Spore & the Creature Creator

[Peter McCoy]

http://www.spore.com/ftl

The free trial version of the Creature Creator is available from the above website. It supposedly gives you access to 25% of the customization features that will be present in the full game. I toyed about with it last night/this morning before bed. It's mucho fun! You can even test-drive the little dude by walking him around a small area and trying out a few different 'emotes' such as roaring and jumping. My little dude had a scorpion-like tail but there was no function to test it unfortunately. There is a punch option but it didn't make his awesome tail do anything, alas! I'm in work at the moment but I'll be sure to post some screenshots of my creations when I get a chance later on tonight.

Come on guys, try your hand and post the results! :)

[Dasquian Belargic]

This is bizarrely addictive. I don't know if you can add friends to look at their creations, but my username is tehwofl :)

[Peter McCoy]

Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you...

Swalanky!

http://www.plmccoy.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/spore/swalanky_01.jpg

http://www.plmccoy.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/spore/swalanky_02.jpg
http://www.plmccoy.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/spore/swalanky_03.jpg
http://www.plmccoy.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/spore/swalanky_04.jpg
http://www.plmccoy.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/spore/swalanky_05.jpg

I can't wait for this game to get released! Roll on September!

And here's a decent shot of Clawfiend...

http://www.plmccoy.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/spore/clawfiend_01.jpg

[Peter McCoy]

Got myself the full editor, and had some fun with it this evening!

Prometheus wants YOU! (http://www.plmccoy.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/spore/prometheus_10.jpg)

Prometheus Roaring! (http://www.plmccoy.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/spore/prometheus_03.jpg)

Kerfumble (http://www.plmccoy.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/spore/kerfumble_01.jpg)

The eyes! THE EYES!!!! (http://www.plmccoy.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/spore/kerfumble_03.jpg)

I'm hooked.

[stevenvdb]

Heh. Reminds me of building scenarios for D&D campaigns, but not having the opportunity to get others to play -- yet. Can't wait until the full game is released. ;)

[Peter McCoy]

In 9 hours time I will be home with Spore in my hand - gonna pick it up straight after work. I can't wait to play this finally!

[Peter McCoy]

Yes, yes, yes!!! I have it! I have it in my hand right now! Just been over to GAME on my lunch hour. There's an awesome screeniee on the back cover of a cool little buggy. I'm gonna have sooooo much fun this weekend! :)

I'm all giddy - it feels like I've come early!

(Check my custom title before you ostricise me for vulgarity! ;) )

[Dasquian Belargic]

:lol Nice. Let us know how it is - I've been reading a couple of reviews and it sounds promising, though I might have to wait until the price has dropped before picking it up.

[Khendon Sevon]

I should have a free copy coming in the mail...

I <3 EA.

[Callista]

I have been so excited for this game :D But didn't reserve it or probably won't buy it for a bit...I need monies for it first :( and for The Force Unleashed.... Why are they so darn expensive?!?!

I want a free one.

[Peter McCoy]

This game is really enjoyable. I've just completed the creature phase - my brain has reached sentience-capacity now. Even the cell-phase was a lot of fun. It lasted just long enough to be fun without getting old or tedious.

The creature phase just looked gorgeous even without all the settings maxed out. My pack and I were approaching a nest of this weird-looking flying elephantine creatures when all of a sudden there was this weird noise. Then there was a blast followed by a weird light bathing down from above. I look up and what do I see!?

A UFO, abducting the elephantine snack I was about to charge! Awesome - just awesome. Then it zipped off somewhere, and my carnivorous clan of cohorts and I carried on our crafty way to collect DNA samples as well as new evolution parts.

The game lets you develop your species really well - a sort of 'archetype' is generated based on how you play.

During the cell-phase I had a spike and a mouth, so I could wound and eat other microbes. Every evolution point I got was from eating other microbes, so I became a carnivore. The in the creature phase, I was going around attacking everything, making 'em extinct - that developed me into a predatory species. The other two possibilities I could have gone for were social or adaptable. each stage has a similar progression path based on your behaviour during that stage. I can already see my species becoming some intergalactic carnivorous hunting race!

I wonder if another Spore user has created an Arnold Schwarzenegger creature for me to stalk!? :)

I'm ready to move onto the tribal stage, so more later.

[Yog]

I've been playing this as well, if only for a little bit. I really enjoyed the game so far. Really really creative game this and fun to play. I passed the cell phase and now in creature phase, eating some species up, and interacting with others depending on my mood.

