Spore

Mkt2015

2008-09-05 05:39:57 pm

MGS for PS1 forever.

I'm a true fanboy of Spore. I've been a fanboy for the full 4 years that I've had to wait. It is only a mere one day a couple of hours before I can get my hands on it.

Most people and including my co-workers don't grasp why it is that I love the game so much...and it's not even the game, really, but the concept behind it. I heard Will Wright speak of procedurally generated content and the idea that you can make almost any kind of creature you want and see other peoples' creations. It doesn't stop there, however...you can also make any type of building you want, so I'm looking forward to see Dr Seuss style houses and Nightmare Before Christmas structures. The ideas are endless.

It's true that the game is meant for everyone...including everyone who bought a Wii (this is not about Wii bashing...I swear!). It is a game that truly everyone can play and be creative with. I consider myself a hardcore gamer but I'm not the kind of person who goes out and buys the latest shooter or something else that has hype just because of what it is. Haze....nah. GTA IV...no. Call of Duty 4...nu uh. I look at the big picture.

Imagine ... if you could boot up Quake right now and instead of it dropping you right into a map it asked you questions about what kind of gamer you are.

Do you want a long game? Do you consider yourself skilled at shooting? Do you want open-ended maps or maps that have long narrow corridors? Now imagine that based on your choices the game essentially created itself. A window could open up and ask if you want to see a particular door or creature and then you created one and all of a sudden, it's in the game as well as other peoples' creations.

I see this as ... hopefully ... a shift in how games are played and developed. A developer could make an engine that generates a game. I'm sure there'd still be a way to put in cutscenes and story segments... after all Diablo and Diablo 2 create a new game every time and yet still has the same quests and a lot of the same ingame cutscenes/story segments. This would definitely cut down on the time it takes to make a game. I'm not saying that an entire game would have to be generated, but portions of it could be. It would also allow the developers extra time to weed out bugs and extend the life of the game with extra story since they wouldn't have to worry about developing the makeout of individual levels.

Companies like ID and Epic already license out their engines...why not have an engine that generates gameplay?

This also made me think that if this were to happen, SDA would probably have a hard time staying afloat, but yet there are speedruns of Diablo and Diablo 2...hmmm.

Thread title:

I'm a true fanboy of Spore. I've been a fanboy for the full 4 years that I've had to wait. It is only a mere one day a couple of hours before I can get my hands on it.

Most people and including my co-workers don't grasp why it is that I love the game so much...and it's not even the game, really, but the concept behind it. I heard Will Wright speak of procedurally generated content and the idea that you can make almost any kind of creature you want and see other peoples' creations. It doesn't stop there, however...you can also make any type of building you want, so I'm looking forward to see Dr Seuss style houses and Nightmare Before Christmas structures. The ideas are endless.

It's true that the game is meant for everyone...including everyone who bought a Wii (this is not about Wii bashing...I swear!). It is a game that truly everyone can play and be creative with. I consider myself a hardcore gamer but I'm not the kind of person who goes out and buys the latest shooter or something else that has hype just because of what it is. Haze....nah. GTA IV...no. Call of Duty 4...nu uh. I look at the big picture.

Imagine ... if you could boot up Quake right now and instead of it dropping you right into a map it asked you questions about what kind of gamer you are.

Do you want a long game? Do you consider yourself skilled at shooting? Do you want open-ended maps or maps that have long narrow corridors? Now imagine that based on your choices the game essentially created itself. A window could open up and ask if you want to see a particular door or creature and then you created one and all of a sudden, it's in the game as well as other peoples' creations.

I see this as ... hopefully ... a shift in how games are played and developed. A developer could make an engine that generates a game. I'm sure there'd still be a way to put in cutscenes and story segments... after all Diablo and Diablo 2 create a new game every time and yet still has the same quests and a lot of the same ingame cutscenes/story segments. This would definitely cut down on the time it takes to make a game. I'm not saying that an entire game would have to be generated, but portions of it could be. It would also allow the developers extra time to weed out bugs and extend the life of the game with extra story since they wouldn't have to worry about developing the makeout of individual levels.

Companies like ID and Epic already license out their engines...why not have an engine that generates gameplay?

This also made me think that if this were to happen, SDA would probably have a hard time staying afloat, but yet there are speedruns of Diablo and Diablo 2...hmmm.

