Spore - New Will Wright Game

[Yegolev]

For some reason I installed Black & White again last weekend, probably because I have forgotten most everything about it.  We'll see how that goes.  Early impressions: solid framerate, assy controls.

This is the sort of shit that happens when you have ~500GB of storage on your rig.

[Samwise]

B&W's control scheme takes a little getting used to, but I give them credit for making it feasible to control the entire thing with the mouse, and without having much of a HUD.  Very elegant design, if a bit quirky.

[Margalis]

It looks cool but the scope is too large.

I never got to play the N64 game "cubivore" which this kind of reminds me of. In cubivore you were a creature that ate other creatures and as you ate them you would mutate.

Creating different biological organisms and setting them loose is a game all on it's own. I have trouble believing that the game can be fun from single cell to space hopping alien. I suspect many people will like the first 1/3 (growing a creature from a cell), many people will like the middle 1/3 (rts/city management civilization building) and many people will like the last bit (space) but most people will have a strong preference and the other 2 parts will just sort of be in the way.

I would be very happy just creating creatures, it looks like you can make them pretty wild looking. Especially if you can do online things with them.

[Samwise]

The idea, as I understand it, is that once you finish unlocking all the aspects of the game, you have complete freedom to go back and revisit any other part of the game that you want, from different angles, with every planet in the galaxy available to you as a fresh sandbox.  Sort of like how once you finish the story mode in the Movies you can play with anything you like in the "sandbox" mode.

I too think I'll be spending a lot of time in the creature editor.  Apparently at the UFO levels you can edit plants as well (once you unlock all the gene-splicing tools), and I'm very curious to see how much flexibility there is there - can I design beautiful but deadly carnivorous plants that other unsuspecting players will then download?  That would be all kinds of fun.

[MrHat]

I agree it needs more fun.

But it's still probably the coolest thing I've heard in a long long time.

[Sky]

That game looks cool as shit. I think he really cinched it for me when he started in with the SETI stuff. Sure, it could use a bit more /game/ to it...but this is Will Wright. He makes fun sandboxes (emphasis on fun).

Molyneux is a fucking mess and should retire. B&W was a great sandbox that fell apart when it tried to be a game (second level).

My personal secret super wish for Spore? WW partners with Sid Meier :P Then again, my favorite 'Sim' game was Sid's Sim Golf. Mashunu!

[Paelos]

I like sandboxy type games, but I like them to have an "You win, <cutscene>. You're awesome, want to keep playing (y/n)" moment. That way the goal oriented can bail out while the rest can tinker away with glee until their bucket overflows.