[Lilaena De'Ville]

Oh man, I saw this in the store yesterday, a pre-order pack, and held it in my hand before reluctantly putting it back on the shelf. I didn't know it came out today! :lol

[Yog]

Oh man, I saw this in the store yesterday, a pre-order pack, and held it in my hand before reluctantly putting it back on the shelf. I didn't know it came out today! :lol

Tell your reluctant hand to behave, and do the right thing and pick the game up. :p

[Peter McCoy]

I'm sorry to admit this, but after my second day of playing, I'm at the Space stage and I have to say the game is a very big disappointment.

I've spoken to Droo and another friend about it, and while I said I still really liked the game despite its shortcomings, I've been mulling it over the past hour or so and I honestly cannot justify saying that it is a good game.

The features for a great game are all there - being able to customize your creature, their buildings, their vehicles, their ship and eventually their planets. Being able to explore the galaxy as you see fit, interacting with other species, terraforming, looking for rare artefacts on alien worlds, scanning flora and fauna.

But the mechanics ruin it. You can see straight away that a lot of stuff from the original video's were removed.

Cell stage: This section of the game was simple, which is to be expected. As such, it is just long enough to be entertaining without getting tedious. If you're a carnivore, then you want weapons such as spikes. If you're a herbivore, then you want speed so you can evade carnivores. That's pretty much it, and it looks great! No complaints here.

Creature stage: This stage was probably the most fun. You start off as your creature at a nest, surrounded by your species. Then you venture out to explore the local habitat - there are other nests with different species for you to either befriend or eliminate, depending on your disposition. As you destroy/befriend nests you unlock body parts/upgrades, and there are more to be found in bone piles dotted about the place. Every so often your brain gets bigger until you become sentient and form a tribe.

Tribal stage: Boring, if you ask me. You have a village with a town hall and an animal pen behind it. Plus up to 6 more buildings. Your choice of buildings expands as you defeat/alloy with other villages. If you want to ally with a tribe, you have to impress them with didgerydoo's or maracas etc, so you build a respective hut and tell your tribe to grab them, go to the village and Bob's your uncle. Alternatively, build an axe hut, tell everyone to grab an axe and go attack the other tribes. Once all tribes are either annihilated or allied, you can move onto the civilisation phase. The one resource is food.

You can also have spearthrowers or shaman to heal the others. That's it. You can outfit the tribe by customising their attire to a degree. Not many different options available for this though. So thats two different combat units an a healer. Oh and your chief has one or two special abilities as well.

Civilisation stage: So your united tribe becomes a city. You get your City Hall in the center, as well as the ability to place 3 other types of buildings - factories, entertainment and houses. You design each one. Factories increase income or spice (the currency at this stage), entertainment buildings increase happiness (factories decrease it) and houses increase the number of vehicles you can have, as well as somehow balance your happiness levels out. You can build land, sea and air units. But there is only one type of each, which is just boring. You get to design them, but there's no variety at all. You use your land units to claim spice nodes to generate income. Once the other cities have all been claimed or allied with, you move onto the space stage.

I would have liked more resources at both tribal and civi stage. Just food/spice seems a bit too dumbed-down for my liking. And the limited options for military units is quite frustrating, uninspired and boring.

The Space Stage: This is where the game gets extremely annoying and tedious. Once you've designed your spaceship, you have a few tutorial missions to do, then you can do whatever you like - or rather this is where you should be able to do whatever you like. At first, I had the freedom to explore nearby planets, as well as make contact with two other civilisations. I was running missions of exploration and recovery for both my own empire and the neighbours. But then all of a sudden my homeworld is under attack. So I returned home to repel the invaders, passing by a colony I had not long established. I managed to defeat the pirates before being killed. So I quickly repaired and recharged my shi, then desiced to pay my colony a visit. As soon as I left my home system, it was under attack again. Okay, obviously a randomly generated attack. So I repelled that one. Then another, and another, and another - each time I left the system.

It's now gotten to the point where missions that are a few systems away are impossible to do since I cannot even leave my system without getting attacked. And I can't even think about exploring other planets either - I simply don't have the time due to these attacks.

Its the same on the Spore forums - people complaining about never-ending attacks of a dozen ships at a time. Now if the AI can attack with multiple ships, how come I have just the one!? I entered the local space around an enemy system and started getting attacked - couldn't attack back though. So I zoomed in to orbit a planet and the ship was right on my tail - I couldn't attack back. So I zoomed down to the planets surface and was able to attack back finally. But there were too many ships so I retreated to space - still getting shot so I retreated to outer space - still being attacked. So I moved to the next system - still being attacked as I was still in their territory. So I moved to my own system - finally, no more attacking. But then my homeworld is under attack.

I switched the game off right there.

I really can't see myself playing this game tomorrow. Or the day after.

