by Gongonzabar Farbin - 09.07.06

If you aren’t excited about Spore, well you should be. This is shaping up to be one of the most revolutionary games ever. Coming from gaming legend Will Wright, of The Sims fame, Spore will let you create almost any creature imaginable. Seriously, the starting template for your creature mostly resembles a blob of Silly Putty or Play Doh. Check out this video of the game (pay attention, you might even see gaming legend Robin Williams!). Well for a small price, Maxis and EA have a program that will let you actually purchase a small figurine of your creature. So whenever your friends come over and comment on it, you can be like “Yeah I created it, what have you been doing?” And then your friend will whip out his and he’ll be like “Yeah, that’s right. My civilization will invade your civilization tonight, just wait for it.” And so the fun ensues.
These new figurines just add a whole new dimension of fun to the game. Hopefully, we will see this on other platforms other than the PC. This game would be Wiitastic! The DS could stand to see a port as well. But in the meantime, you should check out these other figurines that people around the web have come out with.
Here’s the few from Scott Rasoomair of VG Cats (September 5th entry)
Figurines Displayed at E3
Another Creature Made by a Joystiq Writer











that game looks awesome…though that figurine above is very disturbing. very disturbing.
…in other news, is it just me or is all the type different on 4cr now? Did someone tinker with the CSS?
Gravitymachine - 09.07.06 8:48 am
I noticed that too, but we are about to go through some “maintenance.” So after that, perhaps it will be fixed again.
Gongonzabar Farbin - 09.07.06 9:01 am
Now I want Spore more then ever! (Go my race of super Elmo’s)
BAINICK - 09.07.06 9:36 am
ign says spore is on its way to the Wii, im so excited!
Alex - 09.07.06 9:38 am
I’ll see your race of super Elmos and raise you an uber Kermit the Frog!
DCSimian - 09.07.06 9:52 am
This game will be a letdown, I promise you that. No disrespect to Will Wright, but the guy shoots super high, and compromises are made on the way there and you end up with a cool but not as amazing as it was hoped game.
666 - 09.07.06 10:05 am
Uhh, in that picture, does the creature have it’s ass over it’s head?
So much for *intelligent* design….
Marc - 09.07.06 10:07 am
And then your friend will whip out his and he’ll be like “Yeah, that’s right. My civilization will invade your civilization tonight, just wait for it.” And so the fun ensues.
Just as a point of clarification, Spore isn’t a multiplayer game. Will Wright instead describes it as “massively single-player,” where data generated from your play is uploaded to the Spore server, and distributed to other worlds as needed. Each player is in a galaxy all his own, so to speak.
Scott Jon Siegel - 09.07.06 10:36 am
I’d really hate to be a creature like in that picture. I’m not a fan of pooping on my own face.
G - 09.07.06 10:39 am
Scott Ramoosair, of VG Cats, made the butt-creature, Marc. Silly goose!
I really like this feature.
“This game will be a letdown, I promise you that. No disrespect to Will Wright, but the guy shoots super high, and compromises are made on the way there and you end up with a cool but not as amazing as it was hoped game.”
I’d have to say Peter Molyneux is MUCH more guilty of that than Will Wright could ever hope to be. And I still love his games. Even Fable. So, I don’t plan to be disappointed.
theoneguy - 09.07.06 10:43 am
You said “small price”, and I realize that the game won’t be out for a while and such, but any idea of how much this is going to cost? 10 bucks? 20 bucks?
Disco - 09.07.06 10:43 am
Oh, and for the record, the game HAS been announced for the DS.
http://www.dsfanboy.com/2006/03/23/will-wright-confims-spore -will-hit-the-ds/
Way back in March. And he also said that Spore will hit “all platforms”, so I presume he means the Wii as well.
Disco - 09.07.06 10:47 am
Rapid Prototyping is not a cheap affair; I am guessing that Maxis will have some kind of amazing deal with a 3D printing facility…or will this be the luxury enjoyed by the upper-middle class?
Pal - 09.07.06 11:35 am
Spore is THE game I’ve been anticipating all year. Maybe even more than Twilight Princess. Now you can get figurines made? Even better!
This is exactly the type of game I’ve been waiting a decade for. I have mixed feelings about it not being multiplayer, but there are some definite advantages of not having to share a galaxy with people who can invest 15 hours a day, or started months before you did. Imaging civilization-scale griefing and you get the idea. Spore seems so tactile, I couldn’t imagine it not coming out for the Wii.