Lag.Com

2008-09-06 04:10:21 am

sda loyalist

Quote from Mkt2015:

It would also allow the developers extra time to weed out bugs and extend the life of the game with extra story since they wouldn't have to worry about developing the makeout of individual levels.

I had to pick out this passage because it's particularly amusing in the context of Daggerfall. Almost all of the towns, dungeons and names in the game were randomly generated (once), then a few maps hand-edited (like the castles and important dungeons) and then shipped as is. Yet it's still the buggiest game there has ever been, and probably ever will be.

Still, I agree with most of what you've said. I'm quite interested in procedural generation myself, and one of my projects has been a SRPG with randomly generated characters, plotlines and battles. It's definitely a good way for indie developers to head in the future, allowing them to make a game engine relatively quickly then releasing small additions that enhance the capability of the engine.

Siyko

2008-09-08 08:11:13 am

I used to be athiest until I realized I was God.

Spore isn't even close to offering the kind of gameplay you are looking for. It doesn't shatter any conventions behind games, and doesn't really do anything new.

What it is is a quite good set of tools for designing creatures, buildings, and vehicles. Past that, there's four minigames that feel tacked on (cell, creature, tribal, civ stage), and have the gameplay scope of an atari game. The heart of the game is clearly intended to be the space stage, which has very strong design, very ambitious scope, but has enough flaws to be deemed borderline unplayable by me.

If there's one thing I don't understand, it's all the love for the building/vehicle customization. You just design it and plop it down, and there it is. Nothing different happens. If your vehicle has no weapons or 500 guns, it still shoots the same generic energy beams. Whether it has 50 jet engines or a single wheel, it still moves around the ground with the same animation loop. The only creator worth mentioning is the creature creator, which can be neat, but it doesn't take long to lose interest.

I wouldn't say the game is for everyone - it's clearly for casual gamers. I went through the first 4 stages in about 2 hours, and was shaking my head at the space age. Just to name a couple flaws:
-every opponent has hundreds of ships in their fleet, you only have one
-there's no way to tell if the distress call from your colony is a pack of raiders that pose no threat, or a large invasion force about to take over
-the main method of gaining power comes from gaining money which comes from trading spice. There's no way to see what colonies of yours have spice, or the prices available for trading space, so you spend a good chunk of time flying from planet to planet simply looking at information that should be available on a single screen.
-missions simply tell you which star system it is at - which means upon accepting a mission, you often spend a couple minutes mouseovering dozens of stars looking for the right name

there's several more...

it's not an awful game, but it's not a great game, and definetly not a legendary game.

Spore isn't even close to offering the kind of gameplay you are looking for. It doesn't shatter any conventions behind games, and doesn't really do anything new.

What it is is a quite good set of tools for designing creatures, buildings, and vehicles. Past that, there's four minigames that feel tacked on (cell, creature, tribal, civ stage), and have the gameplay scope of an atari game. The heart of the game is clearly intended to be the space stage, which has very strong design, very ambitious scope, but has enough flaws to be deemed borderline unplayable by me.

If there's one thing I don't understand, it's all the love for the building/vehicle customization. You just design it and plop it down, and there it is. Nothing different happens. If your vehicle has no weapons or 500 guns, it still shoots the same generic energy beams. Whether it has 50 jet engines or a single wheel, it still moves around the ground with the same animation loop. The only creator worth mentioning is the creature creator, which can be neat, but it doesn't take long to lose interest.

I wouldn't say the game is for everyone - it's clearly for casual gamers. I went through the first 4 stages in about 2 hours, and was shaking my head at the space age. Just to name a couple flaws:
-every opponent has hundreds of ships in their fleet, you only have one
-there's no way to tell if the distress call from your colony is a pack of raiders that pose no threat, or a large invasion force about to take over
-the main method of gaining power comes from gaining money which comes from trading spice. There's no way to see what colonies of yours have spice, or the prices available for trading space, so you spend a good chunk of time flying from planet to planet simply looking at information that should be available on a single screen.
-missions simply tell you which star system it is at - which means upon accepting a mission, you often spend a couple minutes mouseovering dozens of stars looking for the right name

there's several more...

it's not an awful game, but it's not a great game, and definetly not a legendary game.

armacham

2008-09-08 02:31:26 pm

Yeah spore needs a bit of work, the game is one giant tutorial designed around the creature/vehicle/building designer. Hand holding the entire time, infinite lives, and basically zero consequence for anything you do other than getting a few "abilities" for later in the game depending on whether if you kill the shit out of the other creatures/civilizations or you play nicey or something in between.

