Advance Creation Options
Update: Apr. 29th
Here are concepts for advance options I developed in Flash. Most of the items have additional information when moving one's mouse cursor over them. Please note with the changes to the Spore Forum my Flash mock-ups are now too wide. Also, for some reason they are being indented by about five characters.

It may be that it is defaulting them to a certain size because I made a reduced size Flash mock-up and it adjusted to the same size.

This one is focus around the Creature Editor. Feedback is welcomed.



Non-Flash mock-up. Because of the changes to Spore Forum the embedded Flash images are stretching the post, hiding some of the mock up.


This one is focus around Civilized and Space Fairing races. Feedback is welcomed.


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Update: Added discussion on interface in regards to drag-n-drop method

PacoPaco wrote:

ParadoxJuice wrote:I like the general idea, but there is simply too much of a limit here. Look at GA-I was expecting the adventure editor to be some kind of menu like this, with things to tick off and what not.

We need some kind of drag n drop interface. Maybe it would show us the creatures mind, and we would drag and drop the cards of creatures we want it to hunt, help, etc. Maxis/EA is never gonna release it without that drag n drop style.

Actually, that would be the idea I am working with. This is only a basic concept of what the menu itself looks like. So when a Player selects the detail behavior and goes to pick a certain creature, it would open up the Sporepedia and allow the player to select a creature or multiple creatures at once and click a button that says, "Add this to the list". I might need to add some sort of image or message on this.

But I see your concern. I should mention this on the first post.

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Update: Added discussion on possible ways to handle voice editing of creatures

Voter wrote:How about a call editor in the creature editor? It would be a collection of various animal sounds and a few other sounds. You could choose the pitch of certain sounds, overlap sounds, decide how long certain sounds go and things like that. The sentient's language editor could work similarly except with more human noises and noises you don't find animals making.

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With the new expansion coming up soon I figure I would throw out something in the same vein.

I would like to see advance options when making a creature <in any Stage>. It would be a pop-up box which would have the following. Or something similar to it. Another person, Daegor, already made a mock-up of what that could look like. And I thank Daegor for giving inspiration for me to create this post.

As for the options I would like to see check mark boxes for:
• Always encounter in game
- Any creatures you want to always see in a game
- This applies only to the creator of the creature
• Never encounter in game
- Any creatures you do not want to see in a game, such 'art scene' creations or 'templates'
- This applies only to the creator or any Player with the "Artwork/Templates" set off
• Only encounter in free form games
- For whacky gaming times, i.e. flying toasters and dancing bears
• Creature is able to survive on T0 planets
- This would be for the adventure mode when wanting to add robots,undead,ghost,etc...
• Creature can be a Rogue
- Allows for this creature to be a Rogue creature
• Creature always appears as a Rogue
- This creature will only appear as a Rogue creature
• Creature can be an Epic
- This creature can be an Epic creature
• Creature only appears as an Epic
- This creature will only appear as an Epic creature
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Space Stage:
• This Empire always appears as... <select type>
- This allows the Players to select an archetype for a Space Fairing race
• This Empire always is hostile
• This Empire always is friendly
• This Empire has... <set number of systems>
- This is the number of systems an Empire starts with
- The number can change once the Player encounters them in the Space Stage
• This Empire is... <select either young or old>
- This determines if a race has been around for a short time or long time
New as Feb. 27th:
Additional ideas in regard to Space Fairing race advance options
• History of the Race <select the behavior of the race throughout their evolution>
Cell: - Herbivore - Omnivore - Carnivore
Creature: - Social - Adaptable - Predator
Tribal: - Friendly - Industrious - Aggressive
Civilization: - Religious - Economical - Military
• Space Stage
- Suggested Archetype <can pick another Archetype>
- Number of Systems <AI only/can change once encountered>
- Age of Race <AI only/young or old >
• Preferred Items <select preferred items, game will select certain items if available>
- Spaceship
- City Hall
- House
- Factory
- Entertainment
- Land Vehicle
- Sea Vehicle
- Air Vehicle

