewarding, IMO.

*Insert epic list of suggestions here*

I realise I want a whole new game with a whole new way of playing. No X-pacs are going to come close. I think I will be waiting a long time.

My five-year-old son has been playing it since I bought it (like right when it came out), plays it for like an hour a day, would get up at 5am to play it if we let him and would play it for 6 or 8 hours a day if he could. He can't get enough of it.

:) I guess your son is getting the full benefit of the way Spore was slimmed down and presented. Certain persons like myself have only become more demanding after wasting obscene amounts of time on computer games throughout their own childhood :o

I wonder if your son would like it so much if he had as much time to play it as he wanted... Not that I think it would be healthy, but I think one of the reasons I have fond memoires of Sonic the Hedgehog 2 was that I didn't have it (or a megadrive/genesis) but my friend did, and so I could only play it at his house, and in two player mode, which made it special :)

Ah those were the days, when your whole game would fit in a 2 megabyte cartridge...

I played some Spore today. I decided that, above a load of other things, I have two main problems with it:

#1 is the lack of continuity between phases. Every time you move on to a new stage, everything is wiped out, and you can't ever go back to re-play it. A whole new set of creatures appears on your planet, and of course there is no real evolution (see point #2) which adds to the randomness. Aside from your city plans continuing from the civ stage into space, there's absolutely no way to leave your mark on 'your' planet. You get your basic species traits, but there's no sense of epic-ness. I really miss that after playing games like civ4, EU2, and NES forum games here on civfanatics, where worlds evolve over time and have layers of history to them.

The Sims and Sim City also that have continuity, the sense that you were building something up over time, not just accumulating X points so you could skip to a whole new scenario.

#2 is the AI competition. IMO, Spore puts itself in an awkward position with regards to this. In the Cell and Creature stages, you are 'special', nothing else can evolve or do the things you do. Tribal seems is impossible to lose. Civ stands out as being challenging, where other civs can defeat you (although I've yet to see anything other than brute military force achieve final victory, and it seems odd that your whole game ends just because your chosen faction didn’t win :p). In space, the fact that you play catch-up has fairly been called a refreshing change from other games, but in this case it also means the rest of space is pretty much stagnant. The other empires do slowly expand and fight, but again you are the only one with the special ability to expand rapidly, and the special spaceship and its special gizmos doing the special quests. Basically, its just a matter of perseverance/reloading before you get what you want. If you want anything at all.

In Civ4/EU2/Moo2, etc, things are more dynamic, you have rivals at different times, who do the same kinds of things you do. You compete for territory and influence, and new technologies can change the way the whole game works. You aren't the special chosen race and its not a linear progression - if you want to be the top empire, you have to struggle throughout history to get there, else others will overtake you. Or you can set yourself your own personal goals instead. I like the fact that you can end a game as 2nd or 10th in overall ranking, perhaps as an ally or vassal of strong AI players, and still feel like you had an interesting game.

On the other hand, in the Sims/Sim city, the only things you don't control are random disasters and briefly-encountered things. You don't compete with anyone except yourself, to create the kind of city/neighbourhood you want, or perhaps to match the achievements of some other player in another game. That is fun in its own way.

My point is, Spore has AI competition that basically just makes up the background, which could work well for an open-ended 'god' game, but in Spore's case the player is quite limited in action and has a linear set of goals set out for them, so the whole thing is quite unrewarding, IMO.

*Insert epic list of suggestions here*

I realise I want a whole new game with a whole new way of playing. No X-pacs are going to come close. I think I will be waiting a long time.



:) I guess your son is getting the full benefit of the way Spore was slimmed down and presented. Certain persons like myself have only become more demanding after wasting obscene amounts of time on computer games throughout their own childhood :o

I wonder if your son would like it so much if he had as much time to play it as he wanted... Not that I think it would be healthy, but I think one of the reasons I have fond memoires of Sonic the Hedgehog 2 was that I didn't have it (or a megadrive/genesis) but my friend did, and so I could only play it at his house, and in two player mode, which made it special :)

Ah those were the days, when your whole game would fit in a 2 megabyte cartridge...