I will be happy if they patch it so that in space stage I can hire other space ships, mercenaries, etc to actually take care of things so I dont have to personally handle every little goddam pirate or infected animal. It is way beyond repetitive and annoying when there is some potential for a decent space empire building game. There are devices you can purchase to reduce the likelihood of things or add "uber defense" but there is no indication of whether they will be successful and you are still asked to deal with it every 5 minutes.

Carcinogen

2008-09-09 06:25:03 pm

Well, next time some magazine hails a game as "the greatest video game ever" before it's even released, I know what to avoid.

Emptyeye

2008-09-20 08:07:41 am

Talk to the Hand

Quote from Carcinogen:

Well, next time some magazine hails a game as "the greatest video game ever" before it's even released, I know what to avoid.

You act as though this is the first and only time something like this has ever happened. Almost every big-budget title suffers from this, frankly.

Siyko

2008-09-20 11:09:23 am

I used to be athiest until I realized I was God.

Quote from Emptyeye:

Quote from Carcinogen:

Well, next time some magazine hails a game as "the greatest video game ever" before it's even released, I know what to avoid.

You act as though this is the first and only time something like this has ever happened. Almost every big-budget title suffers from this, frankly.

That's an exaggeration. The only other one I can think of offhand is Daikatana. There have been tons of big-hype games, Sims, Half-life2, Doom3, Diablo2, World of Warcraft, Halo 2, Halo 3, etc... Maybe they're not legendary, but they're still a fun enjoyable game.

tenfoLd

2008-09-20 11:19:25 am

I have to agree with Siyko on his first post that is.

Enterim

2008-09-20 01:08:26 pm

Hmm, purchasing the game and installing it while in the process of updating a computer seems to be a bad idea. If it detects ANY hardware change at all, it needs a reinstall. All 3 used up already. Thanks, EA, for letting me RENT your game.

Siyko

2008-09-20 01:13:56 pm

I used to be athiest until I realized I was God.

Quote from Enterim:

Hmm, purchasing the game and installing it while in the process of updating a computer seems to be a bad idea. If it detects ANY hardware change at all, it needs a reinstall. All 3 used up already. Thanks, EA, for letting me RENT your game.

And this of course is the biggest complaint of all. EA added all of this securom and invasive copy-protection software trying to make sure that pirates had to buy the game to play it. And as ANYBODY in the piracy scene could have EASILY told them, it was all for naught. The pirates were playing the game a week before the legit buyers, and without any invasive software on their computer.

Good job EA. You really showed everyone.

NONOCE

2008-09-22 09:48:09 am

I love YaBB 1G - SP1!

I liked the two first stage then it become a RTS game not even worth Dune 2.

xud9dab2

Edit history:

xud9dab2: 2008-09-22 10:13:04 am

2008-09-22 10:05:04 am

heh heh heh heh heh heh heh heh heh

EA's idea of 'copy protection' backfired. Like a $25.000.000 dollar cannon, because apparently 500.000 people pirated the game

Well I'll be dammed: EA got word of the numbers

RaneofSOTN

2008-09-23 08:12:26 am

I want off the ride....

this is just horrible; I am glad i decided against getting spore. It didn't seem something that i'd like and siyko seems to confirm this. Also with this "legitmate" thing... its just dumb in some cases.

The more you try to stop pirating, the easier it probably gets... I donno I don't condone the thing

I think my family has 4 copys of SC, 3 of D2 n D2:lod and a few other PC games (Jedi outcast) that we played online with each other a lot. And we also each got it cause we all split up ways.... also we deemed the games worth it.

But sorry for going off-topic.

Thanks for your words on Spore Siyko, and I hope that those who get Spore do enjoy the time with it.

Carcinogen

2008-09-23 03:50:25 pm

Quote from Emptyeye:

Quote from Carcinogen:

Well, next time some magazine hails a game as "the greatest video game ever" before it's even released, I know what to avoid.

You act as though this is the first and only time something like this has ever happened. Almost every big-budget title suffers from this, frankly.

Not that this was the first time. I keep falling into the same hole of buying these 'greatest ever' games. RE4, OoT, FFVII, name it.

"Oh surely it MUST be at least engaging if some magazine hails it as greatest ever before it's released!"