Here are the VGCats comics featuring the unfortunate butt alien:
http://www.vgcats.com/comics/?strip_id=200
http://www.vgcats.com/news/comic_spore_Will.jpg
amanaplan - 09.07.06 11:38 am
FYI, Will Wright has since clarified that they’re only considering other platforms, but nothing has been started or even decided on. Personally, I really hope Spore makes it to something else, cuz all I have is an average laptop.
http://pc.ign.com/articles/724/724248p1.html
Geoff - 09.07.06 12:23 pm
Matt Cassamina has confirmed that game is going to Wii… there’s some magazine article on it too. I think at GoNintendo.
Tony - 09.07.06 12:44 pm
Why would VGcats dad think he made them? What a terrible lie of a story.
NoBullet - 09.07.06 1:53 pm
“Why would VGcats dad think he made them? What a terrible lie of a story.”
What? You make no sense.
“This is exactly the type of game I’ve been waiting a decade for.”
I haven’t been waiting a decade for it, but ever since I first heard about it, I was all for it.
theoneguy - 09.07.06 2:13 pm
Other games that feature creature creation:
Magical Pengel (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magic_Pengel)
Rakugaki Kingdom (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graffiti_Kingdom)
Amazing Island (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amazing_Island)
60Hz - 09.07.06 2:38 pm
HTML version…
Other games that feature creature creation:
Magical Pengel
Rakugaki Kingdom
Amazing Island
60Hz - 09.07.06 2:42 pm
Meh. I can’t get excited about it, despite what I’ve heard and seen, because the whole game design is so nebulous that it’s bound to not be properly polished. Pessimistic prediction: it’ll show huge potential but will disappoint in several key respects, and it’ll be highly innovative, but the innovations won’t be fully or satisfactorily realised.
I’m like a moth to the flame with these megaconcept games, they get me excited but never deliver a solid gaming experience, and I’m always left wondering what else I could’ve spent my £40 on.
Lizard - 09.07.06 3:47 pm
“Scott Ramoosair, of VG Cats, made the butt-creature, Marc. Silly goose!”
I know, that’s what I meant by “So much for *intelligent* design….”.
(I kid, I kid)
Marc - 09.07.06 4:35 pm
“I know, that’s what I meant by “So much for *intelligent* design….”.”
Touché, sir!
“Other games that feature creature creation…”
But not to the extent that Spore is claiming to do. Well, Will Wright’s claiming it, but you know what I mean.
theoneguy - 09.07.06 4:52 pm
‘And then your friend will whip out his and he’ll be like “Yeah, that’s right. My civilization will invade your civilization tonight, just wait for it.” And so the fun ensues.’
Inuendo, FTW.
Joey_v - 09.07.06 6:09 pm
What? You make no sense.
Did you go to VGcats site? His dad asks him if he made the figure. Why would he asked that? That convo never took place!
NoBullet - 09.07.06 6:20 pm
“Why would he asked that?”
Because he’s an artist? Seen the website? There’s a whole comic and everything. d:
theoneguy - 09.07.06 8:17 pm
I guess I’m just not getting it. How is this different then any of Will Wright’s other games that you play for an hour then never touch again?
rainking187 - 09.08.06 1:46 am
I lived for SimCity 2000 PC/SNES, for a long time. I never got into 3000 or 4K or whatever the sequels were. I was also, I admit, into The Sims for a while when it first came out. If Spore is half as good as The Sims or SimCity 2000, you can bet we’ll see (at least for the PC market) expansion packs and other things to fix up whatever might be lacking.
amanaplan - 09.08.06 11:25 am
“I guess I’m just not getting it. How is this different then any of Will Wright’s other games that you play for an hour then never touch again?”
I never touched Will Wright’s other stuff in the first place. It all looks so dreadfully boring!
This doesn’t.
theoneguy - 09.08.06 5:50 pm
“‘And then your friend will whip out his and he’ll be like “Yeah, that’s right. My civilization will invade your civilization tonight, just wait for it.” And so the fun ensues.’
Inuendo, FTW.”
I was wondering when someone was going to point that out.
Xion - 09.08.06 6:36 pm
The Sims has really opened many doors to gaming for a lot of people. It is the best selling PC game of all time. It has sold 6.3 Million Copies. Few games ever get that high.
Sure it may not be the funnest game for us hardcore gamers. But there are a lot of casual or non gamers picking it up and enjoying it.
Gongonzabar Farbin - 09.08.06 7:45 pm