I agree fully with this text, and I am glad that you mentioned the NES forum of some reason. :p

I think the game needs a phase between cell and creature. I mean going from a small cell to walking on land on the next phase? Needs to have a "fish"stage.

no; spore is a joke, the only thing it gave us was DRM and a bunch of procedural editing tools with no game attached to it. in an effort to please the bigger audience EA has pleased no one,

not exactly a big surprise with this company.

I just hope Sims 3 won't fail like Spore did. :sad:

I haven't played Spore. The initial joy of the game has been dulled by my distaste for their 'Creepy and Cute' parts pack. I'd play it if I had spare time, but I don't.

Anyway, I am increasingly regretting the 'what could have be', and have a rather large article on what needs to be done to restore what could have been.

I'm also faced with a moral quandry about asking for Command and Conquer: Red Alert 3 for Christmas- it looks like a very good game, but I don't want to break my goal of not buying anything more from EA. I suppose I'll make a judgement call after I've tried the demo.

Anyway, yeah, I feel kind of down about the game- its repetitiveness, where there should be none, has gotten to me.

Don't buy RA3.

Don't buy RA3.
I just played it. Finished the russian campaign and i'm erasing it. Horrible game. Don't buy it.
The best thing in the game is the women. And you can look at porn sites for that. So there really isn't a point in buying/playing this game.

I've honestly got to say that this is the most disappointing game I've ever wasted money on.
It has no sandbox mode (you have to buy the pieces for evertything), and aside from creature creation, the game is pretty bland.
There's only one way to win stage one
Two ways to play stage 2 and 3
And I think three ways to play stage 4.
Stage 5 is alright, could have been done a lot better.

Don't bother buying the full game, you can buy the only fun segment for $10.

Yes, it did not become what it could have, no, SHOULD have been. EA ruined yet another potentially awesome game to increase sales to children and idiots, what was potentially the ultimate sandbox game became a child's toy.

I'm glad I didn't pay for it, that's as much as I'll say. I haven't bought an EA game since Red Alert 2.

The one shown in 2005 was MUCH MUCH better than the current Spore version. I think the game was released later because they had to ruin the game on EA's request.

I WANT SPORE ZERO!!!

The one shown in 2005 was MUCH MUCH better than the current Spore version. I think the game was released later because they had to ruin the game on EA's request.

I WANT SPORE ZERO!!!

That's been confirmed.
Someone at EA wanted the entire game turned into a kiddy mess such as giving everyone tennis shoes, googley eyes, etc.
They eventually had to come to an agreement which resulted in an alleged half-and-half mix of both versions.

That's been confirmed.
Someone at EA wanted the entire game turned into a kiddy mess such as giving everyone tennis shoes, googley eyes, etc.
They eventually had to come to an agreement which resulted in an alleged half-and-half mix of both versions.

Source?

I'd like to know where this fool lives... who could do something completely unnecessery to their home.

Source?

I'd like to know where this fool lives... who could do something completely unnecessery to their home.

http://seedmagazine.com/news/2008/09/the_creation_simulation.php

http://seedmagazine.com/news/2008/09/the_creation_simulation.php

This guy is dead!!

Pay unbeliever tax or die!!

The biggest problem is that they tried to incorporate too much into it making it shallow in all areas. I think they should have ignored the tribe, civilization and space phase of the game. Instead, they should have focused on the creature phase with a dynamic environment and real natural selection and evolution. It should have been a mix of Sim Life/Sim Earth with the addition of real dynamic evolution. It could have been a biologist´s dream-game, and a game that taught millions of people the wonder of natural sciences, the dynamics of the evolution of life and how fragile our planet is. It is such a wasted opportunity! :mad::cry::sad::(

they shouldnt have dumped everything but creature, but the should have kept some of the cooler features like saving up dna points to but brain upgrades. they didnt drain the game, but the cut off some of the things that made spore look so much like a dream come true.

The best part of spore is the first and 2nd part with the creature evolution. couldn't stand the rest.