I'll return to it in a few days and see what its like, maybe mess about with the editor, go back to the previous stages and mess about there. My personal opinion is that they've taken a massive scope and emptied it to the point where there's a few little features dotted about and nothing in between. Yes, the editors are great - but I'm not paying £35 just to create a creature/vehicle/ship and then hit the 'share' button. I wouldn't do that for £5, it's not a game. It's a feature. A great feature, but nothing more. The actual gameplay is far too empty. The stages prior to Space are over far too soon and far too simple. And Space itself, while huge and full to the brim with things to explore, you can't actually get to it because your homeworld might get attacked.

One thing people have said is that no matter what race you develop, you'll be fighting when it comes to the space stage, otherwise you're gonna die. I haven't done any terraforming yet but I did mess about with two of the planet-sculpting tools - the level and raise terrain. They have a recharge time of somewhere between 10 and 20 seconds. Why!? It's so annoying to click the tool to activate it, then click on the ground somewhere so that the rocket fires with raises the terrain in a small radius around the impact, then have to wait 20 seconds before you can do it again.

And Droo mentioned something evident in the Creature Creator that was released before the full game. If you don't like the look of the higher-tier body parts, then you're going to miss out on the higher bonuses. I wanted a creature to have a horned nose that looked like a drill-bit or a corkscrew. But that's only a tier 1/2 horn. The tier 3 and 4 horns have better damage stats, but I really hate how they look. So I can either have my creature the way I want it, but be penalised, or go for the better stat and be dissatisfied with how my creation looks. Same with most other body parts really.

A patch or two won't do it for me. This game needs a lot of changes made in order to make it playable beyond the two days I've given it. It's as if the creators we counting on player creation sharing being enough to keep people happy. Well sorry guys, but while its a great idea and can potentially keep the game going, without better gameplay that's not gonna spin.

I can't really type more on it at the moment. I'm just so frustrated. Some of that (probably most of it) may be hard to follow since I jumped about a lot. Just typing as I thought it really.

While my whole weekend was forecasted to be taken up by Spore, tomorrow I'll definitely be playing good-old Resident Evil!

[Peter McCoy]

This is a post from someone on the Spore feedback forum. It pretty much sums up/says what I was trying to say better and quicker :p

The game overall is too simple and lacks a true challenge like "create a working/balanced or simply "better" creature". 90% of the game is style. Which is fun, but it feels unrewarding as the player has so little chance to play the designs.

Cell is satisfying in that regard. here it really pays to change your creature around, some things fail, others work depending on the environment and type of predators. At least on "Hard".

Creature is still nice but too easy and simple. The way that mutations are "found" in bone-piles kinda breaks the whole metaphor.

Tribe sucks as suddenly the creature and its features becomes meaningless, reduced to mere styling. Clothing options are too few and too meaningless again.

Civilization is meaningless crap. Requires one to design 4 buildings and 4 vehicles which you'll hardly come to appreciate up close and could be just some random blocks thrown together (exception is the UFO).

Overall the design choices become too cosmetic and loose nearly all meaning in civ-phase.... very disappointing.

I'd like to have MUCH more twisting and tweaking the creature / buildings / vehicles in every stage of the game. And an option to play at varying detail levels (think of sid meiers civilization), different timeframes, bigger/smaller worlds, more complex "tech tree" etc.

[Yog]

From what I heard, the way to deal with the constant attacks is to make sure each of your cities has the maximum amount of turrets. Later on, you will be able to buy an uber turret, a turret that orbits the planet by itself and flies around shooting at pirates. Once your defenses are maxed, ignore the attacks and do your own thing.

Also, apparently, you are missing out on the terraforming. A friend of mine said the space game sucked, and when he got into terraforming, he loved it.

[Peter McCoy]

I've resorted to using the money cheat to actually be able to afford the main upgrades I've come across. I'm trying to ignore the pirate attacks as much as I can so I can actually play the game as I want to. I've managed to set up a colony on my nearest planetary neighbour. At the moment the atmosphere is too dense to support life so I need to find a Drought Generator to get it ready for plants and animal life. My ship is loaded with a full set of flora and fauna. It's quite good the way terraforming works.

Using either a drought generator or atmospheric generator thickens or thins the atmosphere to a suitable level. But once it has been stabilized, you don't have long before it reverts back to the inhospitable levels, so you have to introduce life to the planet. In order to maintain that T1 atmosphere, you need a full range of plants (a small species, a medium species and a large species) as well as a carnivorous animal species and a herbivorous animal specis. Once introduced, the T1 atmosphere is maintained. Then you can improve it by introducing another full set of flora and fauna, attaining a T2 atmosphere, and then a third set for a T3 atmosphere. I've read you can attain other scores of a higher T-rating, but they are dependent on the starting conditions such as the planets orbital distance from its star, size etc. I think the maximum is T-10. Higher T-scores let you have more extravagant cities.