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New as Jan. 26th:
Also, all the following could be turned into Tags the Player could just click on:
Creature Archetypes
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Special Tag Options - They assign AI behaviors. <either for the Adventures or in General>
The AI behavior options being:
• Always friendly toward creatures with this tag
• Always hostile toward creatures with this tag
• Hunt creatures with this tag
• Hunt creatures without this tag
• Never attack creatures with this tag
• Avoid creatures with this tag
• Avoid creatures without this tag
• Defend creatures with this tag
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Space Stage:
• Always friendly toward Empires with this tag
• Always hostile toward Empires with this tag
• Attack Empires with this tag
• Attack Empires without this tag
• Never attack Empires with this tag
• Avoid Empires with this tag
• Avoid Empires without this tag
• Defend Empires with this tag
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Note:
I did a search for this and couldn't come up with anybody else discussing it. Though, I do know one person who talked about this and even made a mock screen shot of it. That person being Daegor. Here is that Thread.
Either way, I just wanted to make the point.
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If you like this particular idea, maybe you would also like this other idea:
Asymmetry Button For Editors

A couple days ago I would have been adamant that Spore couldn't handle these sorts of settings. But given the demoed options for SGA, they certainly seem possible.

MinionJoe wrote:A couple days ago I would have been adamant that Spore couldn't handle these sorts of settings. But given the demoed options for SGA, they certainly seem possible.

That's one of the reasons I decide to go with this post. I mean, there looks to be all sort of possibilities with fine tuning gameplay. And it is going to be Player driven.

And something I have been thinking about with the tags. They can also be applied to buildings and vehicles. This would help allow a Player to design a whole civilization. Imagine this, the Player could set up buildings, vehicles, and creatures that would always appear together. So a civilization would have a certain set of building they use and a certain set of vehicles they use. Then with the personality AI adjustments, they can be like how the Player imagine their creation acting.

Alright, just a bump to get people voting and commenting on the idea.

Please feel free to vote and leave comments. Even a comment as simple as, 'good idea, voted' would be appreciated.

Excellent idea, but I have read Daegor's thread and I think the best thing would be to have a mixture of both. I really liked the Space Empire options you suggested.

This is a much need idea ! Stupid Epic Ewoks.

How Bout

Creature only appear as epic
For those single named creatures, like G3NJI's Abas the Abominable

rlk17 wrote:How Bout

Creature only appear as epic
For those single named creatures, like G3NJI's Abas the Abominable

Great idea. I'll add it to the list.

That was on Daegor's list, and was one of my favourites.

US_of_Alaska wrote:That was on Daegor's list, and was one of my favourites.

That's right. Well, either way, it won't hurt to mention it in multiple places. ^_^

Yep I voted..... YESSS!!!! This is needed. I hope this gets added in.

I hope so too! There's a lot of benefits to gameplay if this were to be implemented. That is why I hope people on the form take a look at this thread and the thread by Daegor.

So anybody who like this idea, please vote and make comment. That can be as simple as commenting, "Voting."

Excellent suggestions, Paco. I'm not sure if it should rely on tags added by players, though.

I could almost see like a personality test format being added to the end of a Creature Creator session, where you click on check boxes to select personality traits, and those traits act as their own "official" tags. But perhaps, if you wanted your creature to specifically target another species, or a group of species, perhaps there could be a box where you could load in a Creature card from the Sporepedia, or a Sporecast card filled with creatures you intend to be the prey.

Klokkwork wrote:Excellent suggestions, Paco. I'm not sure if it should rely on tags added by players, though.

I could almost see like a personality test format being added to the end of a Creature Creator session, where you click on check boxes to select personality traits, and those traits act as their own "official" tags. But perhaps, if you wanted your creature to specifically target another species, or a group of species, perhaps there could be a box where you could load in a Creature card from the Sporepedia, or a Sporecast card filled with creatures you intend to be the prey.

Great idea. There could be an option to select a specific creature or creatures instead of just Tags. Maybe even have it set up where certain traits could be selected too. For example, traits like herbivore, omnivore, carnivore, biped, tripod, quadruped, and so on. These would be traits that are defined by the number or types of parts the creature has.

I think a combination would work. So it would appear something like this:
• Hunt creatures with these Tag(s)/Trait(s), <insert or select tags/traits>.
• Hunt these creatures, <select from Sporepedia>.

- The reason I still would keep tags as an option is to allow the Player to create creations in any order. That way a Player does not have to return to a previous creation to update it.
- For example: I create a small creature that avoids a certain species of creatures I like to make. Instead of having to go back and up date the that creation, all I do is to make sure I include the tag of the species it avoids every time I make a new one.

Maybe it could work dynamically, so that when you select a creature to be its natural predator to avoid, then your creature is also added to the predator's prey list.

I'd then go so far as to say the predator/prey list should be stripped when uploading to the Sporepedia, or there'll be a 6-million creature ecosystem to contend with. Which would be cool, but at this point... chaotic.