Indeed, the game went downhill from then on. The first time I played I got such a huge buzz when I seen the Cell Stage. Thirty minutes into the Creature Stage and I was beginning to realize I had maybe made a mistake in buying this game.

I think Spore's greatest failure is that it essentially released an ambitious framework of a game without the game itself. It's a great idea to have a user-customizable game, especially to the point where your customizations change the type of game it is, and to the point that you don't have to buy into aspects you don't want. But they failed materially, because those customizations weren't available at release; Instead we have to wait probably 6 months at a time, for the customizations.

Spore would have been criticized as a money pit, but lauded for game play, if we had all the expansions available at release of Spore, or at least by December 08. Meaning expansions for each stage of the game.

Alternatively, they probably should have focused most of the attention on one stage (probably Space), and stripping even more of the development time from the other stages, other than the editors. Easily, they could have made all the editors, focused on making Space fun, and then adding expansions backwards in the sequence (e.g. Civ stage, then Tribe, then Creature, then Cell).

As is, Spore is a Space conquest game with a big tease, with earlier stages as needless mini-games and an ad hoc civ-leveling system to make the player run through all the stages.

I've played, it's OK. Space is my favorite stage, then Cell, Creature, Civ, and last is Tribal, which I absolutely hated!

Just seen this, a quote from Will Wright:


We were very focused, if anything, on making a game for more casual players. Spore has more depth than, let’s say, The Sims did. But we looked at the Metacritic scores for Sims 2, which was around ninety, and something like Half-Life, which was ninety-seven, and we decided — quite a while back — that we would rather have the Metacritic and sales of Sims 2 than the Metacritic and sales of Half-Life.

What type of thing to say is that? He WANTS smaller sales and scores for his own game? This just seems like a half-assed attempt at sounding unsurprised that his game sucked.

What type of thing to say is that? He WANTS smaller sales and scores for his own game? This just seems like a half-assed attempt at sounding unsurprised that his game sucked.

No, The Sims 2 sold a lot more than Half-Life. So I guess he's saying he'd rather score a bit less but have much higher sales. That is, have a slightly (quite a bit, imo...) less complicated or intricate or "for hardcore gamers" game and sell to a larger audience...

Just seen this, a quote from Will Wright:



What type of thing to say is that? He WANTS smaller sales and scores for his own game? This just seems like a half-assed attempt at sounding unsurprised that his game sucked.

he never said he wanted smaller sales, he said he wants sims 2 sales repeated, which i'm pretty sure is more then Half Life's sales

Sims 2 sold tons tons ton

I am still pissed that I bought that piece of s game. The friggin dissapointment!

I really like Spore, but it could have been so much more.

I'm a poet and didn't know it.

he never said he wanted smaller sales, he said he wants sims 2 sales repeated, which i'm pretty sure is more then Half Life's sales

Sims 2 was the 2nd best selling PC game ever, with 11 million sold. Half life got 9 million. (from wiki).

I personally think Sims2 has more depth. It has more meaningful stats, for one thing. And every building and character can be part of the same game world, I like that. For all the time you spend, it all builds up and up... Whereas in Spore, you don't have much to play with in the first place, and most of it is wiped out at the start of each new stage. You can only meet NPC 'clones' of your species in other games.

Sims2 > Spore IMO. This is a very sad state of affairs because I would much rather be guiding evolution of species and flying through space.

Sims 2 was the 2nd best selling PC game ever, with 11 million sold. Half life got 9 million. (from wiki).

Half Life (1 at least) has sold on average one million copies a year, not counting downloaded sales over Steam or other outlets. Since it was released 11 years ago , I think that comfortably beats Sims 2 sales.

Half Life (1 at least) has sold on average one million copies a year, not counting downloaded sales over Steam or other outlets. Since it was released 11 years ago , I think that comfortably beats Sims 2 sales.

Whichever game you want to believe sold more, from his quote it is obvious that Will Right himself thought that the Sims 2 sold significantly more than Half Life.