I really want to be able to develop my own creature and then introduce it to a barren planet. That'd be cool.

Still having fun with the editors - made a cool robot/astronaut-looking spaceship, as well as some cool boats, planes and tanks. The building editor is also fun. But the actual number of buildable stuff is still disappointing. I think I'll end up installing Imperial Galactica 2 - city-planning and starship designing was great in that game.

I'll stick with the space-phase of Spore for the time being - terraforming seems to hold my interest. I just hope the other issues are addressed at some point to make the other phases worthwhile - at the moment I doubt I'll play them again the way they currently are. Once you're in the Space phase, the consequences of the other phases have no real effect on your experience. As a creature I was able to charge and strike and bite - yet as soon as you enter the Tribal phase you can't seem to charge or bite, just use axes to hack at enemies. I won't even bother with Civilisation phase (what a joke). The Space phase - again - previous choices seem moot. Whether you were aggressive or passive, you can still kit your ship out the same way as anyone else.

I don't want to end up repeating myself. Good thing is the space phase is getting funner as I mess about with planets more. But those damn pirates...

[Figrin D'an]

Knowing EA, they probably cut features from the earlier versions of the game in order to sell them as expansion packs later on (ala The Sims and it's 8 billion expansions).

I would have consider buying this game, if not for the horrendous DRM that has been included with it. That, combined with the less than stellar reviews I have read, have pretty much turned me off to this all together.

[Dasquian Belargic]

http://www.metacritic.com/games/platforms/pc/spore

So, metacritic currently has Spore scored at 86/100. A couple of choice quotes from the reviews, both good and bad:

"Spore's triumph is painfully ironic. By setting out to instill a sense of wonderment at creation and the majesty of the universe, it's shown us that it's actually a lot more interesting to sit here at our computers and explore the contents of each other's brains." - PC Gamer UK

"It may not be a perfect game, but truly innovative titles seldom are. Spore is a technological triumph that introduces a whole new way of tapping into a bottomless well of content." - GameSpy

"Electronic Arts and Will Wright send you on a unique journey through Evolution. But it's less of a game and more of a colourful biological construction kit. Spore is sophisticated and rich in details, but all this is rarely noticeable because of its uninspired game play and lack of a story, which is such a pity. It's a paradise for creative gamers, but an expensive one, too. Electronic Arts asks 10 Euros more than usual - that's a rip off." -GameStar

"Spore is a one of a kind videogame. It offers endless possibilities and gives the gamer a game within the game. But in the process of giving you everything you want, EA has forgotten to include some depth and gameplay. As a design program Spore deserves an A+, as a videogame a little less." - Gamer.nl

It seems like predominantly positive reviews from websites so far, though with a lot of emphasis on the fact that some gameplay value is lost at the expense of how... innovative the design aspects are.

I'm hearing people on other forums saying that this will get some Game Of The Year awards... what do we think?

[Peter McCoy]

After over a month I've returned to Spore - the Space phase of course. I've sussed out terraforming now and I'm well on my way to a lush, bustling empire settled on well-developed planets forged from the barren rocks in my neighbourhood of the galaxy.

You progress by earning badges. Different actions earn you different badges, and those badges unlock upgrades for your ship. And the upgrades naturally make things easier for you. My ship is now kitted with all the tools necessary for terraforming, from altering the thickness of a planets atmosphere to its temperature. Previously I had to buy atmosphere/drought generators and meteor storm devices and ice storm devices - but now I have the tech built into my ship on infinite supply - providing my ship has enough energy to run those devices as needed.

Still no sign of the amazing orbital guns, but I think they may be close at hand given how quickly I'm now progressing. As I'm using the money cheat I'm just paying off any demands from hostile empires until I have the fire-power to blitz their backsides. Once I've secured my currently-explored systems, as well as either acquired or conquered the inhabited systems, I'll make my way towards the centre of the galaxy.

And no, Jenny, I don't think it will get Game of the Year. I simply don't think it's good enough for it. I haven't even played Fallout 3 or Farcry 2 yet and I'm pretty sure they'll be better games. In fact, I don't even know what the 'cut-off' date for 2008 GotY is - anybody know? Or is a game released on Dec 31st eligible?

[Dasquian Belargic]

And no, Jenny, I don't think it will get Game of the Year.

Mmm, I'm not surprised. The hype over this died very quickly.