Evolution should have featured (more). IMO, there should be very few creatures plugged straight into the game (at least, not on your home planet). Things should start off simple like your cell/ceature, and evolve according to certain logical rules (certain responses to what is causing them most injury/deaths). The user content can act as 'targets' which creatures evolve towards, but the end result is something cross-bred with the conditions on your own planet, which can then be uploaded and shared again... Yes, the game should generate its own creatures! With much branching out in different directions, as well as mass extinctions...

I'd tolerate less freedom in designing creatures, in order to see this happen - a world that actually evolves as you play. Why not have the land surface gradually shifting, rising and falling too? The technology already exists in the game engine, as seen in the terraforming tools in the space age. All basic 'Parts' should be available, and you can buy more advanced parts in your next generation, instead of randomly searching for mystical skeletons. And needless to say, species should have populations that rise and fall also, sometimes swarming in huge numbers, and be able to migrate across the planet. And when you lay an egg, it should just be for increasing population. Only if you have gained enough new DNA and if enough time has passed should you be able to click on your egg to evolve the next generation. Maybe you’d be searching for a mate with some slight mutation you’d want for your offspring…

So many what ifs!!!

Anyways, my actual main gripe is with the three stages after the creature phase. Today I had an epic session of installing and playing some old games - Rise of Nations, Ground Control II, Startopia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Startopia), Warlords III and Galactic Civilizations #1. Startopia and GC2 in particular had really nice 3D graphics without being too demanding on hardware (a breeze on my new PC). They really put the civ stage in Spore to shame in terms of detail on screen. And in terms of gameplay, I'm also thinking back to games that were out 10 years ago – like Settlers III and Populous: The Beginning (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Populous) (one of my favourite games of all, with people living on 3D spherical planets, just a shame it doesn't seem to work on any OS above Windows '98 :cry:). And nearly 20 years ago (when I was very little), those early Amiga strategy games like the Populous I, Warmonger and Mega Lo Mania (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mega_Lo_Mania), which had simplicity (out of necessity) but depth and replayability too.

From creatures to space, there's just so much out there they could have copied from - game concepts that have already been thought out and tested for decades - while still kept things relatively simple. Although I do enjoy Spore, it's really a shame to think what could have been. As other's have said, its bitter-sweet.

/rant

Just to say this: LifeNES III + The Civilized Zone + ZPNES A Brave New Galaxy >>>>>> Spore.

Of course, Part 2 and 3 are eagerly waiting!

Spore isn't that good. The only good thing I can say about it is the graphics in the space phase. The nebulae are beautiful. But the actual game is horrible. It treats the player as if their an idiot. This may be good for noobs, but for hardcore gamers it's not good. Civ4 is by far much better. Although civ has it's flaws, it is still amazing.
Will Wright should have stuck with the Sims. The Sims is so much better and so much more creative.
The Sims is much more creative, and allows for more choice in it.

Whichever game you want to believe sold more, from his quote it is obvious that Will Right himself thought that the Sims 2 sold significantly more than Half Life.

He would be wrong. :p

Spore isn't that good. The only good thing I can say about it is the graphics in the space phase. The nebulae are beautiful. But the actual game is horrible. It treats the player as if their an idiot. This may be good for noobs, but for hardcore gamers it's not good. Civ4 is by far much better. Although civ has it's flaws, it is still amazing.
Will Wright should have stuck with the Sims. The Sims is so much better and so much more creative.
The Sims is much more creative, and allows for more choice in it.

Hopping in your spaceship and cruising the galaxy did have a charm of its own, I must admit. Some of the graphical effects, especially the likes as seen from planets or moons, are fantastic. Creative wise, this must be one of the most creative games relased... you can customise your creature down to a minute detail, their clothing, houses, buildings, music, spaceships, vehicles etc... What exactly do you mean?

Well the game does have a lot of creativity, and yes that is a good thing. But the logic of it is not very good. For example if you put a leg on an animals head, it would still have the same affect as putting a leg on their wast. I guess what I'm trying to say is the game is not very logical in it's approach.

By the fact this is the most active thread in Spore.. i'd say YES! :cry:

say we to what

Well the game does have a lot of creativity, and yes that is a good thing. But the logic of it is not very good. For example if you put a leg on an animals head, it would still have the same affect as putting a leg on their wast. I guess what I'm trying to say is the game is not very logical in it's approach.

It allows creativity, but being creative doesn't change anything.
It's like having the option to paint a racing stripe on a pet rock. It won't make the pet rock go faster.
It's just now, after a short while, you have to make your pet rock choose between performing music and fighting (that's all tribal stage is. Dear god. Can that even be called a gameplay stage? Unless your game is Mortal Kombat vs Jem, that's not a gameplay stage.)

I think the game needs a phase between cell and creature. I mean going from a small cell to walking on land on the next phase? Needs to have a "fish"stage.

It did initially, but they removed it.

By the fact this is the most active thread in Spore.. i'd say YES! :cry:

You know a game is bad when the two most viewed and replied to threads are:

"SPORE: The SimEarth Game" (pre-release)
"SPORE: A failure?" (post-release)

So sad :( So sad :(

The thing is, for the first few days I thought it was great. Not what I was hoping for, even after hearing the first negative feedback, but still enjoyable. Caught up in the hype, I kinda role-played and filled in the blanks. I even liked the tribal stage. When I got into space, it gradually dawned on me that there would be nothing to justify this whole story that I had built up in my mind (does that make sense lol). So I tried new games, on new planets, with new creatures, expecting new things, but found it was basically the same experience again.

End result for me is no motivation for actually playing. Creating things and randomly flying through space is fun and all, but not worth £35 and the 6 gigs of HD space and SecuROM.

No, The Sims 2 sold a lot more than Half-Life. So I guess he's saying he'd rather score a bit less but have much higher sales. That is, have a slightly (quite a bit, imo...) less complicated or intricate or "for hardcore gamers" game and sell to a larger audience...
FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU
10/10 good job will, awesome, you'd rather design dogpoop that sells than something worthwhile, You are not a game designer, get out of the industry.

Shaw's Principle:
Build a system that even a fool can use, and only a fool will want to use it.

I think that's the case in Spore.

How foolish that he thinks Spore was comparable in quality to The Sims 2. Spore < Star Control + MS Paint.

10/10 good job will, awesome, you'd rather design dogpoop that sells than something worthwhile, You are not a game designer, get out of the industry.That's a bit of exaggeration. He designed a moderately good game that sells, than something that ONLY hardcore gamers will find "worthwhile".

Game designers have to make a healthy balance between profit and gameplay (complexity). If profit is cut because the game is only supposed to appeal to 95% of CivFanatics forumgoers but only an insignificant percentage of the rest, then they lose and there will never be a Spore 2 or any expansion of the original thereof.

How foolish that he thinks Spore was comparable in quality to The Sims 2. Spore < Star Control + MS Paint.
A poor comparison. Star Control is far too good.
Still, I find Spore better than Sims 1 or 2. I have Sims Hatred Syndrome.

Personally, I absolutely loved the cell stage. It was awesome. The creature stage was also quite fun but also a bit disapointing. Tribal stage was too easy and really bad, as was the civilization stage (But civ stage on a smaller scale). I found the space stage pretty hard, and found keeping the colonies nice and habitable was actually surprisingly hard, especially since thanks to my creature stage aggresiveness (Creature peacefullness sucks), everyone hated me. :mad:

BTW, Spore is the only game made by Will Wright that doesn't have the word 'Sim' or 'Sims' in it.

I don't understand the love for the cell stage. I mean, it's fun and all, but it amounts to nothing more than a well done flash game.

Precisely. A flash game is fantastic in comparison to the rest of a game what took 4+ years to make.

http://www.spore.com/comm/prototypes is an interesting collection of small games and concept demos that are a bit entertaining. Perhaps more entertaining than Spore, and you can't beat free!

Maybe the reason people loved the cell stage was because it was so simple? I personally didn't like it at all. I really only liked the graphics of the space stage.

I barely think of spore as being a failure at all. I don't like the cell stage because it is so simple, and I don't like the space stage because it is so long, but, I do think that it achieved it's goals as well as it could. I think spore is as much as a failure as The Sims 3. They both have great graphics, and both allow freedom and creativity.

Freedom and creativity??
You can attack or sing, attack or dance.. again and again...
True that the creature creator give you some aesthetic freedom and are interesting to play, but this part they put for free to download.

I barely think of spore as being a failure at all. I don't like the cell stage because it is so simple, and I don't like the space stage because it is so long, but, I do think that it achieved it's goals as well as it could. I think spore is as much as a failure as The Sims 3. They both have great graphics, and both allow freedom and creativity.

the fact that the 'great' graphics is the first thing you have to say about it is very telling
also, no, spore does not have great graphics, and it doesn't allow freedom or creativity, you cant even land on trees or fly across water. it gives you about as much choice as any generic MMORPG, /dance and *clickclicklickclickclick*

It was a fun game. Not what it was hyped up to be. But people exagerate a bit. It's fun, good but not great. Most games are not 'great'.

It's fun for the first few days

Guess you gotta have a little complexity, and actual divergent paths to go down and commit to, so theres actually new things to try out.

First two games (the first one I stopped halfway and decided to start fresh) were fun.

Second game was a little less fun (still fun because I was trying out different things).

Third, fourth, fifth, and six games were successively less fun.

Seventh game (which I played recently) was not fun.

Does that make the game a failure? I don't know. But it certaintly isn't a "great game", or even a "good game", if this is the case.

First two games (the first one I stopped halfway and decided to start fresh) were fun.

Second game was a little less fun (still fun because I was trying out different things).

Third, fourth, fifth, and six games were successively less fun.

Seventh game (which I played recently) was not fun.

Does that make the game a failure? I don't know. But it certaintly isn't a "great game", or even a "good game", if this is the case.

Replayability is an interesting arguement. It does show that Spore is lacking in game-play if both it lacks replayability, and a single play is over pretty quick (or just gets deleted). I'd say that is the case with spore.

I wouldn't downrate a game just for lack of replayability though, but more in the overall entertainment value--which might cynically be hours played vs. $$$ spent. Though not sure what the subjective measure of 'good' and 'great' would be here. I think 40 hours per $50 would be good, while a game at 100 hours+ would be 'great' at $50.

First two games (the first one I stopped halfway and decided to start fresh) were fun.

Second game was a little less fun (still fun because I was trying out different things).

Third, fourth, fifth, and six games were successively less fun.

Seventh game (which I played recently) was not fun.

Does that make the game a failure? I don't know. But it certaintly isn't a "great game", or even a "good game", if this is the case. As I've said before, when I first played Spore I actually liked the game. About two weeks later, I hated the game. It just has really redundant gameplay, and it's basically the same thing over and over and over. The space stage is just stupid. All you do is go around trading resources, with one little ship.

Jumping in late...

Spore has almost 0 replay value for me, for many of the reasons noted.

1) How your creature is built and designed is essentially worthless. Just stick the hands somewhere and pick the right mouth.

2) Dumbed down. Many things that don't matter but are repetetive.

3) Once you've done it once... it's the same thing, and you can't even "story mode" it like you can in Sims.

I consider myself only slightly above a casual gamer. Games like Spore play to the least common denominator rather than playing to strengths. I play games from The Sims to Civ4, I've modded for Civ4, Paradox games, etc. And Spore just couldn't hold my interest. I regret spending the money.

I'm glad I didn't buy this game. The Civilization series rules....

For me spore was fun the first time i played through it. The following 2 games were much less fun as there are almost no variations in how you play it. Everything is soo dumbed down.

I have to say i was blown away of just how big the world if(10.000+ solar systems.... wow)
You could make a incredible empire/strategy/trading game with that huge world size, but unfortunately its soo dumbed down that if becomes boring instead.
Imagine a civilization kind of game with 100s of unknown civilizations to meet, ally and go to war with. :king:

The game have a crapload of potential, but its too simple to be fun for me, and the space phase is just... stupid. One ship to do it all? come on...

At least in X3: TC, you can actually fly multiple ships and build humungous complexes in space. And there are loads of different ship types. The space stage should be more like that.

The fact the game was pretty much advertised and sold to me as a strategy game where every choice mattered (which also implies lots of replay value) only for it to be almost the opposite of that really ticked me off. The first go-around was fun. It was when I did the second one and tried to take a completely different route only to have it be the same as the first one did I feel ripped off.

I wonder what this game would've been like if Sid had done it :mischief:

I remember I was thinking about buying this game about a month ago. I was on the fence because I wasn't sure if I'd keep playing it after the first play through. From the look at this feedback, I'm rather glad I opted not to buy the game.

I wonder what this game would've been like if Sid had done it :mischief:

I remember I was thinking about buying this game about a month ago. I was on the fence because I wasn't sure if I'd keep playing it after the first play through. From the look at this feedback, I'm rather glad I opted not to buy the game.

it would have been passable, cid's kind of a conservative in the designing department, spore was a radical idea, so i don't know how good it would be if he designed it, but it certainly wouldn't deliver much new.

I wonder what this game would've been like if Sid had done it :mischief:

I remember I was thinking about buying this game about a month ago. I was on the fence because I wasn't sure if I'd keep playing it after the first play through. From the look at this feedback, I'm rather glad I opted not to buy the game.

If Wright had 100% designed it, it would have been better. Spore and Sims 3 are the reasons why he left. It's obvious in both that he didn't get as big a role as planned. Sims 3 plays more like a console Sims title than a real sims game, and Spore... we all know how Spore turned out.

I'm saying it from the perspective that Sid's games tend not to shy away from the complex. So I was wondering what it would be like if Sid designed the game from a complexity aspect.

Though yeah, I really enjoyed the Sims, I have memories of playing the first one for hours, but I gotta be honest, I really hated the latest iteration :(

I'm saying it from the perspective that Sid's games tend not to shy away from the complex. So I was wondering what it would be like if Sid designed the game from a complexity aspect.

Though yeah, I really enjoyed the Sims, I have memories of playing the first one for hours, but I gotta be honest, I really hated the latest iteration :(

Same. I -loved- 1 & 2. 3 though... I feel I don't have as much control.
I can't alter the faces as much, less of a selection of hairs, it's -extremely- awkward having more than one family, I can't change up the neighborhood (I can only play on -two- neighborhoods, even.)
Graphically, it's better. Gameplay wise, it's a big step down.

How is the Sims 3?

Spore was great in 2005. By 2008, :cringe:.
It was a great loss for me. :cry:. My main site is now dead because of how much Spore sucked.

IMO, Sims 3 is a great addition to the Sims series. Keeps some of the old, adds some new. Good game.

Oh good. Maybe once I get a new computer I will get it.

The sims 3 really was not good at all, you can only have 1 family. The graphics are really bad for 2009 standards. Plus you barely get any items, and EA excepts us to buy the items they have on their online store. The game was not made for people to enjoy, but for EA to make money in a really douchebaggy way. Oh and the game is really glitchy, even if you have a computer that is above the standards of the game it will freeze and be obnoxious.

The sims 3 really was not good at all, you can only have 1 family. The graphics are really bad for 2009 standards. Plus you barely get any items, and EA excepts us to buy the items they have on their online store. The game was not made for people to enjoy, but for EA to make money in a really douchebaggy way. Oh and the game is really glitchy, even if you have a computer that is above the standards of the game it will freeze and be obnoxious.


*sigh* It's sad to say, but I'm afraid that's what video games are going to turn into. I fear that we will begin to see more and more PC games available only through programs like Steam, with practically criminal DRM programs bundled in, and to top it all off, the vanilla game will include only about half of the game with the rest of it marketed as "expansion packs".

Yes, I realize they've been doing that for years. But before, at least, you couldn't tell as easily, and it wasn't done over the course of 5-10 expansion packs like The Sims historically has been.

After finally getting the game and playing a couple of games it didn't fill up the expectations at all. For a hardcore RTS player the two phases before the Saucer one felt like a really half-assed build up. Up until tribal the game felt fun and somewhat innovative (*cough*E.V.O. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E.V.O.:_Search_for_Eden)*cough*) but after that the two next stages were in my opinion really poorly designed and dull. Tribal stage was basically poor AOE clone with little to no strategy involved, all I had to do against every enemy village on the map was to attack after their rush. I literally managed to clear the whole phase with only the Stone Axe building in my village. The AI was terrible too, I can't even recall all the times I was microing one weak unit to lead the idiotic NPC's following it to certaing doom - and I played each game on Hard for Pete's sake!

The Civilizationesque phase for an aggressive player like myself was more like a really poorly designed internet Risk than anything else. The only point was to pump military with all you resources and expand faster than the computer. Each time I tried a more methodical approach by investing more time & money on city develoment instead of just building up Houses whenever I needed them, I ended up being bulldozed but the CPU who instead had concentrated all of it's resources on expanding. With only one resource, three unit types and redicilous diplomatic options there's really no way to have an intresting game against the Computer if you had fallen behind in the early steges.

I have to admit though that the final stage of the game is pretty cool. I haven't ran into any other Civilizations yet so I can't really comment how the galaxy-spanning diplomatic relations & conflict work but exploring the seemingly endless universe and spreading your influence within it is indeed pretty darn cool.

I guess my main gripe with this game is that everything before the Saucer-stuff is basically just a really boring, poorly desinged build up. Well, the cell-stage and the one in which you control a small pack of animals are sort of entertaining but in a hindsight they lacked the dept too. I think Spore just had it's goals set a bit too high. I don't know how much more time in the drawing board would have helped but I guess it would've not harmed the final product either. I honestly think that if they had just concentrated on the galactic stage the game would've been loads better. Less is more I guess.

I think EA cared more about the graphics of the game, than actual gameplay. Like the graphics are :):):):)ing great, but the game itself just sucked ass. I admit to liking it at first, but after about a week I realized that it was kinda dull and repetitive.

I guess my main gripe with this game is that everything before the Saucer-stuff is basically just a really boring, poorly desinged build up. Well, the cell-stage and the one in which you control a small pack of animals are sort of entertaining but in a hindsight they lacked the dept too. I think Spore just had it's goals set a bit too high. I don't know how much more time in the drawing board would have helped but I guess it would've not harmed the final product either. I honestly think that if they had just concentrated on the galactic stage the game would've been loads better. Less is more I guess.

That's the thing. It spent too much time on the drawing board; enough time for them to dumb it down A LOT.

That's the thing. It spent too much time on the drawing board; enough time for them to dumb it down A LOT.

That might indeed be the case. Guess as the development prolonged they had to sacrifice a lot of depth to meet with Wrights perversion: an adventure spanning over billions of years set for all audiences. Born to fail it seems.

All audiences = :(

It age range starts too low.

They ripped this game apart to make more $ from expansions. Soon there'll probably be an aquatic stage expansion, an expansion to fix space the way we wanted, etc

Oh, you bet there will be an aquatic creature stage expansion!

I'd rather see a Spore 2. I know Spore itself sold well, but anyone know how well the Cute+Creepy pack or the Galactic Adventures actually sold? Hopefully not very many, so they will give up on making more... I mean, I hope they learn that the base game has to have major replayability before any X-pacs will sell well.

I'd rather see a Spore 2. I know Spore itself sold well, but anyone know how well the Cute+Creepy pack or the Galactic Adventures actually sold? Hopefully not very many, so they will give up on making more... I mean, I hope they learn that the base game has to have major replayability before any X-pacs will sell well.

They sold pretty terribly.
Sims 3's not doing too well either. It sold really well at first, then just sort of... died.

They're both dying for the same reason. EA's draining their customers dry and giving them very little in return.
The worst part? At the same time, they're also buying out companies that -don't- suck. Activision is as well. Makes me worried about the PC industry. What will happen when two of the most poorly managed PC companies, that only manage to stay alive by buying out the competition with money from -before- they began failing, end up controlling everything?

I would get the Sims 3, but my computer can't run it.

Spore was a major disappointment for me.

Here's a brief video I found on youtube a while back that compares the creature phase from the 2005 demo to the 2008 release.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q3OG6tv-5II

It's really sad.